Paper Title
Correlation of Mercury, Cadmium, and Lead Levels in The Hair with Autism in Libyan Children

Abstract
Determination of the toxicity level of heavy metals in autism is one of the major challenges for modern scientists. The main pathogenic factors implicated in these disorders are epigenetic changes caused by environmental factors, which include toxic metals (Cd, Pb, Hg). In this work, hair samples from 40 Libyan children ranging from 4 to 16 years of age were analyzed using Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS) after microwave-assisted acid digestion (HNO3 + H2O2) to determine the level of heavy metals (Cd, Pb and Hg) across autism and normal children. The results showed that the mean concentrations (μg/g) of children with autism are Pb 40.99 ± 32.02, Cd 0.82 ± 0.98, and Hg 7.84 ± 10.57, while those of normal children are Pb 37.00 ± 14.61, Cd 0.42 ± 0.27, and Hg 4.07 ± 2.54. The comparison indicated that lead (Pb), cadmium (Cd), and mercury (Hg) contents are found higher in children with autism than those in normal children. Good agreement with the certified values of Pb, Cd, and Hg concentrations could be achieved by the proposed method through the analysis of the human hair certified reference of material (CRM) GBW07601 Keywords - Heavy metal, autism, hair, children, ICP-MS