Seasonal manganese transport in the hyporheic zone of a snowmelt-dominated river (East River, Colorado)
S. Bryant, A. Sawyer, Martin A. Briggs, C. Saup, A. R Nelson, M. J. Wilkins, J. R. Christensen, K. H. Williams
2020, Hydrogeology Journal (28) 1323-1341
Manganese (Mn) plays a critical role in river-water quality because Mn-oxides serve as sorption sites for contaminant metals. The aim of this study is to understand the seasonal cycling of Mn in an alpine streambed that experiences large spring snowmelt events and the potential responses to changes in snowmelt timing...
Geologic map of the Homestake Reservoir 7.5′ quadrangle, Lake, Pitkin, and Eagle Counties, Colorado
Chester A. Ruleman, Michael G. Frothingham, Theodore R. Brandt, Colin A. Shaw, Marc W. Caffee, Brent M. Goehring, Keith A. Brugger
2020, Scientific Investigations Map 3451
The Homestake Reservoir 7.5' quadrangle lies at the northwestern end of the Upper Arkansas Valley, and headwaters of the Arkansas River, and the Roaring Fork, Fryingpan, and Eagle Rivers of the Colorado River system. The quadrangle lies within tectonic provinces of the 1.4 giga-annum (Ga) Picuris orogeny and includes the...
Indonesia and the United States team up to reduce impacts from dangerous volcanoes
Jacob B. Lowenstern, Kasbani, John S. Pallister, David W. Ramsey
2020, Fact Sheet 2019-3074
With 75 historically active volcanoes, Indonesia is the world’s most volcanically active nation. Its volcanoes are legendary throughout the world, with the notorious 19th-century eruptions at Mount Tambora (1815) and Krakatau (1883), and the eruption that created the giant Toba Caldera in Sumatra (75,000 years ago)—the Earth’s largest volcanic eruption...
HESS opinions: Beyond the long-term water balance: Evolving Budyko's supply–demand framework for the Anthropocene towards a global synthesis of land-surface fluxes under natural and human-altered watersheds
A. Sankarasubramanian, Dingbao Wang, Stacey A. Archfield, Meredith Reitz, Richard M Vogel, Amirhossein Mazrooei, Sudarshana Mukhopadhyaya
2020, Hydrology and Earth System Sciences (24) 1975-1984
Global hydroclimatic conditions have been substantially altered over the past century by anthropogenic influences that arise from the warming global climate and from local/regional anthropogenic disturbances. Traditionally, studies have used coupling of multiple models to understand how land-surface water fluxes vary due to changes in global climatic patterns and local...
A graphical causal model for resolving species identity effects and biodiversity–ecosystem function correlations
Donald R. Schoolmaster Jr., Chad R Zirbel, James P. Cronin
2020, Ecology (101)
Identifying and clearly communicating the drivers of ecosystem function is a crucially important goal for both basic and applied ecology. This has proven difficult because the putative causes (e.g., environment, species identity, biodiversity, and functional traits) are numerous and correlated. The problem is exacerbated by a lack of a formal...
PFAS in the environment
U.S. Geological Survey
2020, General Information Product 197
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) is working with Federal, State, and local partners to monitor and evaluate perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in the State’s groundwater and surface waters. PFAS are synthetic chemicals with widespread commercial and industrial use that can take a very long time to break down in...
Microplastics
U.S. Geological Survey
2020, General Information Product 196
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) is working with Federal, State, and local partners to monitor and evaluate microplastics in our lakes, rivers, and coastal waters. Microplastics are very small pieces of plastic, some-times so small that they cannot be seen with the naked eye. The USGS is taking an active...
Temporal magnetotellurics reveals mechanics of the 2012 Mount Tongariro, NZ eruption
Graham J. Hill, Hugh M. Bibby, Jared R. Peacock, Erin L. Wallin, Yasuo Ogawa, Luca Caricchi, Harry Keys, Stewart L. Bennie, Yann Avram
2020, Geophysical Research Letters (47)
Monitoring dynamics of volcanic eruptions with geophysics is challenging. In August and November 2012, two small eruptions from Mount Tongariro provided a unique opportunity to image subsurface changes caused by the eruptions. A detailed magnetotelluric survey of the Tongariro volcanic complex completed prior to the eruption (2008–2010)...
