Shards of ancient Athenian pottery sit on a gray tabletop

Brendan Foran of the Physical Sciences Laboratories at The Aerospace Corporation and a co-principal investigator for the project, directed the effort to collect high-resolution images of morphological and microstructural features in the ceramic slips using scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) of extremely thin samples prepared by focused ion beam (FIB) milling.

The resulting high-angle annual dark-field images, nanobeam electron diffraction, and energy-dispersive X-ray analyses yielded information about density, crystalline phase, and chemical makeup of components within the gloss, providing details about the preparation and firing conditions used to create the decorated vessel.

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