Analysis of Some Metals in Human Hair by the AAS Method

Abstract

The essential and toxic elements are contained in drinking water, food and the air - in the entire general human surrounding. Considering the effects of these elements on human health, the recommended/allowed levels of their intake into the organism are defined by the national and international regulations. Those levels are an important indicator of the state an organism is, which is determined by different biological samples of human origin. In this work, the determination of the concentrations of metals was performed on human hair samples of the people living on the area of Kiseljak. The metal levels that were established in the hair were of those essential metals (copper, zinc, calcium, magnesium, iron) and of two toxic metals (chromium and cadmium). The human hair sampling was carried out during the period of November 2014. - February 2015. The group of responders was male and female donors of various ages, (2-66 years old). By the examination of the results, the specifications that were taken into consideration were the following: age and gender of the hair donor, chemical treatment of the hair, smoking habits of the donors. The technique that was applied for determining the concentration of the heavy metals in the samples was the atomic absorption spectrometry (AAS). The final results showed a normal and in some cases increased, concentration of essential metals. The content of Cr and Cd in all analyzed samples was below the limit of quantification of used technique.