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. 2020 Feb 26;10(1):3446.
doi: 10.1038/s41598-020-60261-6.

Input of terrestrial organic matter linked to deglaciation increased mercury transport to the Svalbard fjords

Haryun Kim  1 , Sae Yun Kwon  2 , Kitack Lee  2 , Dhongil Lim  3 , Seunghee Han  4 , Tae-Wook Kim  5 , Young Ji Joo  6 , Jaesoo Lim  7 , Moo-Hee Kang  8 , Seung-Il Nam  9
Affiliations

Input of terrestrial organic matter linked to deglaciation increased mercury transport to the Svalbard fjords

Haryun Kim et al. Sci Rep. .

Abstract

Deglaciation has accelerated the transport of minerals as well as modern and ancient organic matter from land to fjord sediments in Spitsbergen, Svalbard, in the European Arctic Ocean. Consequently, such sediments may contain significant levels of total mercury (THg) bound to terrestrial organic matter. The present study compared THg contents in surface sediments from three fjord settings in Spitsbergen: Hornsund in the southern Spitsbergen, which has high annual volume of loss glacier and receives sediment from multiple tidewater glaciers, Dicksonfjorden in the central Spitsbergen, which receives sediment from glacifluvial rivers, and Wijdefjorden in the northern Spitsbergen, which receive sediments from a mixture of tidewater glaciers and glacifluvial rivers. Our results showed that the THg (52 ± 15 ng g-1) bound to organic matter (OM) was the highest in the Hornsund surface sediments, where the glacier loss (0.44 km3 yr-1) and organic carbon accumulation rates (9.3 ~ 49.4 g m-2 yr-1) were elevated compared to other fjords. Furthermore, the δ13C (-27 ~ -24‰) and δ34S values (-10 ~ 15‰) of OM indicated that most of OM were originated from terrestrial sources. Thus, the temperature-driven glacial melting could release more OM originating from the meltwater or terrestrial materials, which are available for THg binding in the European Arctic fjord ecosystems.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Spatial distributions of absolute THg concentration in the surface sediment of the Wijdefjorden, Dicksonfjorden, and Hornsund of Svalbard archipelago. The K, I, and A mean Kongsfjorden, Isfjorden, and Adventfjord, respectively. Red and blue arrows indicate warm Atlantic and cold Arctic currents, respectively. The map was created using an S100 Raster Data Set in Matlab 2018a version.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Box plots of trace metal concentrations (As, Cu, Ni, Zn, Cr, and Pb) in the surface sediments of the Svalbard fjords that were studied.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Relationships between TOC (A), TS (B) and THg concentrations of the surface sediments in the Svalbard fjords that were studied.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Relationship between TOC/TN ratio and δ13C values (‰) (A), THg and TOC/TN ratios (B), the percentage of terrestrial organic carbon (Fterr; C), and THg and δ34S (‰) values (D) in the surface sediments in the Svalbard fjords studied. The blue box (A) indicates the range of TOC/TN ratio and δ13C (‰) that are derived from terrestrial OM.
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