System characterization report on the Gaofen-1
Mahesh Shrestha, Aparajithan Sampath, Shankar N. Ramaseri Chandra, Jon Christopherson, Jerad Shaw, Gregory L. Stensaas, Cody Anderson
2021, Open-File Report 2021-1030-B
Executive SummaryThis report addresses system characterization of Gaofen-1 and is part of a series of system characterization reports produced and delivered by the U.S. Geological Survey Earth Resources Observation and Science Cal/Val Center of Excellence in 2020. These reports present the detail methodology and procedures for characterization; present technical and...
System characterization report on the German Aerospace Center (DLR) Earth Sensing Imaging Spectrometer (DESIS)
Mahesh Shrestha, Aparajithan Sampath, Shankar N. Ramaseri Chandra, Jon Christopherson, Jerad Shaw, Cody Anderson
2021, Open-File Report 2021-1030-A
Executive SummaryThis report addresses system characterization of the German Aerospace Center (DLR) Earth Sensing Imaging Spectrometer (DESIS) and is part of a series of system characterization reports produced and delivered by the U.S. Geological Survey Earth Resources Observation and Science Cal/Val Center of Excellence. These reports present the methodology and...
Predictability of invasive Argentine ant distribution across Mediterranean ecoregions of southern California
Jonathan Q. Richmond, Tritia Matsuda, Cheryl S. Brehme, Emily E. Perkins, Robert N. Fisher
2021, Western North American Naturalist (81) 243-256
The invasiveness of nonnative taxa can vary across a landscape due to environmental gradients, suggesting that location-dependent management strategies may be more effective at reducing spread compared to a “one size fits all” approach across the entire introduced range. Using bait stations placed along linear transects within habitat preserves, we...
Harvest as a tool to manage populations of undesirable or overabundant fish and wildlife
Craig P. Paukert, Elisabeth B. Webb, Drew N. Fowler, Corbin D. Hilling
2021, Book chapter, Harvest of fish and wildlife: New paradigms for sustainable management
Harvest is a common management tool for fish and game species and can also be used for overabundant populations when stakeholders want to reduce populations reduced and still provide recreational opportunities. The authors propose a framework to determine if harvest can be used to control populations when overabundance is an...
Recent carbon storage and burial exceed historic rates in the San Juan Bay estuary peri-urban mangrove forests (Puerto Rico, United States)
Cathleen Wigand, Meagan J. Eagle, Benjamin Branoff, Stephen Balogh, Kenneth Miller, Rose M. Martin, Alana Hanson, Autumn Oczkowski, Evelyn Huertas, Joseph Loffredo, Elizabeth Watson
2021, Frontiers in Forests and Global Change (4)
Mangroves sequester significant quantities of organic carbon (C) because of high rates of burial in the soil and storage in biomass. We estimated mangrove forest C storage and accumulation rates in aboveground and belowground components among five sites along an urbanization gradient in the San Juan Bay Estuary, Puerto Rico....
The limitations of external measurements for aging small mammals: The cautionary example of the Lesser Treeshrew (Scandentia: Tupaiidae: Tupaia minor Günther, 1876)
Neal Woodman, Ananth Miller-Murthy, Link E. Olson, Eric J. Sargis
2021, Journal of Mammalogy (102)
Age is a basic demographic characteristic vital to studies of mammalian social organization, population dynamics, and behavior. To eliminate potentially confounding ontogenetic variation, morphological comparisons among populations of mammals typically are limited to mature individuals (i.e., those assumed to have ceased most somatic growth). In our morphometric studies of treeshrews...
Untargeted lipidomics for determining cellular and sub-cellular responses in Zebrafish (Danio rerio) liver cells following exposure to complex mixtures in U.S. streams
Huajun Zhen, Quincy Teng, Jonathan D Mosley, Timothy W. Collette, Yang Yue, Paul M. Bradley, Drew R. Ekman
2021, Environmental Science & Technology (55) 8180-8190
Surface waters often contain a variety of chemical contaminants potentially capable of producing adverse outcomes in both humans and wildlife due to impacts from industrial, urban, and agricultural activity. Here, we report the results of a zebrafish liver (ZFL) cell-based lipidomics approach to assess the potential ecotoxicological effects of complex...
Integrating wildlife habitat models with state-and-transitions models to enhance the management of rangelands for multiple objectives
Jennifer M. Timmer, Crystal Y. Tipton, Retta A. Bruegger, David J. Augustine, Christopher P.K. Dickey, Maria E. Fernandez-Gimenez, Cameron L. Aldridge
2021, Rangeland Ecology and Management (78) 15-25
State-and-transition models (STMs) are tools used in rangeland management to describe linear and nonlinear vegetation dynamics as conceptual models. STMs can be improved by including additional ecosystem services, such as wildlife habitat, so that managers can predict how local populations might respond to state changes and to...
