Heavy metal pollution in urban topsoils: mineralogical analyses and magnetic characterization

Urban soil samples collected from the city of Xuzhou were analyzed by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) for Pb and Zn. The samples were also investigated for mineralogy using X-ray diffraction, thermal analyses and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The identified minerals are mainly composed of quartz and calcite as major minerals. Soil samples contained elevated Zn (2,049 ± 5,439 mg/kg) and Pb (115 ± 58 mg/kg). According to the index of geoaccumulation, the soils of the study area are considered to be moderately to strongly contaminated with respect to Zn, moderately contaminated with respect to Pb. The magnetic measurements indicate that the dominant magnetic components are multidomain grains of ferrimagnetic minerals and that superparamagnetic and stable single-domain ferrimagnetic grains and non-ferrimagnetic minerals are present in small magnetic concentrations in this area. The measured metals correlated positively with the determined magnetic parameters (χ, χARM, SIRM and SOFT). This result suggests that simple, rapid, and non-destructive magnetic measurements could provide useful information about Pb and Zn pollution in Xuzhou urban surface soils.