USE OF AGRICULTURAL PLANTS FOR ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING OF HEAVY AND TOXIC ELEMENTS Petya Kovacheva, Rumiana Djingova Faculty of Chemistry, University of Sofia, 1, J. Bouchier Blvd., 1126 Sofia, Bulgaria E-mail: RDjingova@chem.uni-sofia.bg Abstract An assessment of environmental metal pollution using agricultural plants, sampled from a background region and 3 regions with different anthropogenic contamination in Bulgaria was performed. Multielement analysis of leaves and fruits of apple, pear, maize and sunflower was carried out using ICP-AES. The concentrations of Al, As, Ba, Ca, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Fe, K, Mg, Mn, Na, Ni, Pb, Sb, Zn were determined. A comparison of the accumulation of heavy and toxic elements between the plant species under investigation was done by accumulation coefficients calculation. It has been established that the sunflower leaves are efficient for estimation of environmental contamination with Al, Cd, Fe and Sb; the maize leaves - for As, Co, Ni and Pb; the pear leaves - for Cu and Zn and the apple leaves - for Cr. On the basis of the accumulation coefficients the level of metal pollution of the different regions was evaluated. Introduction Increase of trace element concentrations and their redistribution in the different components of the biosphere is an actual problem for the contemporary ecological monitoring. Large amounts of heavy and toxic metals, emitted from various anthropogenic sources enter the environment. The enhancement of metal concentrations in soils, waters and air gives rise to their accumulation in plant organisms through the leaf surface and the root system. This could disturb not only the growth and the living cycle of plants, but also endanger the health of other organisms by further redistribution of heavy and toxic elements along the trophic chain. In this respect the response of agricultural plants to the metal pollution of the environment appears to be of special interest. There are already a lot of investigations, reporting accumulation of toxic elements in agricultural plant species [1-6]. According to the data, published in [2] the most effective accumulaton of heavy and toxic elements is observed for the leafy vegetables, followed by the corn and stem vegetables, and the lowest metal accumulation in this order is found for the fruits. The aim of the present contribution is to establish the response of some agricultural plant species to the environmental contamination with heavy and toxic elements. A comparison of the accumulation ability of the species under investigation will be performed using accumulation coefficients (Ka) calculation. On the basis of the obtained data the level of metal contamination in the different regions will be evaluated.