Mercury chemistry in the Arctic: study of « Atmospheric Mercury Depletion Events »

Environmental pollution caused by mercury has been a cause of concern for decades. In Arctic, it undergoes during polar spring special reactions and can then be deposited onto snow packs leading to contamination of sensitive ecosystems. These special events are called Atmospheric Mercury Depletion Events (AMDEs).During field experiments in Arctic, we observed seven AMDEs and we then tried to understand which physical and chemical parameters are necessary to produce such events. The roles of low temperatures and frozen surfaces as iced clouds are mentioned. The consequences of AMDEs onto mercury levels in surface snow samples have also been studied. We showed that such events do not always lead to important contamination in surface snow samples, and that we lack of knowledge to precisely quantify the toxic effect of AMDEs in Arctic.