After only four months, the conservation work of the collection of university theses of the TU Ilmenau was completed. A total of 6,500 dissertations and post-doctoral theses, which were written between 1953 and 1992 at what was then the Ilmenau University of Electrical Engineering and later the Ilmenau Technical University, have thus been secured for the long term. Last year, the university library received 130,000 euros in funding from the federal government and the state of Thuringia for the restoration and conservation work.
In September 2020, the TU Ilmenau awarded the contract for the refurbishment of the 6,500 dissertations and post-doctoral theses to a specialist company, specialised in deacidification processes of wood-containing paper. Not all of the publications were bound works; a large proportion were in the form of scrapbooks of individual sheets, while others were large-format writings, collections of photographs or publications on special papers and microfilms.
Before the writings could be restored, they first had to be sifted and cleaned. In an elaborate process, metal staples were then removed, missing parts and tears closed and pages smoothed. All publications that consisted of single leaves were bound in covers or booklets. Material that was not suitable for binding was stored in specially made cassettes.
The preservation of some of the university publications proved particularly problematic. The use of groundwood pulp as a raw material in paper production, which was common since industrial production until 1990, introduced a so-called acid sizing into the paper. In the long run, however, this acid led to the dreaded acid corrosion: the paper turns yellow, becomes brittle and disintegrates. The endangered writings of the TU Ilmenau therefore had to be subjected to a deacidification process for their lasting preservation. The environmentally friendly method neutralises the acid and thus stops the decay of the paper. Recently, the collection of university publications of the Ilmenau University of Technology has been returned to its place in the university library.
The realisation of the project was made possible by funding from the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media and the Coordination Office for the Preservation of the Written Cultural Heritage.