Photoinduced reduction of divalent mercury by quinones in the presence of formic acid under anaerobic conditions

BERKOVIK, ANDREA; BERTOLOTTI, SONIA G; VILLATA, LAURA; GONZÁLEZ, MÓNICA C,; PIS DIEZ, REINALDO; MÁRTIRE, DANIEL O.

CHEMOSPHERE

PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD

Lugar: Amsterdam; Año: 2012 vol. 89 p. 1189 - 1194

0045-6535

The laser flash photolysis technique (kexc = 355 nm) was used to investigate the mechanism of the HgCl2 reduction mediated by CO 2 radicals generated from quenching of the triplet states of 1,4-naphthoquinone (NQ) by formic acid. Kinetic simulations of the experimental signals support the proposed reaction mechanism. This system is of potential interest in the development of UV-A photoinduced photolytic procedures for the treatment of Hg(II) contaminated waters. The successful replacement of NQ with a commercial fulvic acid, as a model compound of dissolved organic matter, showed that the method is applicable to organic matter-containing waters without the addition of quinones.