Correlation between blood concentrations of heavy metals and DNA damage in peripheral blood from welders

Abstract

Objective To investigate the concentrations of heavy metals in peripheral blood from welders and its relationship with blood DNA damage.Methods The blood samples were collected from 22 welders of the medical equipment manufacture enterprise (group A),25 welders of shipbuilding enterprise (group B) and 22 administrators (control group).The concentrations of chromium (Cr),zinc (Zn),cadmium (Cd),lead (Pb),cobalt (Co),nickel (Ni),and manganese (Mn) in blood were detected by inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry(ICP-MS).The DNA damage of peripheral blood was measured by comet assay.The relationship between metal concentrations and the levels of DNA damage was analyzed by multiple linear regression and correlation analysis.Results Compared with control group,blood concentrations of Pb and Mn were higher in group A and B (group A:UPb =136.0,tMn=-6.2; group B:UPb =78.5,tMn=-7.6; P all ＜ 0.01),blood levels of Cr and Ni were significantly higher in group A(UCr =64.0,tNi =-4.4; P ＜0.01)and blood concentrations of Cd were higher in group B respectively(UCd =260.0,P ＜ 0.01).The results of multiple linear regression analysis indicated that the level of DNA damage in B group were significantly higher than the control group after the control of drinking factor (β =3.9,SE =0.9,t =4.3,P ＜ 0.01).However the results of correlation analysis indicated that there was no correlation between blood concentrations of heavy metals and the levels of DNA damage (P ＞ 0.05).Conclusions Differences of heavy metal burdens in blood from welders may be related to the steel wires used in welding.But no correlation between DNA damage and any single metal burden in blood is found in this study.The blood DNA damage observed in group B may attribute to other unclear factors. Key words: Metals, heavy; DNA damage; Welder