I just had a paper published on environmental Methyl Mercury in subsistence food eating populations.

I took hair samples from 16 people living in the Yup'ik Eskimo village of Napakiak and 20 samples from people on the University of Alaska Fairbanks campus. The Natives had a raw average of 1450 ng/gram versus 190 ng/gram of the Fairbanks population. The water here from wells and the river have been tested to reveal virtually non-detectible levels. They are getting it from the food. I am doing nutritional surveys and taking prepared food samples for analysis this fall.

Mark from Kluane Mountaineering is correct; the environmental microorganisms covert mercury into methyl mercury. Most ingested merc is complexed with the bile salts and passed. The problem with methyl merc is it replaces the sulfur atom in an amino acid (which of course I now forget) and passes through the blood brain barrier into the brain where the merc is released. It interferes with the growth of the microtubules which are necessary to the cell for transport of almost everything in the cell, consequently the cell dies. Normally mercury is complexed with selenium by the brain to form a relatively unreactive compound. This is why the brains of the Spanish mercury miners are found to contain almost perfect 1:1 concentrations of merc to selenium.

It hurts kids because their brains are still developing and it takes time to complex merc with selenium which is relatively rare in the environment. When dealt with acute mercury poisoning, there is no way to get enough selenium to complex with the merc.

How does this all pertain to lead? I don't know, I haven't studied it.

I thought you folks would find this interesting though. I will have to look at lead some more but I am at work and my books are at home.

Whale has high levels of selenium. I don't remember off hand if it's the muktuk, organs or meat.
I'd like to get a copy of your paper.
My research is in the perception of risk from contaminants, but I am very interested in the many biological factors.
I am especially interested in the high levels of contaminants found in Inuit who do not usually show signs of poisoning. I wonder how much of it has to do with their traditional diet.

------------------
Kluane Mountaineering Ltd
http://www.kluane.ab.ca