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Chronic exposure to volcanic gaseous elemental mercury: using wild Mus musculus to unveil its uptake and fate

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Abstract

Volcanoes are a natural source of gaseous elemental mercury (GEM) (Hg0). Monitoring GEM releases of volcanic origin has been widely studied; however, few studies have been performed about the biomonitoring of species exposed to GEM, rendering an unknown risk to the worldwide populations living in the vicinity of an active volcano. In this pilot study, we used Mus musculus as a bioindicator species to understand to what extent lungs are the main route of mercury uptake in populations chronically exposed to active volcanic environments. Autometallographic silver protocol was used to detect mercury deposits in the histological lung slides. Abundant mercury deposits were found in the lungs of specimens captured at the site with volcanic activity (Furnas Village, S. Miguel Island—Azores). The presence of mercury in the lungs could represent not only hazardous effects to the lung itself but also to other tissues and organs, such as brain and kidneys. This study confirms that the main uptake route for GEM is the lungs and that, even at very low concentrations in the environment, a chronic exposure to Hg0 results in its bioaccumulation in the lung tissue. These results reinforce that biomonitoring studies should be combined with monitoring classical approaches in order to better characterize the risks of exposure to Hg0 in volcanic environments.

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Fig. 1

Data availability and materials

The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Paulo Melo for the field assistance in the capture of Mus musculus. Ricardo Camarinho is currently supported by a PhD fellowship grant (M3.1.a/F/048/2015) from Fundo Regional da Ciência (Regional Government of the Azores).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculdade de Ciências E Tecnologia, Universidade Dos Açores, Rua da Mãe de Deus, Apartado 1422, 9501-801, Ponta Delgada, Açores, Portugal

    R. Camarinho, P. V. Garcia & A. S. Rodrigues

  2. University of the Azores, 9501-801, Ponta Delgada, Portugal

    R. Camarinho & A. S. Rodrigues

  3. Centre for Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Changes/Azorean Biodiversity Group, University of the Azores, 9501-801, Ponta Delgada, Azores, Portugal

    P. V. Garcia

  4. Department of Biotechnology, University of Alicante, Apart 99, 03080, Alicante, Spain

    A. Navarro-Sempere, M. García & Y. Segovia

Authors
  1. R. Camarinho
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  2. A. Navarro-Sempere
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  3. P. V. Garcia
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  4. M. García
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  5. Y. Segovia
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  6. A. S. Rodrigues
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to A. S. Rodrigues.

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The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Ethical statement

All procedures were carried out in strict accordance with the European Convention for the Protection of Vertebrate Animals used for Experimental and other Scientific Purposes (ETS 123: directive 2010/63/EU) and the Portuguese Law Decree (DL 113/2012). This study was approved by the University of Azores ethics committee (10/2020).

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Camarinho, R., Navarro-Sempere, A., Garcia, P.V. et al. Chronic exposure to volcanic gaseous elemental mercury: using wild Mus musculus to unveil its uptake and fate. Environ Geochem Health 43, 4863–4867 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10653-021-00924-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10653-021-00924-z

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