You might be surprised to learn that gold in the human body exists naturally. Right from the moment of birth.
I mentioned this in the fun facts about gold. The amount is very tiny though.
For example, a 70-kg person has about 0.2 mg of gold, which is equivalent to 0.000000003% of their body weight. If you do the math, 5000 humans, in total, have about 1 g of gold. Not a lot.
Like majority of other trace elements, most of this gold is found in your blood. More than anywhere else though, it is concentrated in the regions around your heart.
Gold specks in your body are not there by coincidence. They have a purpose. Specifically, they are responsible for transduction of electrical signals across your organs, muscles and other tissues. Plus they maintain and keep your joints strong and flexible.
On the interesting note, the same-weighting human has 10 times as more silver in his body. Yeah, silver is floating inside you as well. Didn’t you know that you are a walking mine? Too bad the amounts are tiny.
I bet, if gold and silver occurred in larger quantities (like potassium and sulfur), many would try to extract these precious metals from their blood!
And then articles like “amazing benefits of bloodletting” would start popping up in Internet to justify this self-mutilation! I don’t mean to say that bloodletting has no scientific basis. It actually does. It’s just that humans tend to color dark things they love with white paint to lower the self-guilt. There are articles on the health benefits of smoking, believe it or not… But I am getting off the topic here.
Not only gold
Besides gold and silver, there is a whole array of unexpected elements floating in your body. Including those known for their harm. Like mercury, arsenic and uranium.
Furthermore, if you live in a city, your blood may also contain other precious metals. Like platinum, palladium and even iridium. However, in much much smaller quantities than gold. Their amounts come in nanograms. To give you an idea of the difference consider the following. 1 nanogram is a million times smaller than 1 milligram!
However, unlike gold, the above-mentioned substances are there as a result of their entrance from external environment. Meaning? They come from human-made things. For example, mercury can get into your body if you have mercury fillings in your teeth.
Curious stuff, ha?