A lithium content below 1.7 mg/kg diet dry matter (DM) had a particular effect on the growth, reproduction performance, wellness and mortality of goats. The significant shift of the sex ratio of kids toward females, reduced monoaminooxidase activity in the liver, and increased creatine kinase activity (a stress indicator) are also interesting results. The normative lithium requirement of animals (goats, pigs) amounts to < 2.5 mg/kg diet DM, while that of adult humans might amount to < 200 μg/day.

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Fluorine-nondepleted rats and goats failed to show a significant influence of fluorine-poor nutrition on growth and reproduction performance. Intrauterinely fluorine-depletion over 11 generations of goats with 300 μg F/kg feed dry matter (DM) highlighted the essentiality of fluorine. They consumed significantly more feed, suffered from significant intrauterine and post-natal growth retardation, and had a significantly higher kid mortality rate. Old animals developed skeletal and joint deformities. Intrauterinely fluorine-depleted kids suffered from thymus hypoplasia. The normative fluorine requirement of animals (goats) is 650 μg/kg feed DM, while that of humans amounts to 250 μg/day. The intake of less than 800 μg bromine (Br)/kg feed DM by goats caused a decrease in their feed intake, weight gain, conception rate, and especially their hemoglobin synthesis. Bromine-deficient goats possessed significantly higher triglyceride levels and gamma-glutamyl transferase activities in the blood plasma. The abnormal metabolism of lipids is a symptom of hypobromosis, which manifests itself in fatty hepatosis as well as lipomatosis of somatic muscles. The normative requirement could be 1000 to 1500 μg Br/kg feed DM for goats (animals) and 500 μg Br/day for adult man. The bromine requirements of animals and man are satisfied by food and water.

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Nine generations of goats receiving 2.5 to 6.5 mg Al/kg feed dry matter (DM) developed significantly increased mortality, impaired success of first insemination, an increased rate of abortions and, in the fourth generation, a distinct weakness of the hindlegs. Aluminum-poor nutrition led to significant variations of Al contents of aorta, spleen and bones. This effect of aluminum-poor nutrition was also evident in chickens. The normative requirement of animals is < 10 mg Al/kg diet DM. A potential daily normative aluminum requirement - if it should exist - is < 2000 μg, on the average of a week. The aluminum requirement of animals and man is satisfied by the natural aluminum offer.

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Semisynthetic feeds with < 35 μg arsenic (As)/kg feed dry matter (DM) reduced the intrauterine growth rate, success of first insemination, conception rate and milk production, and increased the abortion rate and mortality of goats, minipigs, rats and chickens. None of the pregnant, As-deficient goats survived the second lactation. Death regularly occurred between the 17^th and 35^th day of lactation; typically, animals suffered spasms and died shortly thereafter. The normative requirement of goats, minipigs, rats and chickens is < 50 μg As/kg diet DM, while that of human adults is < 10 μg/day.

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Cadmium-poor nutrition (< 15 μg Cd/kg feed dry matter (DM)) did not affect feed intake and growth rate, while it affected reproduction performance. Intrauterinally cadmium-depleted kids were often phlegmatic, too lazy to eat and drink, and died of muscle weakness. With oral application of the control feed (300 μg Cd/kg DM), they slowly regained their mobility. Feeding them 65 μg Cd/kg feed DM prevented myasthenia. The normative cadmium requirement of goats (and animals in general) amounts to < 20 μg/kg diet DM. The daily requirement of humans might be < 3 μg.

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Rubidium-poor nutrition with 280 μg Rb/kg diet DM reduced feed intake, pre- and postnatal growth rate and conception rate of goats significantly. The most important finding was the extremely high abortion rate (> 80%) of rubidium-deficient goats. Goats with abortion had a progesterone level of only 7% of the normal amount. The plasma estradiol level in aborting goats ranged from 37 to 280 nmol/l. The normative requirement of goats, and animals in general, might reach < 400 μg/kg feed dry matter (DM). Rubidium (Rb) deficiency is not to be expected in humans. None of the 70 female and 70 male subjects investigated ingested less than 400 μg Rb/day. Thus, the rubidium requirement of humans - if it should exist - might be rated as < 400 μg/day.

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In 14 experiments with intraunterinely depleted goats getting < 20 μg V/kg ration DM, V-deficient goats suffered pain in the extremities, developed swollen tarsal joints of the forefeet, glandular hyperplasia of the endometrium and increased size of pancreas, thymus and thyroid compared with controls. The normative requirement of Vanadium (V) for animals amounts to > 20 μg diet DM and < 5 μg V/day for adult humans.

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The recent research trends on metallomics, which was proposed as integrated biometal science, are reviewed with emphasis on chemical speciation of trace metals in biological systems. The background of proposal of metallomics, literature survey of metallomics and related scientific fields, such as genomics and proteomics, and the research fields to be promoted in metallomics are discussed from the viewpoints of biometal-assisted function science. Furthermore, the present status of metallomics research are described in terms of all-elements analysis of one biolorical cell (cell microcosm) and hyphenated instrumental systems for chemical speciation. As for the experimental results, the metal-profiling chromatograms for salmon egg cell cytoplasm, speciation of mercury and arsenic in salmon egg cell, speciation and excretion patterns of arsenic species in human urine after ingestion of Hijiki (seaweed), and binding behaviors of cisplatin (anti-cancer drug) with DNA and RNA are introduced in relation with chemical speciation for metallomics. Finally, future prospective of metallomics research is discussed, focusing on the significance of all-elements or multielement analysis in biomedical research/diagnosis and the metallomics-oriented research on chemical evolution.

