C-MERC's research findings are especially timely, as the U.S. and other nations prepare for the fifth session of the United Nations Environment Programme's Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC5) on January 13-18, 2013 in Geneva, Switzerland, which is working to prepare a legally binding instrument to control mercury releases to the environment.
"Despite the fact that most people's mercury exposure is through the consumption of marine fish, this is the first time that scientists have worked together to synthesize what is known about how mercury moves from its various sources to different areas of the ocean and then up the food chain to the seafood most people eat," said Celia Y. Chen, Ph.D., Research Professor of Biological Sciences at Dartmouth. She is a co-author of the new Environmental Health Perspectives papers on nutrient supply and mercury dynamics, and mercury sources in the Gulf of Maine, and authored an editorial on the subject in the journal, and is also a lead author of "Sources to Seafood." Chen will represent Dartmouth as an accredited non-governmental organization at INC5 in an observer status. Copies of C-MERC's Sources to Seafood report will be made available to INC5 attendees.
C-MERC research suggests that mercury deposited from the atmosphere ranges from 56% of the mercury loading to several large gulfs to approximately 90% in the open ocean.
"Oceans are home to large tuna and swordfish, which together account for more than half of the mercury intake from seafood for the overall U.S. population," said Elsie M. Sunderland, Assistant Professor of Aquatic Science at Harvard Univer
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| Contact: Amy Olson Amy.D.Olson@dartmouth.edu 603-646-3274 Dartmouth College Source:Eurekalert |