ABSTRACT

Seafood is a popular choice for many Nigerian families when it comes to preparing delicious meals. Seafood contains iodine, making it a valuable source of this essential nutrient. The nutritional significance of iodine in the body is of great importance and consuming seafood in appropriate amounts can effectively prevent iodine deficiency disorders. In this study iodine content was analyzed in two commonly consumed seafood species; Shrimp (Penaeus notialis) and Prawn (Macobrachion vollenhovenii)from a local seafood market in Benin City, Edo state, Nigeria. The iodine concentration in shrimp and prawn muscle tissue were analyzed using Inductively-coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS), the result showed the mean iodine concentration in shrimp (Penaeus notialis) and prawn (Macrobrachion vollenhovenii) to be 61.00 Mg/kg and 44.42Mg/kg respectively, the morphometric data was measured and documented with the mean and standard error of the body weight of 20.22g and 41.4g respectively. The relationship between the iodine content and morphometric of the shrimp and prawn exhibited no limitation in growth of the shellfish species.  The correlation of the results in this study with other findings indicated that Penaeus notialis and Macobrachion vollenhovenii in this study reported extremely high levels of iodine, as such continuous monitoring of iodine concentration in consumed seafood species is recommended as excessive consumption of iodine can pose human health risk to the populace.