Determination of trace elements and minerals in some fruits and vegetable tissues which used at treatment diseases

In recent years there has been a growing interest in some trace elementconcentrations in the environment, the research on the role of these elements invarious metabolic processes and their impact on human health due to environmentalpollution.The elements are present at varying concentrations in different parts of theplants, especially in roots, seeds and leaves . The elemental composition of the fruits,fruit tissues and vegetables is very important because some of these elements arevital for normal growth and maintaining good health. Daily consumption of freshfruits and vegetables is recommended to help prevent major non ? communicablediseases such as cardiovascular diseaseas and certain cancers. Therefore, updatingthe mineral and trace element contents of fruit and vegetable foods are important.Mineral and trace elements can also produce toxic effects when they intakein high concentrations and in low concentration also encountered some problems.For example, abound in nature Fe, an excess in its concentration cause vomitting,diarrhea and damage of the intestine, also iron deficiency results in anemia, whivhranges from a fall in plasma ferritin with no functional impairment to severe irondeficiency characterized by small red blood cells with low hemoglobinconcentrations.An important link in the transfer of trace elements from soil to man are plants.The mineral and trace element contents of plants are known to be affected by thecultivar of plant, genetic factors, geochemical characteristic of soil, ability of plantsto selectively accumulate some of these elements, weather conditions during thegrowing, use of fertilizers and the state of the plants maturity at harvest.In the present study we have selected as fruits, Apple, Cherry, Pear,Pomegranate, Quince, Strawberry and Walnut, as vegetable, Basil and Mint for theanalysis because of their medicinal importance, as folk medicine. The fruits andvegetables are still used in Malatya particularly for their teratment of some diseases.For example, It is believed that eating quince is good for maintaining the optimumhealth of an individual, consumption of quince has been found to be beneficial forpeople suffering from gastric ulcer.the presence of potassium in quince helps in thelowering of high blood pressure.In this objective, the contents of two mineral elements were analysed:potassium (K), magnesium (Mg), and five trace elements: copper (Cu), iron (Fe),mangenese (Mn), selenium (Se) and zinc (Zn), as well as three toxic elements:aluminium (Al), cadmium (Cd) and lead (Pb) from samples of seven fruits, fruittissues (e.g. leaves, seeds) and two vegetables. Sample for determination weredissolved with the use of microwave digestion. The analytical characteristics of theproposed method, the accuracy and precision were tested and verified by a certifiedreference material (NIST ? SRM 1515, Apple Leaves). The concentration ofminerals and trace elements were determined by means of the Flame ? AAS, Flame ?AES and GF ? AAS methods.The contents of trace metals in the fruit and fruit tissue samples were found inthe ranges: 1.45 ? 92.83 mg / 100g for aluminum, 0.11 ? 1.84 mg / 100g for copper,0.30 ? 61.54 mg / 100g for iron, 114 ? 4658. 33 mg / 100g for potassium,11.03 ? 637.79 mg / 100g for magnesium, 0.034 ? 10.97 mg / 100g for manganese,0.17 ? 6.26 mg / 100g for zinc, 0.10 ? 4.21 x 10-3 mg / 100g for cadmium,8.91 ? 351.55 x 10-3 mg / 100g for lead and 0.55 ? 45.45 x 10-3 mg / 100g forselenium. Also vegetable samples were found in the ranges: 12.80 ? 19.16 mg / 100gfor aluminum0.34 ? 1.03 mg / 100g for copper, 29.91 ? 30.00 mg / 100g for iron,2791.67 ? 4754.17 mg / 100g for potassium, 508.33 ? 600.69 mg / 100g formagnesium, 5.07 ? 5.67 mg / 100g for manganese, 2,59 ? 4.48 mg / 100g for zinc,6.48 x 10-3 mg / 100g for cadmium, 63.22 ? 115.38 x 10-3 mg / 100g for lead and41.9 ? 56.1 x 10-3 mg / 100g for selenium.Key Words : Fruits, Vegetables, Mineral, Trace Element, Microwave DigestionTechnique, Atomic Absorption Spectrofotometer.