Question: How does mercury effect you?

Thomas Elias Cocolios answered on 13 Mar 2014:

Mercury is a heavy metal that can bind to molecules in your body and block their natural functions. It wraps proteins in weird configurations that prevent them from performing their normal duties. As such, you start to have a lack in those proteins and your body functions can be affected.

One of the biggest effect can actually be in the brain causing anxiety, or depression.

A big problem with mercury is that because it is so heavy, it never leaves your body and the more you ingest, the more you have in your system. It piles up in your organs and in your bones.

At CERN-ISOLDE, there is a research programme that aims at understanding the interaction between mercury (and cadmium) with proteins using radioactive isotopes as probes with which one may see the kinetic of the bio-chemical reactions.