Mercury, arsenic, lead and cadmium in fish and shellfish from the Adriatic Sea

Abstract

The aim was to measure concentrations of total mercury, total arsenic, lead and cadmium in common edible fresh fish and shellfish from various areas of the Adriatic Sea. Estimates of intake of these elements were made through seafood consumption by the general population. Samples were either wet digested for mercury and arsenic, or dry ashed for lead and cadmium analysis. Mercury was measured by cold vapour atomic absorption spectrometry (CV AAS) and arsenic, lead and cadmium by electrothermal atomic absorption spectrometry (ET AAS). Quality control procedures of analytical methods, which included analyses of dogfish muscle-certified reference material DORM-2, confirmed the acceptability of methods. The highest mercury and arsenic concentrations were found in hake (Merluccius merluccius) and the lowest in mackerel (Scomber scombrus). The respective values in hake were 0.373 +/- 0.075 and 23.3 +/- 3.6, and in mackerel 0.153 +/- 0.028 and 1.06 +/- 0.29 mg x kg(-1) fresh weight (mean +/- SD). Lead and cadmium concentrations were about 10 times higher in shellfish than in analysed fish. The highest lead and cadmium concentrations were found in mussel (Mytilus galloprovincialis) and the lowest in hake. Respective lead and cadmium values in mussel were 0.150 +/- 0.009 and 0.142 +/- 0.017, and in hake were 0.007 +/- 0.004 and 0.002 +/- 0.001 mg x kg(-1) fresh weight. The concentrations of analysed elements were below acceptable levels for human consumption set by the Croatian Ministry of Health, except for total arsenic. The estimated intake of those trace elements included in this study through seafood consumption by the general population did not exceed the provisional tolerable weekly intake recommended by the Joint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives.

Searching Relationships between Tissue Elemental Concentrations and Geographical Distribution of Bigeye Tuna(Thunnus Obesus) from the South Atlantic Ocean

“…The lack of relationships is in line with findings of Besada et al (2006) for a broader range of sizes of T. obesus, T. alalunga and T. albacores captured in the Atlantic Ocean. Previous studies with other fish species from the Adriatic and Mediterranean also conclude that size has no effect on trace element accumulation in muscle and liver (Canli and Atli, 2003;Juresa and Blanusa, 2003). Figure 2 showed that partitioning among tissues varied with the studied elements.…”

Seafoods and Environmental Contaminants

“…Once PEPs are ingested, they are distributed to different tissues in organisms, depending on the lipid content. The liver and gonads are the most contaminated, whereas muscle is generally less contaminated [17,21,61]. However, muscle is commonly analyzed because it is the main fish part consumed by humans.…”

Comparison of heavy metal concentration of some marine fishes from Black and Aegean Seas

“…Tuzen [6] had measured an arsenic concentration in different fish species from Black Sea as follows: 0.15 ± 0.01 μg/g for Psetta maxima; 0.27±0.02 μg/g for Pomatomus saltator, 0.23±0.01 μg/g for Mugil cephalus, 0.14±0.01 μg/g for Sarda sarda, 0.18±0.02 μg/g for Trachurus trachurus and 0.17±0.01 μg/g for Sprattus sprattus. The concentration of arsenic reported in fish species from Adriatic Sea ranged of 0.56 to 10.03 mg/kg fresh weight [19] and up to 1.74 μg/g w.w. in the muscle of S. Lascaris in Turkish part of the Black Sea [1].…”

“…In our previous study on heavy metal pollution in muscle tissue of bluefish, the cadmium levels were below 0.07 mg/kg fresh weight [18]. Cadmium concentration in literature has been reported as follow: 0.02-0.37 mg/kg for edible part of fishes caught from Marmara, Aegean and Mediterranean seas in Turkey [17] and 0.002-0.02 mg Cd kg -1 fresh weight for species from Adriatic Sea [19].…”