Assessment of Proximate Composition, Heavy Metal Concentration, and Human Health Risk Associated with Wheat Cultivated in Haryana and Madhya Pradesh, India

• Published in: Water, air, and soil pollution air, and soil pollution, 2024-07, Vol.235 (7), p.442, Article 442
• Main Authors: Saini, Neha, Yadav, Meenakshi, Kumar, Lalit, Yadav, Vikas, Ezhilselvi, V.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Acidity; Arsenic; Ashes; Atmospheric Protection/Air Quality Control/Air Pollution; Bioaccumulation; Cadmium; Chromium; Climate Change/Climate Change Impacts; Cluster analysis; Clusters; Cultivation; Earth and Environmental Science; Emission spectroscopy; Environment; Flour; Gluten; Grain cultivation; Health risk assessment; Health risks; Heavy metals; Hydrogeology; Inductively coupled plasma; Lead; Mercury; Mercury (metal); Metal concentrations; Moisture; Optical emission spectroscopy; Principal components analysis; Proximate composition; Soil; Soil Science & Conservation; Soil water; Spectroscopy; Water Quality/Water Pollution; Wheat
• ISSN: 0049-6979; 1573-2932
• DOI: 10.1007/s11270-024-07258-3

This study investigated proximate composition and heavy metal concentration in wheat flour samples gathered from five districts of Haryana and Madhya Pradesh. The sample of Panchkula, Rohtak, Palwal, Dadri, Sirsa, Bhind, Neemuch, Bhopal, Khargone, and Anuppur are referred to as HR1, HR2, HR3, HR4, HR5, MP1, MP2, MP3, MP4, and MP5 respectively. The parameters such as moisture, total ash, acid insoluble ash, gluten, crude fibre, alcoholic acidity, and granularity were determined following Indian Standard (IS) 1155:1968. Several heavy metals such as lead (Pb), chromium (Cr), cadmium (Cd), arsenic (As), and mercury (Hg) in wheat flour, water, and soil were also determined by using inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectroscopy (ICP-OES). Results show that moisture, ash, acid insoluble ash, gluten, crude fibre, and alcoholic acidity ranged from 6.9 to 12.6 %, 1.1 to 1.89 %, 0.049 to 0.092 %, 9.4 to 12.4 %, 0.4 to 2.4 %, and 0.11 to 0.18 % respectively. Overall, all the samples were found to have acceptable values for proximate content, except alcoholic acidity, which exceeded the permissible limit. Heavy metal studies inferred that Pb content in wheat flour samples ranged from 0.38 to 3.5 μg/g while Cr content ranged from 1.9 to 6.2 μg/g. Heavy metal concentration in soil increased in the following order: Cr>Pb>As>Cd>Hg. Principal component analysis (PCA) and Hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) indicated the Hg-Cd cluster, suggesting the same source of origin. Bioaccumulation factor (BAF) values obtained for all the samples are