Atomic study using hair as an environmental bio-indicator for monitorization of Ecosystems

• Autor(a) principal: da Costa, Miguel Mendes
• Data de Publicação: 2017
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10400.26/19015
• topic: Zinc; Copper; Iron; Bromine; Ecosystem; Hair; Ruminants

For this curricular internship we proposed to collect samples of hair of small ruminants explored in outdoor livestock production. Our aim was to use hair as a bio-indicator of contaminant elements present in the environment where animals graze. We obtained samples from four regions of Portugal that were storage at environmental temperature until we could prepare them for analysis with X-Ray fluorescence spectroscopy. X-Ray fluorescence spectroscopy assessments were made for identification of heavy metals and other elements present in hair. The information obtained was used to make relations between the presence of the elements found and their possible interaction within animal body as also to make a relationship between the presence of those elements and the natural conditions and anthropogenic activities in the different sampled groups of the four regions of Portugal. The practice contact of the curricular internship was divided in activities in the field of organic animal production in Herdade Freixo do Meio, located in Foros de Vale Figueira in Alentejo, as well tecnicalscientific activities in the Parasitology laboratory of Escola Universitária Vasco da Gama (University of Veterinary Medicine) for coprological analysis, studies in the field of Apiculture, and preparation of samples of hair. Analysis has performed in The Trace Analysis and Imaging Laboratory fo Biophysics department of Coimbra University, being after studied. Activities performed during internship resulted in parasitologic reports with identification of gastrointestinal parasites and evaluation of the parasitic load in groups of animals from Alentejo and Minho, tecnical-scientific works in the field of Apiculture, as also an atomic study with identification of zinc, copper, iron, bromine in hair samples, suggesting a possible environmental contamination.