Bioaccumulation of heavy metals in fish muscle at the Likas Bay, Kota Kinabalu / Kasfizal Kamis

Heavy metal can cause a potential hazard to human such as gastrointestinal effect and cancer. This study aim to identify the concentration of heavy metal namely Cadmium (Cd), Copper (Cu), and Iron (Fe) in the water and fish sample located in 5 station in Likas Bay, Kota Kinabalu and correlates the relationship between the heavy metals in both water and fish. Moreover, the physiochemical parameters were also determined along the station. The detection of heavy metal in both water and fish were compared with the maximum permissible limit in various organizations to assess the safe consumption in human. Acid digestion was used to digest both fish and water sample and only 0.5g composite samples of muscle part of the fish were taken to analyzed. Atomic Absorption Spectrometry (AAS) was used to analyze all samples in this study. From the study, it is found that all fish fall below the maximum permissible limit by various organizations established by FAO/WHO limit (1989), WHO (1989), England (2000), and Malaysian Food Act 1983 & Food Regulation 1985. However, in water samples, only copper meet the standard of the maximum permissible limit meanwhile Iron and Cadmium exceed the standard. The current study also showed that Iron, Fe is the most found heavy metal in the water and fish compared to the Cadmium and Copper and were further supported by a strong positive correlation of heavy metals in Hexanematichtys sago accumulation toward iron with the spearman correlation value of 0.733.