US scientists say they've classified the composition profiles of sixty-two modern sculptures in what may be a way to identify, date, and authenticate sculptures, according to the UPI.

Researchers from Northwestern University and the Art Institute of Chicago said their accomplishment marks the first comprehensive survey of the alloy composition of a large number of cast-bronze sculptures by major European artists from the first half of the twentieth century.

The sculptures studied, from the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, included works by Matisse, Picasso, Renoir, and Rodin, among other masters.

The research team, led by Marcus Young while a postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Northwestern professor David Dunand, used a form of optical emission spectroscopy to determine the metal composition of the sixty-two bronze sculptures cast in Paris.

“By expanding the . . . database of objects studied, these material correlations may become useful for identifying, dating, or possibly even authenticating other bronzes that do not bear foundry marks,” the authors said.

The research, which included professors James Krebs, Margie Krebs, and Joseph Lambert, as well as Francesca Casadio and Susie Schnepp of the Art Institute, appears online in the journal Analytical & Bioanalytical Chemistry.