NEHA September 2025 Journal of Environmental Health

ADVANCEMENT OF THE SCIENCE

TABLE 1

Reported Ingredients of Tattoo Inks According to Manufacturer’s Label and Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS)

Tattoo Ink

INTENZE: Lemon Yellow

INTENZE: Golden Yellow

MSDS

Confirmed in Study

Declaration of Ingredients *

MSDS

Confirmed in Study

Declaration of Ingredients *

2018 2022 2023

2018 2022 2023

x x x x – –

x x x –

x x x –

x x

x

x x

x x

x x

TiO 2

BaSO 4 PB15 PY65 PY14 PO13 Aqua

– – – x x x x

– –

– –

– –

– – x x

– –

x

x

x

x

x

x

– x x

– x x

– – – –

– – – –

x

x x x

x x x

x x x

x x x

– – –

Glycerine

Hamamelis virginiana (witch-hazel) extract

x

x

x

Isopropyl alcohol

x

x

x

x

continued 

lene chloride (99.9% purity) was purchased from RCI Labscan, Australia. Except for the tattoo inks, all chemicals used in our study were not purified further. Tattoo inks were pipetted onto microscope slides and dried in open air at ambient tem- perature for 48 hr prior to characterization. To extract the pigments from the liquid tattoo inks, we added approximately 25 mg of tattoo ink to a 50-ml conical glass tube containing 2 ml of water. The contents were mixed vig- orously and extracted 3 times with 15 ml of methylene chloride. The methylene chloride extracts were combined, dried, and analyzed as dry tattoo ink extracts. Instrumental Analysis Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) was used to generate an IR spectrum of the pigments and dried inks using a Perkin Elmer Spectrum 100 FTIR spectrophotom- eter equipped with an attenuated total reflec- tance (ATR) diamond crystal in the range of 400–4,000 cm -1 with a resolution of 4 cm -1 . The energy of electromagnetic radiation is expressed in wavenumbers, and the intensity is expressed as a percentage of transmittance. Solid state carbon-13 nuclear magnetic resonance ( 13 CNMR) experiments were undertaken using a Bruker Avance III 400 MHz spectrometer operating at 100 MHz

FIGURE 1

Schematic Representation of the Reference Pigments Reported to Be Present in the Lemon Yellow (LY), Golden Yellow (GY), Golden Rod (GR), and Bright Orange (BO) Tattoo Inks

Note. PB = pigment blue; PO = pigment orange; PY = pigment yellow.

for 13 C. Chemical shifts are relative to ada- mantane. Approximately 100 mg of pigment sample/dried ink extract was placed in a Bruker 4-mm rotor and spun at 5 kHz. 1 H- 13 C

cross-polarization magic angle spinning spectra were recorded using an acquisition time of 18.4 ms, a recycle delay of 2 s, and a contact time of 4 ms with a 50% ramp and

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Volume 88 • Number 2

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