Mercury Distribution and Deposition in Glacier Snow over Western

Apr 22, 2012 - Western China is home to the largest aggregate of glaciers outside the polar regions, yet little is known about how the glaciers in thi...
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Mercury Distribution and Deposition in Glacier Snow over Western China Qianggong Zhang,† Jie Huang,† Feiyue Wang,‡,§ Loewen Mark,‡ Jianzhong Xu,§ Debbie Armstrong,‡ Chaoliu Li,† Yulan Zhang,† and Shichang Kang*,†,§ †

Key Laboratory of Tibetan Environment Changes and Land Surface Processes, Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Jia 4 Datun Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing, 100101, P.R. China ‡ Department of Chemistry, and §Department of Environment and Geography, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB R3T 2N2, Canada § State Key Laboratory of Cryospheric Sciences, Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou, 730000, P.R. China S Supporting Information *

ABSTRACT: Western China is home to the largest aggregate of glaciers outside the polar regions, yet little is known about how the glaciers in this area affect the transport and cycling of mercury (Hg) regionally and globally. From 2005 to 2010, extensive glacier snow sampling campaigns were carried out in 14 snowpits from 9 glaciers over western China, and the vertical distribution profiles of Hg were obtained. The Total Hg (THg) concentrations in the glacier snow ranged from