Journal of Microbiology, Biotechnology and Lazor et al. 2012 : 1 (4) 522-533 Food Sciences REGULAR ARTICLE MONITORING OF AIR POLLUTION AND ATMOSPHERIC DEPOSITION OF HEAVY METALS BY ANALYSIS OF HONEY Peter Lazor1*, Ján Tomáš1, Tomáš Tóth1,2, Juraj Tóth1, Silvia Čéryová1 Address*: 1Slovak University of Agriculture in Nitra, Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Sciences, Department of Chemistry, Tr. A. Hlinku 2, 949 76 Nitra, Slovak Republic 2Institute of Chemistry, Center of excellence for white-green biotechnology, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Trieda A. Hlinku 2, 94976 Nitra, Slovak Republic *Corresponding author:
[email protected] ABSTRACT Honey is an important food for the human nutrition. Changes in the quality of bee honey are also caused by the contamination with micro-polluting agents, toxic to consumers. Heavy metals in honey are of interest not only for quality control, but can be used also as an environmental indicator. In this work honey samples were collected in different places of Slovakia. From the experimental results the average values for concentration heavy metals in honey in site Prievidza 2006 - 2008 were: 0.0599 mg.kg-1 As, 0.0948 mg.kg-1 Cd, 0.0747 mg.kg-1 Cr, 0.0394 mg.kg-1 Hg and 0.1252 mg.kg-1 Pb; in site Šaľa 2006 - 2008: 0.0862 mg.kg-1 As, 0.0942 mg.kg-1 Cd, 0.0736 mg.kg-1 Cr, 0.0341 mg.kg-1 Hg and 0.1626 mg.kg-1 Pb. The results suggested that honey could be used to detect contaminating agents in the environment. Key words: honey, contamination of honey, heavy metals, Slovakian regions 522 JMBFS / Lazor et al.