Effects of lead exposure on 18 elements in blood and excretions in rats

To investigate the effects of lead exposure on lead and other metal elements contents in rats.SD rats were randomly divided into control group and several experiment groups of different doses. The rats were exposed to lead acetate through intragastric administration every other day for 5 times. The whole blood, urine and feces of all the rats were collected. The concentrations of lead and 18 metal elements in these samples were determined by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) and inductively coupled plasma atom emission spectrometry (ICP-AES).No significant difference among the groups was found for body weight and organ-body ratios of the rats after lead exposure (P>0.05). With the increase of exposure dose, lead content in blood, total lead in urine and feces tended to increase, while the total lead in urine no longer increased in the high dose group. Significant differences among the groups (P<0.05) were observed for the sodium, magnesium, potassium, strontium, antimony, thallium and bismuth contents in the whole blood, the potassium, iron and antimony contents in the urine, and the calcium, iron, zinc, copper, thallium, bismuth and rare earth elements contents in the feces.The effect of lead on the metabolism of divalent metal ions, namely calcium, magnesium, iron, zinc, copper and strontium ion, may be due to the competition of lead with the ions for common delivery carrier. Lead exposure induces the excretion of light rare earth elements and toxic elements (thallium and bismuth), and changes the antimony, sodium and potassium contents in rats. But there is no effect of lead on molybdenum and cadmium in rats.PubMed02232-64