In its inorganic form, mercury occurs abundantly in the environment, primarily as the minerals cinnabar and metacinnabar, and as impurities in other minerals. Mercury can readily combine with chlorine, sulfur, and other elements, and subsequently weather to form inorganic salts. When mercury reacts with another substance, it forms a compound, such as inorganic mercury salts or methylmercury. Learn about how people are most often exposed to elemental mercury and about the adverse health effects that exposures to elemental mercury can produce.Įlemental mercury is an element that has not reacted with another substance. At room temperature, exposed elemental mercury can evaporate to become an invisible, odorless toxic vapor. If heated, it is a colorless, odorless gas. When dropped, elemental mercury breaks into smaller droplets which can go through small cracks or become strongly attached to certain materials. It is used in older thermometers, fluorescent light bulbs and some electrical switches. Methylmercury and other organic compoundsĮlemental or metallic mercury is a shiny, silver-white metal, historically referred to as quicksilver, and is liquid at room temperature. On the periodic table, it has the symbol "Hg" and its atomic number is 80. Mercury is a naturally-occurring chemical element found in rock in the earth's crust, including in deposits of coal.
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