In the last years, the price of several collectible comic books reached the record value of millions of dollars. Since the value of collectible comic books is strictly related to their state of preservation, specialized rating agencies certificate their quality and condition, and for the same reason comics books are commonly encapsulated in sealed containers or bags for preservation and protection. Nonetheless, recent studies regarding micro-climate frames for the exhibition or storage of artworks as paintings suggest that the storage of any composite object made of organic materials in a sealed environment could lead to the presence of a significant concentration of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in the enclosed micro-climate, that can be related to unexpected degradation pathways, or to an increase in the ageing rate of materials. In this study, we characterized the volatile organic compounds (VOCs) emitted by comic books stored in archival bags for the first time in the literature. In particular, we analyzed the VOCs emitted by comic books printed in the last six years by the same publisher.

We applied solid phase micro extraction (SPME) to characterize the VOCs profile inside archival bags containing comic books by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS). The semi-quantitative data obtained on more than 60 individual VOCs were elaborated by principal component analysis (PCA) allowing us to highlight a variation in the profiles of the emissions of the series of comics books printed from 2012 to 2018 and stored in sealed archival bags immediately after the purchase.

Select ion flow tube mass spectrometry (SIFT-MS) was also used to obtain quantitative results in real time, as an alternative to the SPME sampling step. This study represents the first reported application of SIFT-MS in heritage science.

The study contributed to identify VOC profiles and molecular markers that can be used to study the emission of comic books in sealed bags, and can ultimately be correlated to the degradation processes of the materials used in their production.

在过去的几年中，几本收藏漫画书的价格达到了创纪录的数百万美元的价值。由于可收藏漫画书的价值与它们的保存状态严格相关，因此专门的评级机构对漫画书的质量和状况进行认证，并且出于同样的原因，漫画书通常被封装在密封的容器或袋子中以进行保存和保护。尽管如此，最近有关陈列或存放艺术品作为绘画的微气候框架的研究表明，由有机材料制成的任何复合物体在密封环境中的存放，都可能导致大量挥发性有机化合物（VOC）的存在。在封闭的微气候中，这可能与意外的降解途径或材料的老化速率增加有关。在这项研究中，我们首次对文献中存储在档案袋中的漫画书所散发的挥发性有机化合物（VOC）进行了表征。特别是，我们分析了同一出版商最近六年印刷的漫画所散发的挥发性有机化合物。

我们应用固相微萃取（SPME）通过气相色谱/质谱（GC / MS）来表征包含漫画书的档案袋内的VOCs轮廓。通过主成分分析（PCA）详细阐述了从60多个单独的VOC中获得的半定量数据，这使我们能够突出显示从2012年到2018年印刷并保存在密封档案袋中的一系列漫画书的排放量变化情况。购买后立即使用。

选择离子流管质谱法（SIFT-MS）还可以实时获取定量结果，作为SPME采样步骤的替代方法。这项研究代表了SIFT-MS在遗产科学领域的首次报道应用。

这项研究有助于确定VOC轮廓和分子标记，可用于研究密封袋中漫画的散发，并最终与它们生产中使用的材料的降解过程相关。