The fate and impact of elemental mercury in closed bacterial cultures were examined. The quantity of elemental mercury oxidized by bacteria ranged from small amounts for Pseudomonas aeruginosa, P. fluorescens, Escherichia coli, and Citrobacter to essentially all of the added elemental mercury for Bacillus subtilis and B. megaterium. The percentage of the total mercury in the system associated w...

Ninety-one albacore tuna (Thunnus alalunga) captured during the 2003 commercial fishing season were tested for total mercury content in muscle tissue. The fish were harvested between 32.72°N (off Southern California) and 48.30°N (off the northern tip of Washington) between July and November. Fish weighed from 3.14 to 11.62 kg and were 50.8-86.4 cm long. Total mercury content in the albacore mus...

Concentrations of methylmercury, total mercury and selenium in marine mammal tissues were determined in liver, muscle, skin (muktuk) and blubber of belugas, ringed seals and narwhal, using atomic absorption and capillary gas chromatography with ECD detection. Mean MeHg levels in the types of tissues analysed, except blubber, generally exceeded the Canadian Federal Consumption Guideline for merc...

Mercury cycling in the water column and upper sediments of a contaminated area, the Largo do Laranjo, Aveiro (Portugal), was evaluated after determination of reactive and non-reactive mercury concentrations in the water column and pore waters of sediments, collected in several places of this bay. In the water column, reactive mercury concentrations varied between 10 and 37 pmol dm(-3), the high...

Artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM) has been an important source of income for communities in the Madre de Dios River Basin in Peru for hundreds of years. However, in recent decades, the scale of ASGM activities in the region has increased dramatically, and exposures to a variety of occupational and environmental hazards related to ASGM, including mercury, are becoming more widespread....

Artisanal gold-mining activities in the Philippines have proliferated since the early 1980s. Presently, environmental and health monitoring conducted by several governmental agencies is limited to the determination of total mercury only. Previous studies undertaken focused mainly on the exposure of adults and workers to mercury during mining/processing operations. However, in one area in Mindan...

Atmospheric total gaseous mercury (TGM) concentrations and wet and dry deposition of mercury at a high-altitude mountain peak in south China X. W. Fu, X. Feng, Z. Q. Dong, R. S. Yin, J. X. Wang, Z. R. Yang, and H. Zhang State Key Laboratory of Environmental Geochemistry, Institute of Geochemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Guiyang 550002, China Guizhou Environmental Science Research Institut...

In this review I evaluate the contribution of Spanish-American silver mines during the period 1570-1820 (a Spanish colonial period of 250 years) to the present high mercury concentrations in the global environment. The evaluation is based upon the following bibliographic information: (1) total amount of mercury consumed in Spanish-American silver mines between 1570 and 1820; (2) percentage of t...

We determined the exposure to mercury from dental amalgam by comparison of blood levels of mercury before and after removal of all amalgams from ten subjects. Baseline concentrations of mercury in whole blood were measured weekly for four to 18 weeks (median = 6.6 weeks) prior to removal. All amalgams were removed in a single appointment. The subjects had an average of 14 surfaces of amalgam, s...