Development of Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy methods for determination of chemical elements in kidney tissues

• Grant number: 11/18301-1
• Support type: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Effective date (Start): December 01, 2011
• Effective date (End): November 30, 2012
• Field of knowledge: Physical Sciences and Mathematics - Chemistry
• Principal Investigator: Dário Santos Júnior
• Grantee: Adriana Amorim Canejo
• Home Institution: Instituto de Ciências Ambientais, Químicas e Farmacêuticas (ICAQF). Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP). Campus Diadema. Diadema , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The determination of chemical elements is useful for investigate the nutritional and toxicological effects of metals in biological tissues. In this way, the concentrations of these elements are frequently evaluated in biomedical studies about stages of diseases. The most used analytical methods for metal determination are generally time-consuming and based on acid digestion of 50 to 200 mg of sample. In some cases, these methods are not appropriate for chemical mapping of animal tissue sections. Thus, the development of fast analytical methods that uses only small amounts of samples is necessary in biomedical research. The aim of this project is the development of multielemental methods for determination of Ca, Mg, K, Na, Fe, Zn, Cd, Cr, and Pb in kidney tissues by using the optical emission spectroscopy with plasma induced by laser. This technique is known as Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS), and has been considered a very promising tool for different application fields such as chemical quality control, materials chemistry, environmental toxicology, agricultural chemistry, forensic chemistry, and biomedicine. In many cases, the direct analysis of samples can be done in few seconds, with minimal human intervention, without reagents and, consequently, without chemical waste.