Course Leader: David Martín Freire-Lista
Home Institution: Universidade de Tras os Montes e Alto Douro (UTAD) Portugal.
Course pre-requisite(s): This course is focused on students and professionals of architecture, archaeology, restoration, and cultural heritage. It is especially focused on built heritage.
Characterisation Techniques of Heritage Stones Course will be focused in heritage stone petrological and petrophysical characterisation; provenance of heritage stones and selection of qualified stones for construction and/or heritage substitution; analysis of heritage stone decay (causes, processes, mechanisms and degree) and heritage stones durability and quality assessment.
The use of analytical techniques will guarantee the quality and durability of a sustainable restoration. Scientific research, with the proposed diagnostic techniques, play a key role in safeguarding the built heritage.
Concepts such as sustainability, environmental education, revaluation and citizen participation must go hand in hand with research, development, teaching and employment.
By the end of this course students should be able to synthesize information from results obtained by the most important analytical techniques in the characterisation of stones of the built heritage. In addition, they will be able to identify pathologies and interpret diagnoses of stone deterioration.
The teaching programme will have a total of 42 hours (Theoretical and practical). It will be divided into three blocks. The first will deal with non-destructive techniques (NDT) used to diagnose the building stones decay:
1.1 Surface microhardness.
1.2 Micro-roughness.
1.3 Ultrasonic pulse velocities.
1.4 Colorimetry.
The second block will deal with destructive techniques used to diagnose the building stones decay.
2.1 Calculation of water properties.
2.2 Porosity accessible to water.
2.3 Apparent density.
2.4 Capillary absorption.
2.5 Porosity accessible to mercury.
The third block will deal with practical cases where different characterisation techniques have been applied:
3.1 - Granite as traditional building stone and the influence of capillary absorption on durability.
3.2 - Granite scaling evaluated by measuring the ultrasonic pulse velocity (Vp).
3.3 - Aging tests on granites.
3.4 - Leucogranite from the Penaboa quarry (A Coruña, Spain) and the mason marks in Romanesque Churches of Portugal: determination of accessible pores, bulk density and hydric properties.
3.5 - Contribution of petrographic microscopy to the sepulchral complex of Fernán Pérez de Andrade in the Church of San Francisco, Betanzos, A Coruña (Spain).
3.6 - Sao Tiago de Folhadela Church: Deterioration by oxidation of pyrite in granite in churches of North Portugal.
3.7 - Micro-roughness to determine the different types of decay in the Stones of Paseo del Prado fountains, Madrid, Spain.
3.8 – Influence of porosity (determined by MIP) in the durability of the gypsum of Risco de las Cuevas of Perales de Tajuña, Madrid, Spain.
3.9 - Stone preservation in archaeological sites: examples from Guarrazar (Toledo, Spain), Touças (Sabrosa, Portugal), and Dolmen Alto do Cotorino (Portugal).
In addition, two field visits will be made to the main historical quarries in A Coruña and to the main monuments to study their deterioration.
Three instructional approaches will be used during the course (lectures, seminars, cabinet practices and field trips).
The teacher will need a room with a projector to present his classes with Power point presentations.
The teacher will provide the necessary equipment for the practices of the course, such as: optical microscope, thin films, ultrasound propagation velocity meter... Students must download a colorimetry mobile application to calculate the chromatic parameters.
For field trips, students are recommended to wear sun protection and comfortable clothing.
The course will deal with topics already published in different scientific articles. Recommended readings are the following scientific articles:
- Freire-Lista, D.M. 2021. The Forerunners on Heritage Stones Investigation: Historical Synthesis and Evolution. Heritage 4, 1228-1268. https://doi.org/10.3390/heritage4030068
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Fort, R., 2019. Historical City Centres and Traditional Building Stones as Heritage: the Barrio de las Letras, Madrid (Spain). Geoheritage 11 (1): 71-85. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12371-018-0314-z.
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Fort, R., 2017. Stone provenance and conservation of the Trinitarias Descalzas and San Ildefonso convent, Madrid (Spain). Geo-Conservación ISSN: 1989-8568. 1 (11): 25-33. EID: 2-s2.0-85021893577.
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Fort, R., 2017. Exfoliation microcracks in building granite. Implications for anisotropy. Engineering Geology 220: 85-93. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enggeo.2017.01.027 I.F: 2.196.