Fire, land cover, and temperature drivers of bat activity in winter
Marcelo H. Jorge, Sara E. Sweeten, Michael C. TRUE, Samuel R. Freeze, Michael J. Cherry, Elina P. Garrison, W. Mark Ford
2021, Fire Ecology (17)
BackgroundUnderstanding the effects of disturbance events, land cover, and weather on wildlife activity is fundamental to wildlife management. Currently, in North America, bats are of high conservation concern due to white-nose syndrome and wind-energy development impact, but the role of fire as a potential additional stressor has received...
NGA-East ground-motion characterization model Part II: Implementation and hazard implications
Robert Youngs, Christine A. Goulet, Yousef Bozorgnia, Nicolas Kuehn, Linda Al Atik, Robert Graves, Gail M. Atkinson
2021, Earthquake Spectra (37) 1283-1330
As a companion article to Goulet et al., we describe implementation of the NGA-East ground motion characterization (GMC) model in probabilistic seismic hazard analysis (PSHA) for sites in the Central and Eastern United States (CEUS). We present extensions to the EPRI/DOE/NRC seismic source characterization (SSC) model for...
A hidden Markov model for estimating age-specific survival when age and size are uncertain
Timothy A. Gowan, Michael D. Tringali, Jeffrey A. Hostetler, Julien Martin, Leslie I. Ward-Geiger, Jennifer M Johnson
2021, Ecology (102)
Estimates of age-specific survival probabilities are needed for age-structured population models and to inform conservation decisions. However, determining the age of individuals in wildlife populations is often problematic. We present a hidden Markov model for estimating age-specific survival from capture–recapture or capture–recapture–recovery data when age is...
Relative risk of groundwater-quality degradation near California (USA) oil fields estimated from 3H, 14C, and 4He
Peter B. McMahon, Matthew K. Landon, Tracy Davis, Michael Wright, Celia Z. Rosecrans, Robert Anders, Michael Land, Justin T. Kulongoski, Andrew G. Hunt
2021, Applied Geochemistry (131)
Relative risks of groundwater-quality degradation near selected California oil fields are estimated by examining spatial and temporal patterns in chemical and isotopic data in the context of groundwater-age categories defined by tritium and carbon-14. In the Coastal basins, western San Joaquin Valley (SJV),...
Quantifying the demographic vulnerabilities of dry woodlands to climate and competition using rangewide monitoring data
Robert K Shriver, Charles Yackulic, David M. Bell, John B. Bradford
2021, Ecology (102)
Climate change is expected to alter the distribution and abundance of tree species, impacting ecosystem structure and function. Yet, anticipating where this will occur is often hampered by a lack of understanding of how demographic rates, most notably recruitment, vary in response to climate and competition...
Deposit classification scheme for the Critical Minerals Mapping Initiative Global Geochemical Database
Albert H. Hofstra, Vladimir Lisitsin, Louise Corriveau, Suzanne Paradis, Jan Peter, Kathleen Lauziere, Christopher Lawley, Michael Gadd, Jean-Luc Pilote, Ian Honsberger, Evgeniy Bastrakov, David Champion, Karol Czarnota, Michael Doublier, David Huston, Oliver Raymond, Simon VanDerWielen, Poul Emsbo, Matthew Granitto, Douglas C. Kreiner
2021, Open-File Report 2021-1049
A challenge for the global economy is to meet the growing demand for commodities used in today’s advanced technologies. Critical minerals are commodities (for example, elements, compounds, minerals) deemed vital to the economic and national security of individual countries that are vulnerable to supply disruption. The national geological agencies of...
Using tree swallows to assess reductions in PCB exposure as a result of dredging at Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) sites in the Upper Midwest, USA
Christine M. Custer, Thomas W. Custer, Paul M. Dummer
2021, Ecotoxicology (30) 1116-1125
Tree swallows (Tachycineta bicolor) were used to assess the effectiveness of reducing polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) exposure to wildlife as a result of contaminated sediment removal at locations across the Great Lakes under two dredging scenarios, full or spot dredging. For comparative purposes, other locations where no...
Oxygen-controlled recirculating seepage meter reveals extent of nitrogen transformation in discharging coastal groundwater at the aquifer–estuary interface
Thomas W. Brooks, Kevin D. Kroeger, Holly A. Michael, Joanna K. York
2021, Limnology and Oceanography (66) 3055-3069
Nutrient loads delivered to estuaries via submarine groundwater discharge (SGD) play an important role in the nitrogen (N) budget and eutrophication status. However, accurate and reliable quantification of the chemical flux across the final decimeters and centimeters at the sediment–estuary interface remains a challenge, because there...
