Chemometrical classification of biomonitoring analytical data for heavy metals. Part III. Lichens as bioindicators

Abstract

The present study deals with the application of lichens as bioindicators in a large region of Northern Greece including rural and urban sites. Various types of lichens are collected throughout the sampling procedure and the concentrations of four heavy metals (zinc, lead, copper and cadmium) are determined in the bioindicator species by the use of atomic absorption spectrometry. The analytical data is then treated by hard and crisp clustering approaches to evaluate some similarities in the sampling sites and, if possible to report on some specific bioindicating. It is shown that the sampling areas are grouped with respect to their ecological situation and the similarity is proved within the clusters of “rural”;, “urban”;, “anthropogenically influenced”; sites. No lichen selectivity or specificity with respect to certain heavy metal is proved which may be due to the undesigned sampling procedure.

Keywords:

• Heavy metals
• copper
• cadmium
• lead
• zinc
• air pollution
• lichens
• bioindicators
• cluster analysis
• fuzzy clustering

Notes

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