Unraveling the biogeochemical cycling of mercury using stable mercury isotopes as source tracers

汞污染在地方、区域和全球范围内对人类健康和自然生态系统构成重大威胁。尽管自前工业时代以来，人为汞排放急剧增加，但自然排放对全球汞总量和通量的贡献很大。这给负责管理环境中汞的监管机构带来了相当大的挑战，因为通常无法区分自然汞来源和人为汞来源。因此，详细了解汞的地球化学循环至关重要，但并不总是足够的。汞稳定同位素比值的测定和汞同位素分馏的确定是一种新的有前途的工具，以追踪汞的来源，并获得新的见解，他们的相对重要性，总汞迁移。

Mercury contamination poses a significant threat for human health and natural ecosystems at local, regional and global scales. Although man-made mercury emissions have increased dramatically since pre-industrial times, natural emissions represent a substantial contribution the overall global inventory and fluxes. This poses a considerable challenge for regulators tasked with managing mercury in the environment, as it is often impossible to distinguish natural from anthropogenic mercury sources. Thus, a detailed understanding of the biogeochemical cycle of mercury is crucial, but not always sufficient. The measurement of stable mercury isotope ratios and determination mercury isotope fractionation is a new promising tool to trace sources of mercury and to gain new insights into their relative importance to the total mercury transport.