TY - JOUR AU - T.O. Oluseyi AU - M.O. Hamed AU - A.M. Odukoya AU - B.I. Alo PY - 2019/12/24 Y2 - 2024/03/28 TI - PRELIMINARY STUDIES ON THE DISTRIBUTION CHARACTERISTICS OF POTENTIALLY TOXIC METALS IN SOILS AROUND A GOLD MINING SITE IN IJERO, EKITI STATE, NIGERIA JF - UNILAG Journal of Medicine, Science and Technology JA - UJMST VL - 7 IS - 2 SE - Articles DO - UR - http://ujmst.unilag.edu.ng/article/view/556 AB - Metal pollution in soils arising from mining activities has become a growingconcern especially in developing countries like Nigeria. Illegal mining of solidminerals pervades the entire country leaving behind their deleterious effects on theenvironment. This research focused on the preliminary studies on the distributioncharacteristics of nine potentially toxic metals in soils around a mining site in EkitiState, Nigeria. Thirteen (13) soil samples were randomly collected in and aroundthe vicinity of the mining site and a control sample at a farther distance from themining site. The soil samples were air dried, sieved through a 63 mm mesh sieveand 1g of each of the samples was digested using a microwave digester for twohours. The potentially toxic metal concentration was determined using an Agilent7700s Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometer (ICP-MS). Theconcentration of the metals analysed in the samples were within the followingranges; As (0.20 to 83.49 mg/kg), Cd (0.03 to 0.39mg/kg), Cr (0.65 to 38.16 mg/kg),Cu (3.11 to 11.46 mg/kg), Fe (2.46 to 137.63 mg/kg), Mn (45.88 to 557.20 mg/kg),Ni (0.30 to 10.84 mg/kg), Pb (2.83 to 20.28 mg/kg) and Zn (5.68 to 24.16 mg/kg).Concentrations of As and Cd were above the permissible levels in the environment.The calculated pollution index (Pi) values for As (location 2) and Cd (location 5)under the study exceeded 1 confirming that the soils are highly polluted particularlywith As and Cd. Therefore, it is recommended that farmers should not growagricultural foods such as edible vegetables, rice and potato in these soils unless thesoils have been treated and remediated. In addition, mining activities had impactednegatively on the surrounding environment and the results of this analysis suggeststhat the metal concentrations of the sites resulted from mining activities areexpected to be higher in the nearest future due to bioaccumulation and as such, theactivities should be regulated and arrested. ER -