Measurements were made regarding the adsorption of lead, cadmium, copper, zinc and barium to freshwater surface coatings (biofilms and associated minerals), which were collected in Nanhu Lake in Jilin Province, PR China, in order to investigate the variability of adsorption capacities of these heavy metals mentioned in the above surface coatings. The adsorption of lead and other heavy metals to the biofilms was observed to decrease in the following order: copper, lead, zinc, cadmium, and barium. Generally, the values of Gamma(max) (the maximum adsorption, micromol/m(2)) increased with the standard electrode potential of metal elements used and were recorded as 166.7, 40.0, 29.4, 10.8, and 1.8 for copper, lead, zinc, cadmium and barium, respectively. The values of 1/Gamma(max) increased linearly with the decrease in values of the standard electrode potential of metal elements with a significant correlation (n=5, p=0.01) and increased linearly with the increase in values of covalent radius of metal elements with a significant correlation (n=5, p=0.05). This indicates that standard electrode potential and covalent radius were two of the principal characteristics of metals employed, causing the variation of lead and other heavy metal adsorption to the surface coatings.