TRACE-ELEMENT CONCENTRATION IN HAIR OF BANGLADESH CHILDREN UNDER NORMAL AND MALNUTRITION CONDITIONS

The trace element concentrations of eight elements (Ca, Cr, Mn, Fe, Ni , Cu, Zn and Pb) in the scalp hair of 49 normal and 55 malnourished ch ildren of the Bangladesh population, in the age group of 1 to 5 years were analyzed by the external beam PIXE method to establish their base line values in normal children for pre-diagnostic screening of deficie ncy and excess in malnutrition. The results of this investigation show that the ranges of trace elements in hair are somewhat wide. For exam ple, the normal Zn level has the range of 63-377 mu g.g(-1) for 49 sub jects. The reasons for these large individual deviations are unknown t ill now. The average of the elemental concentrations between normal an d malnourished groups are compared (t-test, p < 0.05). A correlation s tudy has been done on each pair of original data by a non-parametric S pearman's rank test. The frequency distributions of the elements are p resented and the results are compared with the data reported in the li terature. A substantive correspondence between the present data hi hai r of both the study groups and the literature values from different co untries have been observed but they did not show any regular dependenc e on the nutritional status of the subjects. Only the low Cu content i n the hair of malnourished group can possibly be linked with nutrition al disorders as evidenced from this study.