Help:Chem assign ment,just one day remained!

[bow]

hi guys
thnx for your cool forum.I've an assessment which I have to complete for tommorow...and I couldnt find any thing useful.the assessment is:design an experiment to monitor level of mercury in our water ways
plz hlp me ...I couldnt find any thing!
plz just HLP me ...

[Hix3r]

Hello there!

It probably comes too late, but I thought it over for a couple of times, and the best way to do this, is you get a sample from the water, and you drop it on a pile of sulfur.

In theory sulfur will react with mercury formin mercury(II)-sulfide, common name cinnabar, which is bright-scarlet or brick colored. This can indicate if mercury is present like pH. So you drop a little water onto sulfur, and if the water or the surrounding becomes brownish-red you got mercury, and the more intense is the color, the more mercury is present. With no mercury the water should not have any color.

By the way, this is the best way to get rid of mercury if a thermometer breaks, to simply throw some sulfur onto it, and it will form this mercury(II)-sulfide which is not toxic, and do not evaporates like mercury.

Anyway this is a theory I have never tried if it would work, if anyone know s a better way, tell us.