Spatial variation and potential ecological risk assessment of trace elements in the sediments of Chaohu Lake in China

 This study analyzed the heavy metals contents of copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), cadmium (Cd), mercury (Hg), arsenic (As), chromium (Cr), nickel (Ni), and lead (Pb) in sediments of the Chaohu Lake using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. All the data processes were conducted using Microsoft Office 2019, and the statistical analyses using the Sigma-Plot version 12.0 (Systat Software, Inc., San Jose, CA, USA) and SPSS (Version 19.0, Chicago, IL, USA).

The geospatial map was accomplished using ArcGIS 10.2 (Esri, Redlands, CA, USA). Pearson’s correlation coefficient evaluated the occurrence of a linear correlation between analyzed variables. Data analysis also included mean and standard deviations.