Modeling the supporting ecosystem services of depressional wetlands
David M. Mushet, Cali L. Roth
2020, Wetlands (40) 1061-1069
We explored how a geographic information system modeling approach could be used to quantify supporting ecosystem services related to the type, abundance, and distribution of landscape components. Specifically, we use the Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs model to quantify habitats that support amphibians and birds, floral resources that...
Sea-level rise exponentially increases coastal flood frequency
Mohsen Taherkhani, Sean Vitousek, Patrick L. Barnard, L Neil Frazer, Tiffany Anderson, Charles Fletcher
2020, Scientific Reports (10)
Sea-level rise will radically redefine the coastline of the 21st century. For many coastal regions, projections of global sea-level rise by the year 2100 (e.g., 0.5–2 meters) are comparable in magnitude to today’s extreme but short-lived increases in water level due to storms. Thus, the 21st century will...
Updated study reporting levels (SRLs) for trace-element data collected for the California Groundwater Ambient Monitoring and Assessment (GAMA) Program Priority Basin Project, October 2009–October 2018
George L. V Bennett V
2020, Scientific Investigations Report 2020-5034
Groundwater samples have been collected in California as part of statewide investigations of groundwater quality conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey for the Groundwater Ambient Monitoring and Assessment (GAMA) Priority Basin Project (PBP) since 2004. The GAMA-PBP is being conducted in cooperation with the California State Water Resources Control Board...
Science plan for improving three-dimensional seismic velocity models in the San Francisco Bay region, 2019–24
Brad T. Aagaard, Russell W. Graymer, Clifford H. Thurber, Arthur J. Rodgers, Taka’aki Taira, Rufus D. Catchings, Christine A. Goulet, Andreas Plesch
2020, Open-File Report 2020-1019
This five-year science plan outlines short-term and long-term goals for improving three-dimensional seismic velocity models in the greater San Francisco Bay region as well as how to foster a community effort in reaching those goals. The short-term goals focus on improving the current U.S. Geological Survey San Francisco Bay region...
AMMonitor: Remote monitoring of biodiversity in an adaptive framework with R
Cathleen Balantic, Therese M. Donovan
2020, Methods in Ecology and Evolution (11) 869-877
Ecological research and management programs are increasingly using autonomous monitoring units (AMUs) to collect large volumes of acoustic and/or photo data to address pressing management objectives or research goals. The data management requirements of an AMU-based monitoring effort are often overwhelming, with a considerable amount of processing to translate raw...
AMMonitor 2: Remote monitoring of biodiversity in an adaptive framework in R
Cathleen Balantic, Therese M. Donovan
2020, Methods in Ecology and Evolution (11) 869-877
Ecological research and management programs are increasingly using autonomous monitoring units (AMUs) to collect large volumes of acoustic and/or photo data to address pressing management objectives or research goals. The data management requirements of an AMU-based monitoring effort are often overwhelming, with a considerable amount of processing to translate...
Disk-integrated thermal properties of Ceres measured at the millimeter wavelengths
Jian-Yang Li, Arielle Moullet, Timothy N. Titus, Henry H. Hsieh, Mark V. Sykes
2020, Astronomical Journal (159)
We observed Ceres at three epochs in 2015 November and 2017 September and October with Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) 12 m array and in 2017 October with the ALMA Compact Array (ACA), all at ~265 GHz continuum (wavelengths of ~1.1 mm) to map the temperatures of...
Land change monitoring, assessment, and projection
Jennifer Rover, Jesslyn F. Brown, Roger F. Auch, Kristi Sayler, Terry L. Sohl, Heather J. Tollerud, George Z. Xian
2020, Fact Sheet 2020-3024
There is a pressing need to monitor and understand the rapid land change happening around the world. The U.S. Geological Survey is developing a new capability, called Land Change Monitoring, Assessment, and Projection (LCMAP), to innovate the understanding of land change. This capability is the Earth Resources Observation and Science Center's...
Passive sampling of groundwater wells for determination of water chemistry
Thomas E. Imbrigiotta, Philip T. Harte
2020, Techniques and Methods 1-D8-
IntroductionPassive groundwater sampling is defined as the collection of a water sample from a well without the use of purging by a pump or retrieval by a bailer (Interstate Technology and Regulatory Council [ITRC], 2006; American Society for Testing and Materials [ASTM], 2014). No purging means that advection of water...
