Why is methylmercury dangerous

Mercury is extraordinarily toxic, but it becomes especially dangerous when transformed into methylmercury—a form so harmful that just a few billionths of a gram can cause severe and lasting neurological damage to a developing fetus.

Unfortunately, methylmercury often makes its way into our bodies through seafood—but once it's in our food and the environment, there's no easy way to get rid of it.

Now, leveraging high-energy X-rays at the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource (SSRL) at the U.S.

Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, researchers have identified an unexpected major player in methylmercury poisoning—a molecule called S-adenosyl-L-methionine (SAM).

The results, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could help researchers figure out new ways to address methylmercury poisoning.

"Nobody knew how mercury is methylated biologically," said Riti Sarangi, a senior scientist in SSRL's Structural Molecular Biologyprogram and co-author on the paper.

"We need to understand that fundamental process before we can develop

how does methylmercury form

how does mercury become methylmercury