Metabolomics and metagenomics analysis of 18th century archaeological silk

The aim of this study was to analyze the microbial and metabolomic diversity in samples of archaeological silk (18th century) originating from the burial crypts in the church of St. Francis of Assisi in Krakow. The study exploited the latest research techniques (high-throughput sequencing on Illumina platform and 109Ag SALDI analysis (surface-assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry on silver nanoparticle enhanced target) and LARESI MS (laser ablation-remote-electrospray ionization-selected reaction monitoring-mass spectrometry imaging). The applicability of the innovative LARESI MSI method for studying the degradation products of silk directly from the sample surface, was verified. In addition, silk microscopy analysis using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) was done to compare the damage of, archaeological, modern and restored 18th century silk.