DISTRIBUTION OF HEAVY METALS IN WATER, SUSPENDED PARTICULATE MATTER AND SEDIMENT OF POYANG LAKE, CHINA

摘要

In this study, distributions of heavy metals (Al, As, Cd, Co, Cu, Fe, Mn, Ni, Pb, V, Zn) in the water, suspended paniculate matters (SPM) and sediments of Poyang Lake in China were examined. Heavy metal concentrations were determined using a Perkin- Elmer SCIEX Elan 9000 inductively coupled plasma-mass spectroscopy (ICP-MS). The results indicate that the dissolved trace metals in Poyang Lake are generally at a low and safe level. All the particu-late metal concentrations were anti-correlated with SPM, although statistically not significant excluding Cd and Mn, suggesting that the SPM from the bottom sediments with lower metal contaminations dilutes the particulate metal concentrations. The Partitioning coefficients (Log K_d) of the selected metals and percentages of the particulate metals relative to the total metals loads in the water column ranged from 4.09 to 5.98 L/kg and 51.32% to 98.65%, respectively, indicating that most of the metals (Al, Co, Cu, Fe, Ni, Pb, V, and Zn) exist in the particulate phase (>70%), and As, Cd, and Mn show a more equal distribution. Most of the heavy metals in sediments and SPM showed the highest contents at stations 2, 3, 8, and 11, suggesting that urban sewage, dock, mining and smelting activities are the main sources of heavy metals in Poyang Lake. The Principal component analysis (PCA), correlation analysis and geoaccumu-lation index (I_(geo)) results demonstrate that parent rock weathering and soil erosion might be the main sources of As, Cd, Mn, Zn, Fe, Co, V and Fe, whereas mining and smelting activities was well as atmospheric deposition may be the main sources of Pb and Cu.