Three thousand years of Hg pollution recorded in mangrove wetland sediments from South China.

Mercury (Hg) is known to affect aquatic, terrestrial ecosystems as well as human health, through biomagnification. Mangrove wetlands are potential Hg sinks because of their low tidal velocity, fast sedimentation rate, strong reducing condition and high organic matter content. The spatial and temporal distribution of Hg has been a hot topic of recent studies in mangrove wetlands. In this study, we investigated Hg concentration, accumulation rate and isotopes to reconstruct the Hg pollution history and to differentiate its potential sources in the Gaoqiao mangrove wetland (Guangdong province), which is part of the largest mangrove area in China. We reconstructed a first, continuous, high-resolution Hg pollution history over the last 3000 years in South China. Our findings show that mangrove wetland sediments are more enriched in Hg than the adjacent grasslands. The increased Hg concentration and δ

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Declaration of competing interest The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: Kunshan Bao reports financial support was provided by National Natural Science Foundation of China. If there are other authors, they declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.