Determination of mercury in whole blood and urine by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry.

The conventional method for the determination of mercury in clinical samples is cold vapor atomic absorption spectrometry. Sample digestion or pretreatment require large sample volume and long sample preparation time. The inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) method developed in this study requires only 100 microL of sample with practically no preparation, except for dilution with diluent. Significant savings in sample volumes, reagents, technician time, and analysis time are realized. Among different types of diluents, the one containing acid, tert-butanol, and potassium dichromate gave the best results to remove the mercury memory effect. The interassay precisions for whole blood and urine were < 5% and < 8%, respectively, and the intra-assay precisions were < 3% and < 7%, respectively. The lower limits of detection were 0.13, 0.17, and 0.26 microg/L for aqueous standard, urine, and whole blood, respectively. The developed ICP-MS method correlated well with the atomic absorption method and can offer an alternative to the atomic absorption method for mercury analysis with less sample volume requirement as well as shorter analysis time.

[1]  R. Godden,et al.  Inter-laboratory note. Atomic fluorescence spectrometric determination of mercury using a filter fluorimeter , 1989 .

[2]  G. Hansson,et al.  Automated determination of inorganic mercury in blood after sulfuric acid treatment using cold vapour atomic absorption spectrometry and an inductively heated gold trap. , 1995, The Analyst.

[3]  Laurent Bonneau,et al.  Metal and metalloid multi-elementary ICP-MS validation in whole blood, plasma, urine and hair. Reference values. , 2005, Forensic science international.

[4]  C. Wai,et al.  Mercury Loss from Water During Storage: Mechanisms and Prevention , 1975 .

[5]  D. Paschal,et al.  Determination of total and inorganic mercury in whole blood by on-line digestion with flow injection , 1998 .

[6]  L Magos,et al.  Selective atomic-absorption determination of inorganic mercury and methylmercury in undigested biological samples. , 1971, The Analyst.

[7]  D. Baldwin,et al.  Heavy Metal Poisoning and its Laboratory Investigation , 1999, Annals of clinical biochemistry.

[8]  T W Clarkson,et al.  Atomic absorption determination of total, inorganic, and organic mercury in blood. , 1972, Journal - Association of Official Analytical Chemists.

[9]  E. Ong,et al.  Determination of arsenic in traditional Chinese medicine by microwave digestion with flow injection-inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (FI-ICP-MS). , 1999, Journal of AOAC International.

[10]  J. Becker,et al.  Evidence of near-field laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (NF-LA-ICP-MS) at nanometre scale for elemental and isotopic analysis on gels and biological samples , 2006 .

[11]  J. Yoshinaga,et al.  Determination of Mercury in Biological and Environmental Samples byInductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry With the Isotope DilutionTechnique , 1997 .

[12]  M. Sperling,et al.  On-line microwave sample pretreatment for the determination of mercury in water and urine by flow-injection cold-vapour atomic absorption spectrometry , 1992 .

[13]  R. Houk,et al.  Spatially Resolved Measurements of Size and Velocity Distributions of Aerosol Droplets from a Direct Injection Nebulizer , 1993 .

[14]  Quaresima,et al.  Determination of Mercury by Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometry , 1996, Microchemical journal : devoted to the application of microtechniques in all branches of science.

[15]  R. Houk,et al.  Direct injection nebulization for inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry , 1991 .

[16]  C. Hanna,et al.  Determination of total mercury in waters and urine by flow injection atomic absorption spectrometry procedures involving on- and off-line oxidation of organomercury species. , 1993, Analytical chemistry.

[17]  J. Pavón,et al.  On-line preconcentration and determination of mercury by flow injection inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry , 1993 .

[18]  P. Quevauviller,et al.  Influence of chemical species on the determination of mercury in a biological matrix (cod muscle) using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry , 1992 .

[19]  F. Fagioli,et al.  The adaptation of the dichromate digestion method for total mercury determination by cold-vapor atomic absorption spectrometry to the analysis of soils, sediments and sludges , 1994 .

[20]  M. J. Carter,et al.  Automated method for the determination of total and inorganic mercury in water and wastewater samples. , 1976, Analytical chemistry.

[21]  G. Zachariadis,et al.  Time-based on-line preconcentration cold vapour generation procedure for ultra-trace mercury determination with inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry , 2004, Analytical and bioanalytical chemistry.

[22]  A. Baca,et al.  Anodic stripping voltammetry combined on-line with inductively coupled plasma-MS via a direct-injection high-efficiency nebulizer. , 2003, Analytical chemistry.

[23]  D. Beauchemin,et al.  Determination of organomercury in biological reference materials by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry using flow injection analysis , 1988 .

[24]  T. Moyer,et al.  Inorganic, organic, and total mercury in blood and urine: cold vapor analysis with automated flow injection sample delivery. , 1996, Journal of analytical toxicology.

[25]  G Lindstedt,et al.  Microdetermination of mercury in biological samples. II. An apparatus for rapid automatic determination of mercury in digested samples. , 1971, The Analyst.

[26]  F. Ko,et al.  Direct impurity analysis of semiconductor photoresist samples with laser ablation ICP-MS , 2002 .

[27]  Thomas P. Moyer,et al.  The determination of mercury in whole blood and urine by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry , 1999 .

[28]  Zhongxi Li,et al.  Determination of the platinum group elements in geological samples by ICP-MS after NiS fire assay and Te coprecipitation: ultrasound-assisted extraction of PGEs from Te precipitate , 2006 .