Christmas came early to theMonitorCenter this year. We were recently able to purchase a refurbished Bruker Tracer III-SD portable XRF (x-ray fluorescence). We have been able to borrow one of these devices from Bruker in the past, and it is a fabulous piece of analytical equipment. You may remember thatwe talked about using one on the condenser tanka few months ago. Through non-destructive testing, which conservators are a big fan of, this machine will tell you the elements present in your sample, or in our case, artifact. There are some limitations, but it works really well with identifying metals. I had the chance to use the XRF less than a week after its arrival in the lab for just this purpose on a spoon I am currently treating.