scispace - formally typeset
Search or ask a question
Journal ArticleDOI

Mercury in human hair and blood samples from people living in Wanshan mercury mine area, Guizhou, China: an XAS study.

TL;DR: Inorganic mercury is the major mercury species in hair samples, while inorganic and methyl mercury are both about 50% of total mercury in RBC and serum samples, which is in agreement with the data obtained by acidic extraction, fractionation of Hg(2+) and CH(3)Hg(+) and quantification by ICP-MS.
About: This article is published in Journal of Inorganic Biochemistry.The article was published on 2008-03-01. It has received 17 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Mercury (element).
Citations
More filters
Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The questions surrounding hair analysis are addressed with specific intent of discovering what hair concentrations can actually relate to in a biogenic sense, and why and how elements are incorporated into hair and their meaning.
Abstract: Hair analysis receives a large amount of academic and commercial interest for wide-ranging applications. However, in many instances, especially for elemental or ‘mineral’ analysis, the degree of success of analytical interpretation has been quite minimal with respect to the extent of such endeavors. In this critical review we address the questions surrounding hair analysis with specific intent of discovering what hair concentrations can actually relate to in a biogenic sense. This is done from a chemistry perspective to explain why and how elements are incorporated into hair and their meaning. This includes an overview of variables attributed to altering hair concentrations, such as age, gender, melanin content, and other less reported factors. Hair elemental concentrations are reviewed with regard to morbidity, with specific examples of disease related effects summarized. The application of hair analysis for epidemiology and etiology studies is enforced. A section is dedicated specifically to the area of population studies with regards to mercury, which highlights how endogenous and exogenous incorporation relies on species dependant metabolism and metabolic products. Many of the considerations are relevant to other areas of interest in hair analysis, such as for drug and isotopic analysis. Inclusion of a table of elemental concentrations in hair should act as a valuable reference (298 references).

153 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: A review of analytical speciation methods developed for: the determination of oxidation states; organometallic compounds; coordination compounds; metal and heteroatom-containing biomolecules, including metalloproteins, proteins, peptides and amino acids; and the use of metal-tagging to facilitate detection via atomic spectrometry as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: This is the fourth Atomic Spectrometry Update (ASU) to focus specifically on developments in elemental speciation and covers a period of approximately 12 months from January 2011. The International Union for Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) has evaluated speciation and provided a definition as follows: “speciation analysis is the analytical activity of identifying and/or measuring the quantities of one or more individual chemical species in a sample; the chemical species are specific forms of an element defined as to isotopic composition, electronic or oxidation state, and/or complex or molecular structure; the speciation of an element is the distribution of an element amongst defined chemical species in a system.” This review therefore deals with all aspects of the analytical speciation methods developed for: the determination of oxidation states; organometallic compounds; coordination compounds; metal and heteroatom-containing biomolecules, including metalloproteins, proteins, peptides and amino acids; and the use of metal-tagging to facilitate detection via atomic spectrometry. The review does not cover operationally defined ‘speciation’, which is correctly termed fractionation. As with all ASU reviews1–6 the coverage of the topic is confined to those methods that incorporate atomic spectrometry as the measurement technique. However, in the spirit of meeting the needs of the subject, material is incorporated that is not strictly “atomic spectrometry” but the separation or sample introduction technique used could also be coupled with an atomic spectrometry detector. For the most part, such procedures are those in which some form of molecular MS is used for speciation measurements. As the content of this Update shows, the field is now maturing as evidenced by the extent to which the speciation of particular elements or technique combinations have been the subject of review articles. However, it is becoming increasingly difficult to ascertain the analytical details of the methodologies applied in speciation analysis, particularly where the paper is published in an ‘application’ based journal.

73 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Results show that Se at higher exposure levels would significantly inhibit the absorption and transportation of Hg when Hg(2+) levels are higher than 1mg/L in culture media, and elemental imaging using μ-SRXRF shows that Se could inhibit the accumulation and translocation of HG in garlic.

