How Much Mercury Is In Your Soil?

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How Much Mercury Is In Your Soil?

• Aubrey Lewis
• Freeport High School
• Mr. Irwin and Ms. Lewis

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Introduction

• Mercury can be found in many different places.
• Landfills, Auto Junkyards, and Beaches.

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What is Mercury

• Mercury is one of many heavy metals on this
  planet.
• Mercury stays in a liquid form at room temp.
• Mercury was used in filling for teeth until
  recently when it was found to be to cause Mercury
  Poisoning

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Mercury Poisoning

• Mercury poisoning effects the nervous system. It
  can cause personality changes, nervousness,
  trembling, and even dementia. In the 19th
  century these people were called Mad Hitters.

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Materials

• Mercury Analyzer
• Goggles / Gloves
• BOD Bottles
• Soil Samples

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Reagents and Standards

• 10 Stannous chloride
• Sulfuric acid, 0.5N
• 5 Sodium chloride-hydroxylamine sulfate solution
• Mercury stock solution (1ml1mg Hg )
• Mercury working standard

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Perkin-Elmer FIMS 400
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Mercury Analyzer

• The FIMS 100 Mercury Analyzer use a Flow
  Injection System to analyze the sample
• It reads the absorbs of the sample to see how
  much mercury it contains.
• Absorbs _at_ 257.5um

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MERCURY EXTRACTION METHOD

• 1) 0.6g of sample
• 2) Add 5mL of RGW and 5mL of aqua regia
• 3) Heat for 2min _at_ 950C, than cool
• 4) Add 50mL RGW and 15mL 5 Potassium
  Permanganate (KMnO4)
• 5) Mix and Heat for 30 min _at_ 950C
• 6) Cool, add 6mL of Sodium chloride hydroxylamine
  sulfate
• 7) Analysis within 1-28days

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MERCURY STANDARDS

• STOCK (diluted to 1ppm)
• 100uL of 1,000ppm 100mL 2 HNO3
• 1mL 1mg Hg 1,000pmm
• (For 500mL of 2 HNO3 mix 10mL HNO3 with 490mL
  RGW)
• 100uL / 100mL (50uL / 50mL) 1/1,000 dilution
  1ppm

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Results

• The samples from two landfills have be tested so
  far.
• One sample has a higher percent of Mercury then
  the other.
• We believe this is because of were it was taken.
  

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Later Work

• In later work I want to test samples from all
  over Long Island to see what area has the highest
  amount of Mercury.
• We wish to see if this areas have a higher rate
  of Mercury Poisoning and Developmental Disorders
  then other places.
• And we want to test and see if there are other
  toxic Metals that could be in the soil.

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Acknowledgements

• Dr. Sat Bhattacharya
• Harlem Childrens Society
• Mr. Ed Irwin
• Ms. Vanessa Lewis

THANK YOU FOR YOUR TIME !