Atmospheric Modelling of Mercury in the Southern Hemisphere and Future Research Needs: A Review

Abstract

Mercury is a toxic pollutant that can negatively impact the population’s health and the environment. The research on atmospheric mercury is of critical concern because of the diverse process that this pollutant suffers in the atmosphere as well as its deposition capacity, which can provoke diverse health issues. The Minamata Convention encourages the protection of the adverse effects of mercury, where research is a part of the strategies and atmospheric modelling plays a critical role in achieving the proposed aim. This paper reviews the study of modelling atmospheric mercury based on the southern hemisphere (SH). The article discusses diverse aspects focused on the SH such as the spatial distribution of mercury, its emissions projections, interhemispheric transport, and deposition. There has been a discrepancy between the observed and the simulated values, especially concerning the seasonality of gaseous elemental mercury and total gaseous mercury. Further, there is a lack of research about the emissions projections in the SH and mercury deposition, which generates uncertainty regarding future global scenarios. More studies on atmospheric mercury behaviour are imperative to better understand the SH’s mercury cycle.

An updated review of the salient geomedical aspects of mercury for enhancement of data quality in simulation modelling and other prognostic applications: Africa case descriptions

“…Despite the prolificity of research worldwide on Hg exposure, there still exist several gaps in our understanding of the element's emissions-to-impact path, as well as the dynamic interactions during metabolic processes that lead to maladies. For instance, there are significant gaps in the knowledge of chemical processes affecting Hg atmospheric transport and deposition, characteristics of the air-surface exchange and processes responsible for reemission of Hg to the atmosphere (Travnikov et al, 2013;Leiva González et al, 2022); and properly designed simulation modelling experiments with high quality input data would go a long way in helping to bridge these knowledge gaps. The assemblage of a high quality geomedical database for Hg would also enhance our predictive capacity for future modifications in Hg pertubations in the environment under climate change, such as the still unknown direction of Hg ocean -air fluxes (See, e.g., Custódio et al, 2022) and the consequent implications for the elements' toxicokinetics.…”