Sea star wasting disease pathology in Pisaster ochraceus shows a basal-to-surface process affecting color phenotypes differently
Thierry M. Work, Tina M. Weatherby, Christopher M. DeRito, Ryan M. Besemer, Ian Hewson
2021, Diseases of Aquatic Organisms (145) 21-33
Sea star wasting disease (SSWD) refers to a suite of poorly described non-specific clinical signs including abnormal posture, epidermal ulceration, and limb autotomy (sloughing) causing mortalities of over 20 species of sea stars and subsequent ecological shifts throughout the northeastern Pacific. While SSWD is widely assumed to be infectious, with...
Water resources of St. Landry Parish, Louisiana
Maxwell A. Lindaman, Vincent E. White
2021, Fact Sheet 2021-3026
Information concerning the availability, use, and quality of water in St. Landry Parish, Louisiana, is critical for proper water-supply management. The purpose of this fact sheet is to present information that can be used by water managers, parish residents, and others for stewardship of this vital resource. In 2014, about...
Workflow for using unmanned aircraft systems and traditional geospatial data to delineate agricultural drainage tiles at edge-of-field sites
J. Jeremy Webber, Tanja N. Williamson
2021, Scientific Investigations Report 2021-5013
Managing nutrient and sediment runoff from fields that drain to the Great Lakes is key to mitigating harmful algal blooms. Implementation of best management practices on agricultural land is considered a critical step to improving water quality in these streams, however the effect of these best management practices is difficult...
Online-coupling of widely-ranged timescales to model coral reef development
Gijs Hendrickx, Peter M. J. Herman, Jasper T. Dijkstra, Curt D. Storlazzi, Lauren Toth
2021, Environmental Modeling and Software (143)
The increasing pressure on Earth's ecosystems due to climate change is becoming more and more evident and the impacts of climate change are especially visible on coral reefs. Understanding how climate change interacts with the physical environment of reefs to impact coral growth and reef development is critically important to...
Wildfires and global change
Juli G. Pausas, Jon Keeley
2021, Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment (19) 387-395
No single factor produces wildfires; rather, they occur when fire thresholds (ignitions, fuels, and drought) are crossed. Anomalous weather events may lower these thresholds and thereby enhance the likelihood and spread of wildfires. Climate change increases the frequency with which some of these thresholds are crossed, extending the duration of...
Raising the West: Mid-Cenozoic Colorado-plano related to subvolcanic batholith assembly in the Southern Rocky Mountains (USA)?
Peter W. Lipman
2021, Geology (49) 1107-1111
The Southern Rocky Mountains of Colorado, United States, have the highest regional elevation in North America, but present-day crustal thickness (∼42–47 km) is no greater than for the adjacent, topographically lower High Plains and Colorado Plateau. The chemistry of continental-arc rocks of the...
Effects of climate and irrigation on GRACE-based estimates of water storage changes in major US aquifers
Bridget R. Scanlon, Ahsraf Rateb, Donald R. Pool, Ward E. Sanford, Himanshu Save, Alexander Y. Sun, Di Long, Brian Fuchs
2021, Environmental Research Letters (16)
Understanding climate and human impacts on water storage is critical for sustainable water-resources management. Here we assessed climate and human drivers of total water storage (TWS) variability from Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellites compared with drought severity and irrigation water use in 14 major aquifers...
Tracking the source of metals to the San Juan River
Johanna M. Blake, Shaleene B. Chavarria, Anne-Marie Matherne
2021, Fact Sheet 2021-3029
IntroductionThe San Juan River is a major water source for communities in the Four Corners Region of the United States (Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, Utah) and is a vital source of water for the Navajo Nation. The Navajo Nation Environmental Protection Agency (NNEPA) periodically samples surface water on the Navajo...
Benzotriazole concentrations in airport runoff are reduced following changes in airport deicer formulations
Hayley Olds, Steven R. Corsi, Troy D. Rutter
2021, Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management (18) 245-257
A comparison of the presence of additives in airport deicers commonly used in the United States and in airport runoff was conducted with data collected before and after changes in deicer formulations. Three isomers of benzotriazoles (BTs)—4-methyl-1H-benzotriazole (4-MeBT), 5-methyl-1H-benzotriazole (5-MeBT), and 1H-benzotriazole (1H-BT)—are corrosion inhibitors added to some formulations of...
