Monitoring of lead, arsenic and mercury in the indoor air and settled dust in the Natural History Museum of Rouen (France)

Özet

For more than 100 years, mercury and arsenic have been used for the preservation of natural history collections. This may represent a risk for staff as they may be exposed to these substances by inhalation, by skin contact or by unintentional ingestion of settled dust. In this work, we present results from a monitoring of lead, mercury and arsenic in the air and settled dust at the Natural History Museum of Rouen (Normandy, France). Relatively high levels of arsenic were measured in the air, with concentra-tions occasionally over the recommended value of 2 mg m 3 for a working atmosphere (NIOSH REL). Analysis of settled dust has shown a significant contamination with arsenic, lead and mercury compared to house dust respectively with median values of 58, 5507, 11 mg kg 1. Finally, Hg(0) concentrations were measured with highest values in the herbarium storage area (150e200 ng m 3) with a peak value of up to 1100 ng m 3 when manipulating herbarium sheets. Generally, the exposure of staff to these toxic substances appeared to be quite limited when compared for instance, with dietary intake. However, the concentration of arsenic in the air leads to an excess lifetime cancer risk by inhalation estimated to be 5.26 10 4, which requires special consideration.