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Fort, R., Varas-Muriel, M.J., 2016. San Pedro leucogranite from A Coruña, Northwest of Spain: Uses of a heritage stone. Energy Procedia 97: 554-561. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.egypro.2016.10.075
-Freire-Lista, D.M., and Fort, R., 2016. The Piedra Berroqueña region: candidacy for Global Heritage Stone Province status. Geoscience Canada 43 (1): 43-52. DOI10.12789/geocanj.2015.42.076 I.F: 1.225.
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Fort, R., 2016. Causes of scaling on bush-hammered heritage ashlars: Madrid’s Plaza Mayor (Spain), a case study. Environmental Earth Sciences journal 75:932. DOI10.1007/s12665-016-5688-0.
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Fort, R., Varas-Muriel, M.J., 2016. Thermal shock-induced microcracking in building granite. Engineering Geology 203: 83-93. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enggeo.2016.03.005 I.F: 2.196.
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Fort, R., Varas-Muriel, M.J., 2015. Freeze-thaw fracturing in building granites. Cold Regions Science and Technology 113: 40-51. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2017.09.049
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Gomez-Villalba, L.S., Fort, R., 2015. Microcracking of granite feldspar during thermal artificial processes. Periodico di Mineralogia 84 (3): 519-537. I.F: 0.600.
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Fort, R., Varas-Muriel, M.J., 2015. Alpedrete granite (Spain). A nomination for the “Global Heritage Stone Resource” designation. Episodes 38 (2):106-113. https://doi.org/10.18814/epiiugs/2015/v38i2/006 I.F: 3.263.
- Freire-Lista, D. M. 2020. Geotourism from Fuente de Cibeles of Madrid. History, Building Stones and Quarries. Cadernos do Laboratorio Xeolóxico de Laxe. Revista de Xeoloxía Galega e do Hercínico Peninsular, 42: 69–94. https://doi.org/10.17979/cadlaxe.2020.42.0.7286
-Freire-Lista, D.M., 2019. Comparación de propiedades petrográficas y petrofísicas de tres fragmentos escultóricos para determinar su pertenencia al sepulcro de Nuno Freire de Andrade II (siglo XIV). Cadernos do Laboratorio Xeolóxico de Laxe, Revista de Xeoloxía Galega e do Hercínico Peninsular, 40:215-228. https://ruc.udc.es/dspace/handle/2183/21910
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Fort, R., Varas-Muriel, M.J., 2017. Ruta Geomonumental por Manzanares el Real (Madrid). Geogaceta. 62: 107–110. ISSN: (Internet): 2173-65455. EID: 2-s2.0-85042030983
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Fort, R., 2017. Historical Quarries, Decay and Petrophysical Properties of Carbonate Stones Used in the Historical Center of Madrid (Spain). AIMS Geosciences. 3 (2): 284-302 DOI: 10.3934/geosci.2017.2.284
-Freire-Lista, D.M., 2016. Aportación de la petrología al conjunto sepulcral de Fernán Pérez de Andrade en la Iglesia de San Francisco de Betanzos, A Coruña. Galicia (NW España). Anuario Brigantino. 38: 351–364. ISSN: 1130-7625
https://anuariobrigantino.betanzos.net/AB2015PDF/351_364_david_martin_petrologia_sepulcro_andrade_Anuario_Brigantino_2015.pdf
-Freire-Lista, D.M., Greif, V., Álvarez de Buergo, M. and Fort, R., 2015. Gypsum Decay Simulation: Risco de las Cuevas Case Study, Madrid, Spain. Engineering Geology for Society and Territory. 8: 86–90 In: Lollino G., Giordan D., Marunteanu C., Christaras B., Yoshinori I., Margottini C. (eds) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-09408-3_86
The evaluation will be divided into the theoretical part and the practical part. The evaluation will be a learning process for the students as well as for the teachers and the institution.
The evaluation will have two main objectives: to analyze to what extent the objectives have been met to detect possible flaws in the process and overcome them and, second, to encourage students to reflect on their own learning process. To achieve these objectives, the evaluation will be:
Participatory – The students will participate in it.
Complete –The evaluation will cover all the important steps of the teaching-learning process.
Continuous –The evaluation will be throughout the course– it will not be at the end of the course.