Effect of Chemical Composition on Pulmonary Clearance of Man-Made Mineral Fibres

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Abstract
In order to test whether changes in chemical composition of Slagwool (SW) and of Ceramic fibres (CF) are related to their clearance from the lung, samples of SW and of CF were submitted to energy-dispersive X-ray analysis using two minerals of known composition in respect to A12O3, SiO2, K2O, CaO as controls. For both SW and CF 15 samples were examined of the parental materials, of fibres added to non-exposed lung rat tissue, and of fibres recovered from exposed lung tissue 5, 30, 90, 180 and 270 days after inhalation. Results indicate a more marked alteration in fibre composition with passage of time for SW than for CF, of Mg detected after 180 days in SW fibres and at 180 days only about 25% of the original Ca and Al amount was found. Little change occurs in CF fibres except for an abrupt fall in Al content at 270 days, most probably due a technical artifact. The findings appear in agreement with previous results indicating a higher clearance rate from the lung of slagwool fibres in respect to ceramic fibres.

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