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Mercury Isotopes

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Encyclopedia of Geochemistry

Part of the book series: Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series ((EESS))

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Introduction

Mercury is a globally distributed pollutant that bioaccumulates in aquatic food webs, leading to dangerous exposure in humans and wildlife (Driscoll et al. 2013; Fitzgerald and Lamborg 2014). Despite decades of research, there are still knowledge gaps that hinder the understanding of both the modern and past Hg cycle and make it challenging to predict how changes in emissions and climate will affect the Hg cycle (Amos et al. 2013; Fitzgerald and Lamborg 2014; Amos et al. 2015). A rapidly growing tool to study Hg is Hg stable isotope geochemistry, which was largely driven by the discovery of large mass independent fractionation (MIF) of Hg isotopes both experimentally and in nature (Buchachenko et al. 2004; Bergquist and Blum 2007; Buchachenko et al. 2007). Hg is unique in that it exhibits several types of stable isotopic fractionation including conventional mass-dependent fractionation (MDF) and at least three types of MIF. Although Hg isotope geochemistry is a...

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Correspondence to Bridget A. Bergquist .

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© 2018 Springer International Publishing AG

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Bergquist, B.A. (2018). Mercury Isotopes. In: White, W. (eds) Encyclopedia of Geochemistry. Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-39193-9_122-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-39193-9_122-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-39193-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-39193-9

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