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Radioactive multitracer technology was developed at the RIKEN Accelerator Research Facility about 15 years ago. It enables efficient and simultaneous tracing of a number of elements under identical experimental conditions. Since 1991, this multitracer technology has been applied to the investigations of the behaviors of various elements in chemistry, biochemistry, pharmaceutical sciences, medical sciences, nutritional sciences, agricultural sciences, and environmental sciences. Recently, a new multitracer production system, which consists of a gas-jet-coupled mutitarget system for short-lived radioactive tracers and a gas- and water-cooled target system for intense beam irradiations, has been installed on a beam line of the K540 MeV RIKEN Ring Cyclotron. In this paper, we present its principle and features with several examples of recent studies.

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Trace elements in ancient rices and a present-day rice were determined by ICP-MS and neutron activation analysis (NAA). The relationship among the element concentrations, species of rices, individual parts with different degrees of polishing and the harvest site were examined. In general, element contents in the rices were in the following order: Mn > Zn > Fe > Al. The trace metals Mo, Cu, and Co were also found in the redrice from the Toyama Prefecture, while Mo, Cu, and Cr were included in the black rices from Hiraka-gun and Nakashinkawa-gun of Akita Prefecture, as well as in the present-day rice from the Niigata Prefecture. Higher amounts of the elements were observed in the rice bran as compare to other parts of the rice, and white rice contained less of the elements than the other rices. These results will be beneficial in the development of trace element supplementation regimens.

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Lithium carbonate is known as medical supplies for the remedy or prevention of manic-depressive psychosis. Blood lithium concentrations of their patients generally should be monitored during their hospital-treatments not to beyond the toxic concentration level of lithium. When heparin is usually added to a blood sample for preventing the blood-coagulation, impurity lithium of the reagent gives a positive error for the determination of lithium concentration of the blood. In this work the lithium concentration was determined by flame photometry after the decomposition of a sample with nitric-perchloric acids or hydrofluoric-nitric-perchloric acids for food samples. In the chemicals used for anticoagulant it was found that sodium citrate, heparin sodium salt and EDTA-2Na contained high amounts of lithium as impurity; 422, 221and 204 ng/g, respectively, whereas lithium was not detected in EDTA-4H and citric acid. Impurity lithium content of chemicals of general salt of sodium, potassium, magnesium and calcium were also tested; there was a fact that considerable amounts of lithium, 39500 and 14000 ng/g, existed in high purity of calcium metal and its carbonate. The Li/Ca ratio of the content of calcium salt (chemicals, n=36) was almost constant, and there was a good correlation between lithium and calcium content. The same tendency of the constant ratio of Li/Ca for the chemicals was also found in natural carbonate minerals of calcite, dolomite and aragonite, and biological materials of human milk, human serum, mammalian bone and oyster shell. On the other hand, lithium concentrations of plasma of healthy Japanese and Korean female were investigated, and the relationship between plasma lithium concentration and daily dietary lithium intake of the healthy people at urban district and village near seashore were also investigated in Korea. There was no significant difference between dietary lithium intake and plasma lithium concentration for the healthy people. Plasma lithium concentration was almost constant to be 11±2 ng/g (n=164) for healthy people.

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Serum zinc (Zn) tends to be low in elderly inpatients. Therefore, serum copper (Cu) / zinc (Zn) ratio was examined in elderly ones with enteral liquid foods or with oral diets. In either 396 subjects (143 men, 253 women) with enteral liquid foods or 152 (60 men, 92 women) with oral diets, these subjects were divided into many groups by every 10 μg/dl of serum Cu; 1-10 μg/dl, 11-20 μg/dl, 21-30 μg/dl, 31-40 μg/dl, 41-50 μg/dl, 51-60 μg/dl, 61-70 μg/dl, 71-80 μg/dl, 81-90 μg/dl, 91-100 μg/dl, 101-110 μg/dl, 111-120 μg/dl, 121-130 μg/dl, ≥ 131 μg/dl in enteral liquid foods, and 81-90 μg/dl, 91-100 μg/dl, 101-110 μg/dl, 111-120 μg/dl, 121-130 μg/dl, ≥ 131 μg/dl in oral diets. Furthermore, serum Cu/Zn ratios were investigated in inpatients with various diseases. Serum Cu/Zn ratio became higher significantly by the higher levels of serum Cu, because serum Zn remained almost constant in both enteral liquid foods and oral diets. Serum Cu/Zn ratio of inpatients with diabetes mellitus (7 men, 11 women), chronic renal failure (8 men, 35 women) and hepatic failure (8 women) were examined comparing to serum Cu/Zn ratio of the controls (10 men, 28 women). In inpatients with various diseases who ingested oral diets, serum Cu/Zn ratio was the following orders; the controls < diabetes mellitus < chronic renal failure < hepatic failure, when serum Cu levels were almost constant in the above cases. Therefore, serum Zn levels were lowest in inpatients with hepatic failure.

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This investigation aimed to determine whether enteral liquid L-8 (Asahi Kasei Pharma) could provide with adequate contents of some trace elements or not, which contained 0.8 mg of copper (Cu) and 40 μg of selenium (Se) per 1,000 kcal. The investigative period was 12 months. L-8 was administrated to 9 cases (2 men, 7 women), who were divided into 2 groups: 5 cases (1 man, 4 women) with hypocupremia, 72±17 years old and 4 cases (1 man, 3 women) with normocupremia, 80±12 years old. Serum Cu, ceruloplasmin (Cp) and Se increased significantly, resulting in their normal ranges. Mean 0.77 mg of Cu intake and 38.4 μg of Se intake appear to be daily adequate amounts for elderly inpatients with enteral liquid foods. Blood molybdenum (Mo), manganese (Mn) and iodine (I) also increased, while serum zinc (Zn) and iron (Fe) did not change significantly by use of L-8 liquid food for 12 months.

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