The present study in aimed at the determination of concentration of diverse elements like Na, Ca, K, Mg, Cu, Fe, Ni, Cd, Cr, Mn, Zn and Pb in material rich food representative samples of wheat flour, spinach ,apple and milk. Variation in elements concentration in food during the day was also determined by collecting samples in the morning and eveni8ng from three busy commercial areas of Rawalpindi at Saidpur Road, Faizabad Chowk and Commercial market seventy-two samples co0llected from three point from each place were dried, grinded and digested in Nitric acid and Perchloric acid and analyzed by atomic Absorption spectrophotometer. Results revealed that concentration that concentration of each element varies with type of food due to their natural occurrence, sampling time and sampling place ranging from 0.01 ppm-14 ppm. It was also revealed that alkali and alkaline earth metals show decrease in concentration in the evening due to their involvements in redox reactions and bond formation with other elements however, Cu, Fe, Ni, Cd, Cr, Mn, Zn and Pb showed increased variation during the day with lead depicting a maximum of 0.78 ppm. It may be due to the deposition of fuel, smoke containing lead on food. Wheat flour, spinach , apple and milk were found to have upper limits of 13.2 ppm of Mg, 4.88 ppm of Cu, 14 ppm of K and 10.1 ppm of Ca respectively. Variations in sampling place regarding increase in concentration of elements of elements during the day was found to follow the order Saidpur Road>Faizabad Chowk > commercial Market due to comparatively more divers traffic and vendor stands in the first two places.
A ZAHEER ,U RAFIQUE ,A IRUM ,