Determination of heavy metals in goat milk through ICP-OES

This study was planned to find out the concentration of heavy metal residues such as arsenic (As), cadmium (Cd), lead (Pb), mercury (Hg) and nickel (Ni) in goat milk which was collected from three different areas (industrial, semi- industrial and non-industrial) of Hosur, (Tamilnadu). A total of 144 milk samples collected from goat were analyzed to determine the metallic concentration by using inductively coupled plasma- optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES). Results indicated that heavy metals concentration were higher in industrial area, than from the semi-industrial and nonindustrial areas but well within the prescribed permissible limit. Among the five heavy metals analyzed in the milk samples, cadmium was higher than the other elements viz., lead, mercury, nickel and arsenic. From the study, it was concluded that, the concentration of heavy metals in goats milk were generally low but differed (P< 0.01) significantly. The milk used for human consumption is not fully free from hazardous heavy metals and well within the safer limit.