2. Aging cellulose and paper

As defined in the introduction to this article by Fayolle and Verdu in [AM3150] , ageing is a phenomenon of slow, irreversible change in the structure and/or composition of a material due to its own instability, interaction with the environment (light, pollution, etc.) or mechanical stress.

Here, paper degradation is approached from a chemical point of view, and exclusively through the mechanisms of ageing as they occur under usual ambient conditions (natural hygrothermal ageing) or under standardized artificial ageing conditions (temperatures not exceeding 105°C...