A Simplified Approach to Modeling the Dispersion of Mercury from Precipitation to Surface Waters—The Bay of Kaštela Case Study

Wet deposition is the main source of mercury (Hg) from the atmosphere to the Earth’s surface. However, the processes that govern the dispersion of deposited Hg in seawater are currently not well understood. To address this issue, total mercury (THg) concentrations in surface seawaters and precipitat...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of marine science and engineering Vol. 10; no. 4; p. 539
Main Authors Živković, Igor, Gačnik, Jan, Jozić, Slaven, Kotnik, Jože, Šolić, Mladen, Horvat, Milena
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Basel MDPI AG 01.04.2022
Subjects
Adriatic Sea
Atmospheric models
Chemical analysis
concentration gradient
Correlation
Deposition
Dispersion
Earth surface
Food contamination & poisoning
Hydrology
Mercury
Mixing
Mixing processes
Outliers (statistics)
Precipitation
Seawater
seawater mixing
Sediments
Surface water
Water analysis
Wet deposition
Wind
Wind data
Wind effects
Wind speed
Winds
Adriatic Sea
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Summary:Wet deposition is the main source of mercury (Hg) from the atmosphere to the Earth’s surface. However, the processes that govern the dispersion of deposited Hg in seawater are currently not well understood. To address this issue, total mercury (THg) concentrations in surface seawaters and precipitation were determined on a monthly basis in the Bay of Kaštela (Central Adriatic Sea). Following the assumption that deposited THg is diluted in the seawater bulk due to mixing processes, an exponential decay-like model was developed and the wet deposition of THg was normalized based on periods between precipitation events and seawater sampling. Normalized wet deposition of THg showed significant correlation with the THg gradient in surface seawater after removal of an outlier. To explain the observed outlier, further data normalization included wind data to account for enhanced seawater mixing due to strong winds. Wind-normalized THg deposition of all datapoints showed significant correlation with the THg gradient in surface seawater. The correlation showed that the THg gradient in surface seawater of 0.378 pg L−1 m−1 corresponds to THg wet deposition of 1 ng m−2 after including the influence of wind speed on seawater mixing.
ISSN:2077-1312
2077-1312
DOI:10.3390/jmse10040539