Fractionation studies of mercury in soils and sediments: A review of the chemical reagents used for mercury extraction

Mercury in contaminated soils and sediments could be extracted by various chemical reagents in order to determine the different mercury species and partitions, providing useful information of toxicology, bioavailability and biogeochemical reactivity. Unfortunately, at present, neither specific extractants nor standard protocols exist for the isolation of particular mercury species. Although there has been considerable research focused on reagents for extracting mercury species, there is still little consensus. Thus, workers are advised to select the most appropriate reagent based on the nature of their sample, and to take all possible steps to validate the analyses performed. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to review the current reagents used for determining total mercury and its speciation as well as fractionation such as methylmercury, ethylmercury, elemental mercury, mercury sulphide and organically bound mercury by supposed selective (one reagent) and sequential (several reagents) extractions. The gathering information presented here bring to light the need for standard protocol for which the used chemical reagents should take into account the particular chemistry of mercury associated with specific properties of soil and sediment. Beside this required scheme, appropriate reference materials are also demanded.