Nutrient status of San Francisco Bay and its management implications
James E. Cloern, Tara Schraga, Erica Nejad, Charles A. Martin
2020, Estuaries and Coasts (43) 1299-1317
Nutrient enrichment has degraded many of the world’s estuaries by amplifying algal production, leading to hypoxia/anoxia, loss of vascular plants and fish/shellfish habitat, and expansion of harmful blooms (HABs). Policies to protect coastal waters from the effects of nutrient enrichment require information to determine if a water body is impaired...
Assessment of continuous oil and gas resources in Lower Silurian Shales of the Arabian Peninsula, 2019
Christopher J. Schenk, Tracey J. Mercier, Cheryl A. Woodall, Marilyn E. Tennyson, Thomas M. Finn, Michael E. Brownfield, Kristen R. Marra, Phuong A. Le, Ronald M. Drake II, Scott A. Kinney
2020, Fact Sheet 2019-3070
Using a geology-based assessment methodology, the U.S. Geological Survey estimated undiscovered, technically recoverable mean resources of 4.6 billion barrels of oil and 561 trillion cubic feet of gas in the Lower Silurian Shale Total Petroleum System of the Arabian Peninsula....
Mercury, cadmium, copper, arsenic, and selenium measurements in the feathers of adult eastern brown pelicans (Pelecanus occidentalis carolinensis) and chicks in multiple breeding grounds in the northern Gulf of Mexico
U. Ndu, J. S. Lamb, Sarah E. Janssen, R. Rossi, Y. G. Satgé, Patrick G.R. Jodice
2020, Environmental Monitoring and Assessment (192)
The amounts of trace metals and metalloids that have been introduced into aquatic ecosystems due to anthropogenic activities have increased in recent decades. Some of these elements like mercury are easily transferred from one trophic level to another and can accumulate to toxic quantities in organisms at the top of...
Benthic vertical hydraulic gradients in Upper Klamath Lake, Oregon, 2017
Nicholas Corson-Dosch
2020, Scientific Investigations Report 2020-5029
Groundwater piezometers and lake stilling wells were deployed as paired sets at 10 locations in Upper Klamath Lake in south-central Oregon from May to October 2017 to measure hydraulic heads in and beneath the lake. Continuous water-level data from piezometers and stilling wells were then used to calculate the...
Gastric mill age estimates for ringed crayfish Faxonius neglectus neglectus (Faxon) and the influence of temperature on band formation
Shannon K. Brewer, Joshua B. Mouser, Jason Glover
2020, Freshwater Crayfish (25) 59-67
Counting bands via the gastric mill is a potential direct approach for ageing crayfish; however, the validity of ageing crustaceans using the gastric mill is unknown. Our study objectives were to 1) compare gastric mill age estimates to a traditional aging technique, 2) compare ageing precision among the ossicles, and...
The effects of management practices on grassland birds—Lark Bunting (Calamospiza melanocorys)
Jill A. Shaffer, Lawrence D. Igl, Douglas H. Johnson, Marriah L. Sondreal, Christopher M. Goldade, Amy L. Zimmerman, Betty R. Euliss
2020, Professional Paper 1842-EE
Keys to Lark Bunting (Calamospiza melanocorys) management include providing short vegetation with protective nest cover and tailoring grazing systems to the type of grassland. Lark Buntings have been reported to use habitats with 6–72 centimeter (cm) average vegetation height, 2–11 cm visual obstruction reading, 13–71 percent grass cover, less than...
Tree-ring evidence of forest management moderating drought responses: Implications for dry, coniferous forests in the southwestern United States
Phillip J. van Mantgem, Lucy P Kerhoulas, Rosemary L. Sherriff, Zachary James Wenderott
2020, Frontiers in Forests and Global Change (3)
Drought, coupled with rising temperatures, is an emerging threat to many forest types across the globe. At least to a degree, we expect management actions that reduce competition (e.g., thinning, prescribed fire, or both) to improve growth of residual trees during drought. The influences of management actions and drought on...
Assessing mercury distribution using isotopic fractionation of mercury processes and sources adjacent and downstream of a legacy mine district in Tuscany, Italy
Michael Pribil, Valentina Rimondi, Pilario Costagliola, Pierfranco Lattanzi, Danny Rutherford
2020, Applied Geochemistry (117)
Mercury (Hg) concentrations and isotopic compositions in a range of sample types collected from the legacy Abbadia San Salvatore Mine (ASSM) area were used to evaluate the distribution of Hg in the region. The district generated more than 100,000 metric tons of Hg releasing extensive amounts of gaseous Hg...
