Word: fusarium
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Dates: during 2006-2006
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...what introduced the fungus to the cave. Isabelle Pallot-Frossard, director of the LRMH, says that the presence of formaldehyde--used for decades as a foot wash to prevent fungal infections--may have killed off many other organisms present in Lascaux that might have prevented the explosion of fusarium. "The fusarium strains we found in the cave are extremely resistant to formaldehyde, unlike strains from elsewhere," says Pallot-Frossard. "It didn't come from outside, but had been there all along. All it needed was a slight modification in climate to take...
...take off it did. At first Godin's team sprayed the mold with an alcohol solution of Vitalub, a common ammonium disinfectant. But the fusarium appeared unscathed: scientists later learned that it lived in diabolical symbiosis with a bacterium, Pseudomonas fluorescens, which was degrading the fungicide. So the restorers added antibiotics to the mix in which they soaked bandages to plaster the lower walls of the cave. Tons of quicklime, which kills fungus but also temporarily raised the cave's ambient temperature, was spread on the floor. Since the worst of the infection has been brought under control, the team...
...fungus outbreak, anyone determined and patient enough could successfully petition the authorities for permission to visit the real thing. The only precaution was a requirement that visitors walk through a trough of formaldehyde solution--the regimen that Pallot-Frossard of the LRMH suggests may have inadvertently enabled the fusarium to flourish...
...caused irreversible damage to the paintings, but others disagree. Laurence Leaute-Beasley, a Franco-American who led art tours into Lascaux from 1982 to 2001 and formed the International Committee for the Preservation of Lascaux in 2004, says one knowledgeable visitor to the cave in April not only saw fusarium on the paintings but also noticed a grayish tinge to formerly black surfaces where growths had been removed. When the quicklime was removed from the cave over the course of last year, so too was what was left of the soil--which could affect the cave's climate and humidity...
Lascaux's keepers are no longer using chemicals to eradicate fusarium; gone are the antibiotic patches and the quicklime. Geneste sees a few tiny insect colonies as evidence that a new ecological balance is taking shape, and there is talk of reopening Lascaux next year to a carefully restricted numbers of visitors. But that won't be the test of whether Lascaux has imparted a lasting lesson of humility to its custodians. Whether that lesson sticks will be determined by future generations. It will be a terrible indictment of this one if it does...