Determination of total arsenic concentrations in nails by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry |
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Authors: | Kuei-Ling Belinda Chen Chitra J Amarasiriwardena David C Christiani |
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Institution: | (1) Department of Environmental Health, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA;(2) Channing Laboratory, Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, MA |
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Abstract: | The analysis of trace elements in biological samples will extend our understanding of the impact that environmental exposure
to these elements has on human health. Measuring arsenic content in nails has proven useful in studies evaluating the chronic
body burden of arsenic. In this study, we developed methodology with inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS)
for the determination of total arsenic in nails. We assessed the utility of the washing procedures for removing surface contamination.
Four types of preanalysis treatments (water bath, sonication, water bath plus sonication, and control) after sample decomposition
by nitric acid were compared to evaluate the digestion efficiencies. In addition, we studied the stability of the solution
over 1 wk and the effect of acidity on the arsenic signal. Arsenic content in the digested solution was analyzed by using
Ar-N2 plasma with Te as the internal standard. The results suggest that washing once with 1% Triton Χ-100 for 20 min for cleaning
nail samples prior to ICP-MS analysis is satisfactory. Repeated measurement analysis of variance revealed that there was no
significant difference among the various sample preparation techniques. Moreover, the measurements were reproducible within
1 wk, and acidity seemed to have no substantial influence on the arsenic signal. A limit of detection (on the basis of three
times the standard deviation of the blank measurement) of 7 ng As/g toenail was achieved with this system, and arsenic recoveries
from reference materials (human hair and nails) were in good agreement (95–106% recovery) with the certified/reference values
of the standard reference materials. ICP-MS offers high accuracy and precision, as well as highthroughput capacity in the
analysis of total arsenic in nail samples. |
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Keywords: | Arsenic nails inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometer (ICP-MS) washing efficiency extraction efficiency |
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