title: Hair can be a good biomarker of occupational exposure to mercury vapor: simulated experiments and field data analysis.
abstract: Generally, urine mercury (U-Hg) is widely used for assessment of inorganic mercury (I-Hg) exposure in humans. The reliability of scalp hair as an indicator of mercury vapor exposure is contentious. However, significant correlations were found between hair total mercury (T-Hg) and U-Hg and between hair I-Hg and total gaseous mercury (TGM) in ambient air in our previous studies. Simulated experiments were designed to assess the contribution of direct absorption/adsorption of mercury vapor in the hair. Results indicated that the increases of hair T-Hg concentrations were less than 1 μg/g, which was negligible compared with hair T-Hg concentrations in occupationally exposed workers. The β-mercaptoethanol washing can remove 30% of mercury (Hg) in the exposed hair samples. The inhaled Hg constituted the major fraction (97.4%) of I-Hg exposure for the artisanal Hg mining workers. From the simulated experiments and field data analysis, we can conclude that hair I-Hg can be a useful tool for monitoring occupational exposure to Hg vapor.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Environmental Geochemistry, Institute of Geochemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Guiyang, 550002, China.
authors.forename: Ping
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Xinbin
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Feng
authors.forename: Guangle
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Qiu
authors.forename: Qi
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Wan
mesh_terms: D000395:Air Pollutants, Occupational / Q000032:analysis* / Q000493:pharmacokinetics; D015415:Biomarkers / Q000378:metabolism; D003627:Data Interpretation, Statistical; D004784:Environmental Monitoring / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods* / Q000592:standards; D004867:Equipment Design; D006197:Hair / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000378:metabolism; D006801:Humans; D008628:Mercury / Q000032:analysis* / Q000493:pharmacokinetics; D016273:Occupational Exposure / Q000032:analysis*; D011786:Quality Control; D014835:Volatilization
chemical_list: D000395:Air Pollutants, Occupational; D015415:Biomarkers; D008628:Mercury