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Formation and fate of oxidized mercury in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere

Nature Geoscience volume 5, pages 114–117 (2012)Cite this article

Abstract

Mercury contamination affects many aquatic ecosystems1. The atmosphere is the main transport route for this toxicant2. According to aircraft measurements, the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere are depleted in gaseous elemental mercury3,4 but enriched in oxidized, particle-bound mercury5,6. It is therefore assumed that mercury is oxidized in the stratosphere, and then incorporated into stratospheric aerosols6. However, direct evidence for mercury oxidation in the stratosphere is missing. Here, we present simultaneous measurements of elemental and oxidized mercury concentrations in air of stratospheric origin, collected during an aircraft campaign over North America and Europe in 2010. We show that levels of oxidized mercury are strongly correlated with tracers of stratospheric air. Concentrations of total and elemental mercury, in contrast, are negatively correlated with these tracers. Together, the findings indicate that elemental mercury is oxidized in stratospheric air masses. We develop a numerical model of atmospheric mercury, based on the assumption that mercury is oxidized in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere. The resultant vertical profiles—which depict a rapid decline in mercury concentrations with increasing stratospheric height—resemble those seen in other studies, and indicate that mercury has a relatively short stratospheric lifetime. We suggest that following oxidation, mercury is removed from the stratosphere by sedimentation and entrainment processes common to all stratospheric particles.

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Figure 1: Mercury and ozone during a 5 November 2011 flight through stratosphere-influenced air.
Figure 2: Hg(0) versus Hg(II) on 5 November 2011.
Figure 3: Modelled vertical profile of mercury forms.
Figure 4: Mercury versus ozone measured in this study and during other aircraft campaigns.

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Acknowledgements

This study was financially supported by the US National Science Foundation. We thank the CARIBIC team (especially F. Slemr and R. Ebinghaus) for providing us with CARIBIC data (www.caribic-atmospheric.com). We thank R. Talbot at the University of Houston for access to data from INTEX-B and ARCTAS. We are grateful for the efforts of numerous technicians, engineers and scientists at NCAR’s Research Aviation Facility who were essential to the success of this work.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Washington, Bothell, 18115 Campus Way NE, Bothell, Washington 98011, USA

    Seth N. Lyman & Daniel A. Jaffe

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  1. Seth N. Lyman
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Contributions

S.N.L. participated in study design, collected and analysed data and is the primary author of the manuscript. D.A.J. led the study and contributed substantially to all aspects of it, including manuscript preparation.

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Correspondence to Seth N. Lyman.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Lyman, S., Jaffe, D. Formation and fate of oxidized mercury in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere. Nature Geosci 5, 114–117 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo1353

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