A simple method for methylmercury, inorganic mercury and ethylmercury determination in plasma samples by high performance liquid chromatography-cold-vapor-inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry

    Authors

    S. S. de Souza; A. D. Campiglia;F. Barbosa

    Comments

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    Abbreviated Journal Title

    Anal. Chim. Acta

    Keywords

    ICP-MS; Speciation; Plasma; Mercury; Sample preparation; Liquid; chromatography; ATOMIC-ABSORPTION-SPECTROMETRY; BIOLOGICAL SAMPLES; FORMIC-ACID; WHOLE-BLOOD; HUMAN HAIR; GENERATION; SOLUBILIZATION; POLYMORPHISMS; POPULATION; SPECIATION; Chemistry, Analytical

    Abstract

    A simple and sensitive method with a fast sample preparation procedure is proposed for the determination of mercury species in plasma/serum. The method combines online high-performance liquid chromatography separation, Hg cold-vapor formation and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry detection. Prior to analysis, plasma (250 mu L) was accurately pipetted into 15 mL conical tubes. Then, an extractant solution containing mercaptoethanol, L-cysteine and HCl was added to the samples following sonication for 10 min. Quantitative mercury extraction was achieved with the proposed procedure. Separation of mercury species was accomplished in less than 8 min on a C8 reverse phase column with a mobile phase containing 3% v/v methanol + 97% v/v (0.5% v/v 2-mercaptoethanol + 0.05% v/v formic acid). The method detection limits were found to be 12 ng L-1, 5 ng L-1 and 4 ng L-1 for inorganic mercury, ethylmercury and methylmercury, respectively. Method accuracy is traceable to Standard Reference Material (SRM) 966 Toxic Metals in Bovine Blood from NIST. Additional validation was provided by the analysis of a secondary reference serum sample from the INSQ-Canada. Finally, the method was successfully applied for the speciation of mercury in plasma samples collected from volunteers exposed to methylmercury through fish consumption. For the first time to our knowledge, levels of different species of Hg in plasma samples from riverside populations exposed to MeHg were determined. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

    Journal Title

    Analytica Chimica Acta

    Volume

    761

    Publication Date

    1-1-2013

    Document Type

    Article

    Language

    English

    First Page

    11

    Last Page

    17

    WOS Identifier

    WOS:000314488600002

    ISSN

    0003-2670

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