Role of Unprofessional Storage Methods on the Heavy Metal Content of Rosa Damascena (Gole Mohammadi)

Document Type : Original Article

Abstract

As majority of people around the world rely on non-conventional medicine mainly of herbal
sources for their primary healthcare nowadays, the quality of herbal medicine is one of the
most important issues. The products may be contaminated with chemical toxins, excessive
pesticides and heavy metals during the growth process with contaminated environment or during
harvesting, storing conditions and transferring process to herbal market. Chemical toxins may
come from wrong storage conditions or chemical treatment due to transferring to herbal market.
The aims of this study were to : determination of the contents of Cd, Cr, Cu, Ni, Hg, Pb and Zn
in Rosa Damascena available in Iranian market in comparison with these heavy metal contents
in samples which is harvested from Kashan farms in order to find probable effect of transferring
and storing process in contamination issue. The samples were analyzed by a Flame Emission
Spectrophotometer and an automated continuous flow hydride vapor generation system was
used for mercury. our results showed that the majority of medicinal plants (flowers) samples
from markets had higher level of these heavy metals although these contents in samples which
harvested from Kashan farms shows lower level of heavy metal contamination. It revealed that
probably the transferring process and storing herbal plants are the main factors for contaminating.

Keywords

• Heavy metals
• Rosa damascena
• Herbal Markets
• Kashan

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