1) Please find a diagram on the internet that shows that global mercury cycle. Pick the one that you like and that provides the information that you feel is necessary to educate the reader about mercury occurrence and movement in the environment.

2) Do a bit of research on one more mercury researcher...In this case, please learn about Dr. Johan (Hans) F. Gottgens. Hans is one of my best friends and he is an exceptional scientist, researcher, person! Identify where Hans works, name the research center at his university of which he is affiliated (he actually founded the research center...but for some reason he doesn't get credit for it in the university website), name two papers that he published on mercury contamination and one papers that he published on some topic other than mercury contamination.

Dr. Johan F. Gottgens works at the University of Toledo.

He works for the Lake Erie Center.

Two papers about Mercury:

Leady, B.S. and J.F. Gottgens. 2001. Mercury accumulation in sediment cores and along food chains in two regions of the Brazilian Pantanal. Wetlands Ecology and Management9(4): 349-361

Rood, B.E., J.J. Delfino and J.F. Gottgens. 2000. Bathymetry, paleolimnology and mercury accumulation in a sinkhole lake in the Florida Everglades, USA. Verh. Int. Ver. Limnol.27: 2312-2316.

Paper about something other than Mercury:

Nelson, K.M.*, J. F. Gottgens and E. J. Tramer. Environmental correlates of tree species distribution in a Great Lakes tributary floodplain forest. Wetlands (in revision)

3) Find a picture of William (Bill) Fitzgerald, Marc Lucotte, and Hans Gottgens and post them on your blog and identify the universities, including department, address and e-mail address next to each of their pictures.

William Fitzgerald, University of Connecticut, Department of Marine Sciences, 1080 Shennecossett Road Groton, CT 06340, and william.fitzgerald@uconn.edu

Marc Lucotte, Université du Québec à Montréal, Department of Earth Sciences and Atmospher CP 8888 succursale Centre Ville, Montreal, Quebec, CA, and lucotte.marc_michel@uqam.ca

Hans Gottgens, University of Toldeo, Department of Environmental Science, 2801 Bancroft Toledo, Ohio 43606-3390, johan.gottgens@utoledo.edu

4) Find and post on your blog the fish mercury concentration ranges that are used to determine consumption advisories and distinguish the recommended actions for these concentration ranges (i.e. mercury concentration > ###, ACTION = nobody should ever eat the fish... OR mercury concentration between ### and ###, small children and pregnant women should only eat one fish meal per month). If you can find this as a diagram, you are well to post the entire diagram. Alternatively, you can type it out manually.

The US EPA states that all fish containing less than 0.3 ppm mercury are safe to consume. Up to 1 meal a week of fish containing between 0.3 and 1.0 ppm of mercury is safe to consume. Fish containing over 1.0 ppm of mercury should not be eaten. This is consistent with the current mercury FDA action level. Pregnant women should only eat 1 meal a week of fish that are caught from local sources by friends and family.