engleski

DETERMINATION OF SELECTED TOXIC ELEMENTS IN APPLES FROM ORGANIC FARMING

Due to the elevated ecological awareness nowadays the consumption of products of organic agriculture is increasing. Organic farming means excluding the use of synthetic inputs, such as synthetic fertilizers and pesticides or genetically modified organisms, but there are only a few regulations regarding heavy metal concentrations in soils. Thus a not negligible uptake of metals from the soil where the apple trees are grown may occur. Furthermore inorganic copper compounds being traditional fertilizers for apple trees are not considered as synthetic fertilizers, thus they are still used in organic apple farming for soil or foliar application, although their application rate is decreasing. Thus also apples produced by organic agriculture may contain toxic elements, such as cadmium, chromium, copper, and lead. The concentrations of these elements were determined in whole apples, as well as in the flesh and peel in order to estimate the possible risk for human health. After harvesting, the apples were either worked up immediately or dried before sample preparation. Prior to quantification by inductively coupled plasma – optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES) all samples were digested by a microwave assisted digestion system using HNO3 using either open or closed vessel mode. The results obtained for all methods were compared and the best method was chosen for further optimization. The final validated analytical procedure was then used for the analysis of twenty eight apple samples collected in Croatia.

ELEMENTS; APPLES; ICP-AES

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