12. How do you know that the flax fibers were not involved in image formation?

13. Are there any other ways than radiocarbon to date the Shroud of Turin?
14. What could be observed about image properties by looking at the damage from the fire of 1532?
15. What options for future scientific study of the Shroud's history and image were lost as a result of the "restoration" of 2002?
16. What are the optical and physical properties of flax fibers (linen)?
17. What Shroud image properties have been observed objectively by scientific methods?
18. Can the presence of a "bioplastic polymer" coating anywhere on the Turin Shroud be confirmed? Could it affect the radiocarbon age determination?
19. Could a "bioplastic polymer" affect the radiocarbon age of the Shroud of Turin?

1. How do you know that the image on the Shroud of Turin was not painted?
2. How do you know that there is real blood on the Shroud?
3. How do you know that the image was not produced by radiation?
4. How do you know that the image was not a scorch? How do you know that most of the Shroud had not been heated enough to start decomposition?
5. How do you know that the radiocarbon sample was not valid for dating the Shroud of Turin?
6. How do you know that the fire of AD 1532 did not start a long-term autocatalytic decomposition of the Turin Shroud?
7. Why are there bands of different colored linen throughout the Shroud, and what do they prove about image formation mechanisms?
8. How fast does cellulose (linen) decompose (produce a color) compared with the impurities found on the Shroud of Turin?
9. How is it possible to get image only on the topmost surface of the cloth of the Turin Shroud?
10. Can some simple, natural process explain a doubly-superficial image?
11. How fast does a human body begin to decompose, and what are the products?

 

Answer to # 12:

Prof. Alan Adler of Western Connecticut University found that the image color could be reduced with a diimide reagent, leaving colorless, undamaged linen fibers behind. This confirmed spectral data that indicated that the image color was a result of complex conjugated double bonds; however, it proved that image color was found only on the outer surfaces of colored image fibers. Until this time, we had assumed that the image color was a result of chemical changes in the cellulose of the linen. The most likely change would involve the dehydration of the cellulose to produce conjugated-double-bond systems Adler's observations proved that the cellulose was not involved in image formation. This is an extremely important observation.

This fact was confirmed by the observation that the image color on some fibers had been stripped off of their surfaces by the adhesive of the sampling tapes. The photomicrograph shows the places where two fibers were pulled out of the adhesive leaving their colored coating behind. The coating is too thin to measure accurately with a standard microscope; however, it appears to be 200-600 nanometers thick (in the range of a wavelength of visible light).

The bands of color and the fact that all of the image color appears only on the outer surfaces of the fibers, suggested that image formation involved a thin layer of impurities. Because the cellulose was not colored, the impurities had to be significantly less stable than cellulose.

This also suggested that the impurities were the result of cloth-production methods, and they should appear on all parts of the cloth. A search for carbohydrate impurities on the Shroud confirmed McCrone's detection of some starch fractions. Starch and low-molecular-weight

carbohydrates from crude starch would color much more easily than would cellulose as a result of either thermal dehydration or chemical reactions.

Any image-formation mechanism that would result in color formation inside the linen fibers must be rejected. Some "theories" that have been mentioned that would cause coloration inside fibers are penetrating radiation, high temperature scorching (hot statue, painting with a torch, etc.), and catalyzed dehydration of the cellulose. Image fibers are colored only on their surfaces.

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Shroud Story  

© 2004 Daniel R. Porter, Bronxville, New York