ELEMENT CONTENT IN A NUMBER OF PLANT-LEAVES AND ACCUMULATION OF SOME ELEMENTS IN TYPICAL PLANT-SPECIES - A CASE OF OKAYAMA PREFECTURE

Content of 40 elements in plant leaves, soils and rocks collected from several sampling sites in Okayama Prefecture was analyzed by instrume ntal neutron activation analysis using the Research Reactor of Kyoto U niversity. Of these, 16 elements were taken up, and the relationship a mong their amounts in plants, rocks and soils was discussed, focusing mainly on the essential elements of higher plants and related elements in the periodic table. Although most element contents in plant were d ifferent among species, the mediam values of the most non-essential el ements in the leaf were lower than the contents in the soil and rock s amples. However, essential elements showed significantly higher median values than those in the soil and rock samples. Most element contents in leaves showed a logarithmic normal distribution. The normal distri bution was observed in most essential elements except for zinc, while non-essential elements did not show a normal distribution. The results obtained by analysis of variance, showed that the plant species studi ed could be divided into four major groups, namely Dicotyledoneae, Mon ocotyledoneae, Gymnospermae and Pteridophyta. In general, Dycotyledone ae and Pteridophyta had higher element contents than Monocotyledonaeae and Gymnospermae.