Extended Data Table 3 MeHg in Gulf of Maine ABFT

From: Climate change and overfishing increase neurotoxicant in marine predators

  1. MeHg concentrations (ng g−1; mean ± s.d.) measured in ABFT that were captured in the Gulf of Maine between 1971 and 2017. All fish are approximately 14 years old or have a curved fork length of 250 ± 23 cm14 (mean ± s.d.).
  2. MeHg was estimated as 90% of total Hg on the basis of previously published measurements19.
  3. A one-way ANOVA was used for each ABFT cohort to investigate the statistical significance of differences in fish MeHg concentrations between years (P < 0.05). Common letters indicate groups with no significant difference in between-group comparisons (post hoc analysis using Tukey’s test). Statistical analysis was performed in R (v.3.4.3).
  4. §Dorsal or cranial muscle tissue from ABFT that were captured in the Gulf of Maine in 2017 was freeze-dried and homogenized. Total Hg content was measured using a Nippon MA-3000 direct thermal decomposition Hg analyser at Harvard University. Average recoveries of certified reference materials were 104.0 ± 0.6% (mean ± s.d.) (TORT, n = 5) and 102.2 ± 1.7% (mean ± s.d.) (DORM-4, n = 8). The relative precision of duplicate samples (RPD) was 3.1%.