PIXE measurement of human hairs from a small-scale mining site of the Philippines

In gold-producing regions of the Philippines, so-called pocket miners are mining and smelting the ore by gold amalgamation. The amalgamation process and smelting of amalgam are usually done inside houses especially in the kitchen. It is of concern that people become exposed to vapor mercury by inhalation with this practice. The Mines and Geosciences Bureau of the Philippines – Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) communicates to pocket miners the hazards of mercury to the body as well as the damage that mercury causes to the environment. Knowing the toxicity of mercury, miners came to request that their head hairs be analyzed. Consequently, a standard-free method of quantitative analysis for untreated bio-samples was applied to the hairs to estimate their degree of exposure to mercury. The analytical result indicated the anomalous accumulation of mercury especially for women who stay longer and often smelt the amalgam inside the house.