Lead Mediterranean

Capodaglio, G., Scarponi, G., K.H. Coole, K.W. Bruland. Lead Speciation in surface seawaters. X Int. Symp. Chemistry of the Mediterranean, Primosten, Yugoslavia, 4-12 May 1988. 

To determine whether his Pacific samples were in fact representative of other oceans, Patterson and a Japanese colleague, Mitsunobu Tat-sumoto, began developing profiles of the lead in ocean layers in Atlantic and Mediterranean waters. Patterson hated ocean-going field trips he often became violently seasick, once so seriously that he had to be given oxygen. Because the ships were coated with leaded paints and compounds, sampling was tricky, too. Despite the problems, Patterson could see that, as in the Pacific, lead was concentrated in the upper portions of the Atlantic and Mediterranean. 

M. Tatsumoto and C. C. Patterson. Concentrations of Common Lead in Some Atlantic and Mediterranean Waters and in Snow. Nature. 199 (July 27, 1963) 350-352. Source for extrapolation from sea surface to leaded gasolines and Lassen National Park. 

Sheppard, C.R.C. and D.J. Bellamy. 1974. Pollution of the Mediterranean around Naples. Mar. Pollut. Bull. 5 42-44. Shore, R.F. 1995. Predicting cadmium, lead and fluoride levels in small mammals from soil residues and by species-species extrapolation. Environ. Pollut. 88 333-340. 

In the absence of an assumed underlying normal distribution, simple bivariate plotting does not lead to an estimate of the true extent of the parent isotope field. This is particularly a problem if only relatively few samples are available, as is usually the case. Kernel density estimation (KDE Baxter et al., 1997) offers the prospect of building up an estimate of the true shape and size of an isotope field whilst making few extra assumptions about the data. Scaife et al. (1999) showed that lead isotope data can be fully described using KDE without resort to confidence ellipses which assume normality, and which are much less susceptible to the influence of outliers. The results of this approach are discussed in Section 9.6, after the conventional approach to interpreting lead isotope data in the eastern Mediterranean has been discussed. 

Budd, P., Pollard, A.M., Scaife, B. and Thomas, R.G. (1995d). Lead isotope analysis and oxhide ingots a final comment. Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology 8 70-75. 

Stos-Gale, Z., Gale, N.H., Houghton, J. and Speakman, R. (1995). Lead isotope data from the Isotrace Laboratory, Oxford Archaeometry database 1, ores from the western Mediterranean. Archaeometry 37 401M15. 

Rome or elsewhere. Noble pen shells have become so scarce that in Italy and other Mediterranean countries they have the status of a protected species. Possession of a single freshly taken specimen can lead to a stiff fine. 

Tin was known and used at least 5,500 years ago, when it was described in the oldest written records of the Mediterranean region. It is included in the book of Numbers in the Old Testament, along with the other then-known seven metals (gold, silver, copper, lead, brass, and iron). Bronze is an alloy of 20% tin and 80% melted copper, resulting in a metal that is harder than either pure tin or pure copper. Bronze was an extremely important metal because... 

Since the late 1960 s problems related to ccxitaminaticxi of fish and shellfish have been recognized. The problem compounds share one characteristic biopersistence. Compounds such as various salts of lead or mercury have contaminated shellfish or fish living in either fresh or salt water. Chlorinated compounds such as DDT, PCB and dioxins have been found in fish living in fresh water rivers and lakes and to some extent in the Baltic and Mediterranean Seas (25). 

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