Mercury Contamination in Aquatic Environments
A special issue of Water (ISSN 2073-4441). This special issue belongs to the section "Oceans and Coastal Zones".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (1 August 2023) | Viewed by 239
Special Issue Editors
Interests: marine sediments; anthropogenic impact; background values; geochemistry; sediment contamination; marine geology; sedimentology; ecological indicators
Interests: environmental chemistry; bioaccumulation; sediment contamination; organic and inorganic pollutants; biological effects in marine organisms
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
This Special Issue aims to investigate mercury’s sources, fate, transport, and effects on aquatic environments. Although several steps have been taken to reduce or even eliminate the input of this contaminant in the environment, it still accumulates in different environmental matrices, thus representing a global environmental threat to marine organisms and human health due to its ability to form organic complexes, neurotoxic properties, and ability to bioaccumulate and biomagnify within food webs.
This Special Issue aims to update the state of the art regarding this contaminant, together with the results of research carried out to treat the environmental matrices for clean-up, constituting an overall and updated volume on this topic.
The last two centuries of non-circular economic growth have led to significant consequences in terms of contamination of various environmental matrices on land and at sea. In particular, ever-increasing urbanization and the presence of numerous industrial activities (e.g., chemical, petrochemical, thermoelectric, and nuclear), uncontrolled landfills, intensive agricultural activities, military arsenals, shipyards, and maritime traffic have severely altered the natural state of aquatic environments and their related foundations.
The confluence of contaminants in the aquatic environment can occur through punctual and widespread sources; for example, through direct discharge into the sea, run-off from contaminated soils, and atmospheric deposition. Once contaminants arrive in the aquatic environment, their destination is generally sediments, which can therefore play a fundamental role as a secondary source of contamination with a high potential for bioaccumulation in the food web through benthic–pelagic coupling.
Among the most significant contaminants, mercury still represents a significant risk worldwide to the health of ecosystems and humans due to its ability to form organic complexes, neurotoxic properties, and ability to bioaccumulate and biomagnify within food webs.
In this context, collecting the most recent research that is being carried out internationally on mercury issues in various environmental matrices in a single volume can represent an important update on the state of knowledge of this contaminant in aquatic environments.
Dr. Romano Elena
Dr. Antonella Ausili
Dr. Luisa Bergamin
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
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Keywords
- mercury contamination
- aquatic sediments and organisms
- bioaccumulation and biomagnification
- biomarkers
- geochemical anomalies
- background values
- risk assessment
- treatment technologies
