When I go to a museum and stare at the wondrous paintings, rarely do it think of science. I find myself enamored in the artistic strokes of the piece, following the paints of Van Gough or Monet all across the texture canvas surface. What I realized after this day was that this would not be possible without science– and pretty technical science for that matter.
This is the Getty imaging a mummy to help preserve it.
This guy who gave us the lecture was interesting.
Giacomo Chiari from the Getty museum came to lecture us about the scientific work that he does. He is able to utilize microscope technologies to penetrate a painting without even touching the surface. Waves are able show Giacomo what painting are made out of. For example, this is practical when examining an old painting with red paint in it. It could be paint made of multiple different materials- each which reflects light or waves differently. With a machine, one can identify correctly the type of paint used at the time which lets a restorer fix the painting correctly.
Also, Giacomo uses alterations in light to see hidden textures in painting. Using a spatial light modulator, one is able to focus a light from different angles to see varying contrasting on the surface of the painting. With this, one can read texts that have been faded out or see texture (such as cracks or brush stokes) not see to the human eye.
Also what I thought was interesting was how at the Getty, they blast light on the surface of paintings to see how much light they can withstand before they are faded. This can help a curator to choose certain spaces to display a certain piece of art. See, this is something I would have never thought about in a museum before until this lecture. 
http://www.oldhouseweb.net/how-to-advice/painting-historic-interiors.shtml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spatial_light_modulator
http://www.getty.edu/conservation/
http://www.getty.edu/conservation/science/lighting/index.html
http://www.mfa.org/collections/sub.asp?key=44&subkey=94