Heavy Metals Determination in Hair Dye Samples Selected from Iraqi Markets

Heavy metals play an important role in human organism and are called essential metals, while others are not known as being useful for our health, or more precisely they are toxic. High concentrations of heavy metals may cause health problems. Hair dye (K303/66, K303/4 and K307/1) were selected as common brands in Iraqi markets .All these samples were treated with digestion acids(2.5:1 nitric acid: hydrochloric acid) to free the elements from organic components in order to be tested as prepared solutions in atomic absorption. EDX analysis for hair dye samples shows that there was a large proportion of the sulfur element and none of the toxic and health-related elements in the selected samples. Atomic absorption analysis shows that the method of acid digestion by means of a mixture of nitric acid to hydrochloric acid was not effective enough to dissolve all the elements as evidenced by the presence of some elements in the precipitation resulting from acid digestion. Several treatments may be needed to insure the optimum extraction for the elements from the selected samples.

Keywords: Heavy Metal, Hair Dye, Henna, Toxic Element.