Background: Rare earth elements (REEs) played an important role in enhancing the yield and quality of tea, and have been widely used in tea cultivation. In the present study, 3011 tea samples of four tea types, namely black tea, green tea, oolong tea and dark tea, were collected from the mainly tea producing areas in different provinces of China to analyze the contents of 16 REEs by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry.
Results: The results obtained showed that the higher average content of REEs was 2.960 mg kg-1 in black tea from Henan province, 2.500 mg·kg-1 in green tea from Shanxi province, 3.870 mg·kg-1 in oolong tea from Guizhou province and 2.955 mg·kg-1 in dark tea from Hunan province. The sum percentage of five elements (Sc, Y, La, Ce, and Nd) to total REEs was 84.39% in black tea, 85.07% in green tea, 83.67% in oolong tea and 84.42% in dark tea. In addition, the content of Ce in tea was greatest, regardless of the province of China. The content trend of the five REEs was Ce > La > Sc > Nd > Y in black and green tea, respectively. However, the content trend was Ce > Y > Sc > Nd > La in oolong tea and Ce > Y > La > Nd > Sc in dark tea.
Conclusion: The tea leaves mainly accumulated light REEs rather than heavy REEs. These results provided an important theoretical basis for investigation of the accumulation characteristics of REEs in Chinese tea. © 2020 Society of Chemical Industry.
Keywords: China; rare earth elements; selective absorption; tea.
© 2020 Society of Chemical Industry.