Mercury chloride, absorption through

Agemian and Chau [55] have described an automated method for the determination of total dissolved mercury in fresh and saline waters by ultraviolet digestion and cold vapour atomic absorption spectroscopy. A flow-through ultraviolet digester is used to carry out photo-oxidation in the automated cold vapour atomic absorption spectrometric system. This removes the chloride interference. Work was carried out to check the ability of the technique to degrade seven particular organomercury compounds. The precision of the method at levels of 0.07 pg/1, 0.28 pg/1, and 0.55 pg/1 Hg was 6.0%, 3.8%, and 1.00%, respectively. The detection limit of the system is 0.02 pg/1. 

Absorption of mercurous salts in animals can occur through the skin (Schamberg et al. 1918) however, no quantitative data are available. The rate of absorption for mercuric chloride was not evaluated in any study. However, skin biopsies taken from 2 to 96 hours after application of a 0.1% solution of mercuric chloride showed electron-dense deposits, tentatively identified as mercury, in the cells in the dermis, indicating that mercuric chloride could penetrate the outer layer of the skin (Silberberg et al. 1969). 

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