Determination of Chromium Based on Laser Ablation Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry

Abstract

Abstract Chromium plays an irreplaceable role in the life system. The exploration of chromium is beneficial to reveal its physiological or pathological processes. In this study, a novel method was established for determination of chromium in gels by matrix-matched external standard method-laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS). The relative standard deviation of chromium signal intensity during ablation standard were less than 16% (n = 300), the correlation coefficient (R2) of LA-ICP-MS quantitative calibration curve was 0.9805, and the detection limit was 2.22 µg/g. The MCF-7 cells were used as an in vitro cell model, and two kinds of polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (PAGE) method were used to separate the protein extract after chromium incubation. And then, the electrophoresis bands obtained by two electrophoresis methods were ablated respectively by LA-ICP-MS with line scan mode, and the weak chromium-containing protein bands were obtained in electrophoresis band. Finally, the LA-ICP-MS was used to measure and image the chromium in individual cell, and it was found that the cell element distribution map overlapped well with the cell contour map under the laser microscope.