METHODOLOGY DEVELOPMENTS AND THEIR APPLICATION TO ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS

Abstract

Human health is closely related to environmental factors. Owing to better nourishment and advances in medical sciences, human beings live longer than ever before. Perhaps because of the extension of life, cancer, along with cardiovascular diseases have become main killers. In another aspect, gerontological diseases such as senile dementia and Alzheimer's disease lower the quality of life of many aged people. Apart from hereditary factors, chemicals present in the environments have received more and more attention. The causative effects of carcinogens to cancer diseases and aluminum to senile diseases have been established progressively. However, the full elucidation of the etiologic mechanisms needs further study. This dissertation is divided into two pa1ts Part one is concerned with the analysis of a group of potent carcinogens heterocyclic amines in the environmental samples. Chapter 1 describes a general introduction or these compounds. The development of separation methodologies based on capillary electrophoresis is discussed in Chapter 2. In Chapter 1, the applications of the method in the determination or heterocyclic amines in natural waters are discussed. Many factors which affected the type and level of heterocyclic amines in cooked foods, and a survey of such compounds in various cooked foods is discussed in Chapter 4. The analytical methods utilized in the survey include high performance liquid chromatography and capillary electrophoresis. The presence of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in certain types of food samples is discussed in Chapter 5. The second part of this dissertation, divided into three chapters, covers the determination of aluminum in human fluids using several analytical techniques. The determination of serum aluminum was carried out by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), aluminum speciation in urine was conducted by the combination of graphite furnace atomic absorption spectrometer (GF-AAS), ion-exchange and fluorescence spectrometry. The relationship between tea drinking and urinary aluminum excretion, and possible effects of aluminum species in tea infusions on their absorption in human body are also discussed.