Mercury Redox Chemistry in Waters of the Eastern Asian Seas: From Polluted Coast to Clean Open Ocean

We performed incubation experiments using seawaters from representative marine environments of the eastern Asian seas to determine the mercury (Hg) available for photoreduction (Hgr(II)), to investigate the Hg redox reaction kinetics, and to explore the effect of environmental factors and water chemistry on the Hg redox chemistry. Results show that Hgr(II) accounted for a considerable fraction of total Hg (THg) (%Hgr(II)/THg: 24.90 ± 10.55%, n = 27) and positively correlated with THg. Filtration decreased the Hgr(II) pool of waters with high suspended particulate matter (SPM). The positive linear relationships were found between pseudo-first order rate constants of gross Hg(II) photoreduction (kr) and gross Hg(0) photo-oxidation (ko) with photosynthetically active radiation (PAR). Under the condition of PAR of 1 m mol m–2 s–1, the kr were significantly (p < 0.05) lower than ko (kr/ko: 0.86 ± 0.22). The Hg(0) dark oxidation were significantly higher than the Hg(II) dark reduction. The Hg(II) dark reduction...