Corrosion studies with PIXE

To investigate the possible causes of corrosion of some of the tooth paste tubes of a major international cosmetic product manufacturer, the elemental compositions of corroded and clean unused tubes were compared, using PIXE. It was observed that some of the corroded tubes contained much higher amounts of Ti, Fe, Ga and Zn than the clean tubes, while the concentrations of Cr and Ni showed no significant difference between the two types of tubes. Only certain regions of one of the tubes were found to contain higher concentrations of Cu. Those regions were badly corroded and had the highest concentrations of Ti, Fe, Ga and Zn, too. It is suggested that the presence of higher amounts of Ti, Fe, Ga and Zn, and especially of Cu, in the aluminium sheets used to manufacture the tooth paste tubes, may be one of the reasons for the corrosion of some of the tooth paste tubes. (orig.)