70 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Exposure to a mixture of ubiquitous chemicals at concentrations found in human amniotic fluid affect thyroid hormone-dependent transcription, gene expression, brain development and behaviour in early embryogenesis, suggesting that ubiquitous chemical mixtures could be exerting adverse effects on foetal human brain development.
Abstract: Thyroid hormones are essential for normal brain development in vertebrates. In humans, abnormal maternal thyroid hormone levels during early pregnancy are associated with decreased offspring IQ and modified brain structure. As numerous environmental chemicals disrupt thyroid hormone signalling, we questioned whether exposure to ubiquitous chemicals affects thyroid hormone responses during early neurogenesis. We established a mixture of 15 common chemicals at concentrations reported in human amniotic fluid. An in vivo larval reporter (GFP) assay served to determine integrated thyroid hormone transcriptional responses. Dose-dependent effects of short-term (72 h) exposure to single chemicals and the mixture were found. qPCR on dissected brains showed significant changes in thyroid hormone-related genes including receptors, deiodinases and neural differentiation markers. Further, exposure to mixture also modified neural proliferation as well as neuron and oligodendrocyte size. Finally, exposed tadpoles showed behavioural responses with dose-dependent reductions in mobility. In conclusion, exposure to a mixture of ubiquitous chemicals at concentrations found in human amniotic fluid affect thyroid hormone-dependent transcription, gene expression, brain development and behaviour in early embryogenesis. As thyroid hormone signalling is strongly conserved across vertebrates the results suggest that ubiquitous chemical mixtures could be exerting adverse effects on foetal human brain development.

48 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Results demonstrated that CFL manufacturing activities resulted in THg accumulation in the hair of CFL workers, however, MeHg in hair were mainly affected by the sources of rice of the residents.

41 citations

References
More filters
Journal ArticleDOI
Yan Li1, Xiu-Ping Yan1, Chen Chen, Yun-Long Xia, Yan Jiang 
TL;DR: The present work represents the most comprehensive study on the interactions between various mercurial species with HSA and provides new evidence for and insights into the interactions of Mercurial Species to HSA for further understanding of the toxicological effects of mercuria species.
Abstract: Binding of metal ions to the heteroatomic sites of proteins is undoubtedly fundamental to their observed physiological effects. In this paper, the interactions of inorganic mercury (Hg2+), methylmercury (MeHg+), ethylmercury (EtHg+), and phenylmercury (PhHg+) with human serum albumin (HSA) were studied from the electrophoretic behaviors, stoichiometry, thermodynamics, and kinetics by using a new hybrid technique, capillary electrophoresis on-line coupled with electrothermal atomic absorption spectrometry (CE-ETAAS), together with the consequent structural information from circular dichroism and Raman spectroscopy. The stoichiometry (mercurial species to HSA) for the interactions of Hg2+, MeHg+, EtHg+, and PhHg+ with HSA was found to be 6:1, 4:1, 4:1, and 3:1, respectively. Two types of binding sites in HSA were observed for the binding of mercurial species with the orders of magnitude of binding constants of 10(7) and 10(6) L mol-1, respectively, showing strong affinity of mercurial species for HSA. The interactions of mercurial species with both types of binding sites in HSA are exothermic and thermodynamically favorable and are both enthalpically and entropically driven. The binding of mercurial species to HSA follows the first-order kinetics for mercurial species and zero-order kinetics for HSA with the apparent activation energy of 57-59 kJ mol-1. Among the four mercurial species examined, only Hg2+ induces the secondary structure transition of HSA. Mercury-HSA adducts are formed mainly through metal-sulfur binding with participation of C=O and/or C-N groups of amino acid residues in HSA molecules. The present work represents the most comprehensive study on the interactions between various mercurial species with HSA and provides new evidence for and insights into the interactions of mercurial species with HSA for further understanding of the toxicological effects of mercurial species.

70 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Aiming at Hg mercury species measurements in Guiyang, the capital city of Guizhou province in Southwest China, flue gases of medium-to-small-sized industrial steam coal-firing boiler with no control devices and large-scale coal combustion with ESPs are studied using Ontario Hytro method.

69 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: It is shown that, in hemolyzed erythrocytes, the sulfhydryl group of glutathione binds CH3Hg(II) more strongly than the sulfHydryl groups of hemoglobin.

68 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The deposition of atmospheric mercury was reported in species in this important mercury polluted province for the first time and the spatial and temporal variability of mercury emissions were investigated and reported.

67 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The data indicate that lipid bilayers do not pose a significant permeability barrier to the diffusional transport of MMC, and the lipid-water partition coefficient of this mercurial is less than or equal to two.

53 citations