Heavy metal contaminants

Metals such as cadmium, lead and mercury are natural occurring chemical compounds that vary tremendously. All these elements can appear in a lot of different kinds of compounds. The behavior and the risk depend strongly according to the environmental conditions. They can be present at various levels in the environment, e.g. soil, water and atmosphere. Metals can also occur as residues in food because of their presence in the environment, as a result of human activities such as farming, industry or car exhausts or from contamination during food processing and storage. People can be exposed to these metals from the environment or by ingesting contaminated food or water. Their accumulation in the body can lead to harmful effects over time.

The presence of heavy metals has to be checked with the limits that have been established in the European legislation. Maximum levels for heavy metal contaminants are set in Regulation (EC) 1881/2006 and subsequent amendments.

Creative Diagnostics provides a series of heavy metal protein conjugates and antibodies for heavy metal immunoassay method development. Heavy metal immunoassays are new methods for detection of heavy metal ions. Compared to the traditional chemical methods, immunoassays are not only fast, cheap, simple, but also reasonably portable, highly sensitive and selective. It can be used as preliminary screening for rapid determination of heavy metal ions. Except chemical chelators, phytochelatin and metallothionein can also be used for preparing immunogen, both of them can chelate heavy metal ions to carrier protein.