Transglobal spread of an ecologically relevant sea urchin parasite
Isabella T. Ritchie, Brayan Vilanova-Cuevas, Ashley Altera, Kaileigh Cornfield, Ceri Evans, James S. Evans, Maria Hopson-Fernandes, Christina A. Kellogg, Elayne Looker, Oliver Taylor, Ian Hewson, Mya Breitbart
2024, ISME Journal (18)
Mass mortality of the dominant coral reef herbivore Diadema antillarum in the Caribbean in the early 1980s contributed to a persistent phase shift from coral- to algal-dominated reefs. In 2022, a scuticociliate most closely related to Philaster apodigitiformis caused further mass mortality of D. antillarum across the Caribbean, leading to >95% mortality at affected sites....
An introduction to Criteria for Reporting and Evaluating Exposure Datasets (CREED) for use in environmental assessments
Graham Merrington, Lisa H. Nowell, Charles Peck
2024, Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management (20) 975-980
Risks posed by environmental exposure to chemicals are routinely assessed to inform activities ranging from environmental status reporting to authorization and registration of chemicals for commercial uses. Environmental risk assessment generally relies on two key values generated from exposure data and ecotoxicity data. Data sets of measured...
Assessing the probability of grass carp (Ctenopharyngodon idella) spawning in the Sandusky River using discharge and water temperature
Sabrina Jaffe, Song S. Qian, Christine M. Mayer, Patrick M. Kocovsky, Anarita Gouveia
2024, Journal of Great Lakes Research (50)
Grass carp (Ctenopharyngodon idella, Val.) is an invasive species in the Laurentian Great Lakes region with the potential for damaging the lake ecosystem and harming the region's economy. Grass carp spawning was documented in the Sandusky River, Ohio, in 2015 through targeted egg sampling. Continued egg sampling in the Sandusky River...
Mercury bioaccumulation and Hepatozoon spp. infections in two syntopic watersnakes in South Carolina
M. Kyle Brown, David Lee Haskins, Melissa A. Pilgrim, Tracey D. Tuberville
2024, Ecotoxicology (33) 164-176
Mercury (Hg) is a ubiquitous environmental contaminant known to bioaccumulate in biota and biomagnify in food webs. Parasites occur in nearly every ecosystem and often interact in complex ways with other stressors that their hosts experience. Hepatozoon spp. are intraerythrocytic parasites common in snakes. The Florida green watersnake (Nerodia floridana) and the...
Effects of culverts on habitat connectivity in streams—A science synthesis to inform National Environmental Policy Act analyses
Richard J. Lehrter, Tait K. Rutherford, Jason B. Dunham, Aaron N. Johnston, David J.A. Wood, Travis S. Haby, Sarah K. Carter
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5132
The U.S. Geological Survey is working with Federal land management agencies to develop a series of science syntheses to support environmental effects analyses that agencies conduct to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). This report synthesizes science information about the potential effects of culverts on stream connectivity and...
Approaches for using CMIP projections in climate model ensembles to address the ‘hot model’ problem
Ryan Boyles, Catherine A. Nikiel, Brian W. Miller, Jeremy Littell, Adam J. Terando, Imtiaz Rangwala, Jay R. Alder, Derek H. Rosendahl, Adrienne M. Wootten
2024, Open-File Report 2024-1008
Several recent generation global-climate models were found to have anomalously high climate sensitivities and may not be useful for certain applications. Four approaches for developing ensembles of climate projections for applications that address this issue are:Using an “all models” approach;Screening using equilibrium climate sensitivity and (or) transient climate response;Bayesian model...
Disease-smart climate adaptation for wildlife management and conservation
Lindsey Thurman, Katrina E. Alger, Olivia E. LeDee, Laura Thompson, Erik K. Hofmeister, Michael J Hudson, Alynn Martin, Tracy Melvin, Sarah H Olson, Mathieu Pruvot, Jason R. Rohr, Jennifer Szymanksi, Oscar Aleuy, Benjamin Zuckerberg
2024, Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment (22)
Climate change is a well-documented driver and threat multiplier of infectious disease in wildlife populations. However, wildlife disease management and climate-change adaptation have largely operated in isolation. To improve conservation outcomes, we consider the role of climate adaptation in initiating or exacerbating the transmission and spread of wildlife disease and...
Hydrologic analysis of an earthen embankment dam in southern Westchester County, New York
Anthony Chu, Michael L. Noll, William D. Capurso, Robert J. Welk
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5123
In 2001, the New York City Department of Environmental Protection installed 25 wells on the southern embankment of the Hillview Reservoir in Westchester County in an unsuccessful attempt to locate the source of a large seep (seep A) that began flowing continuously in 1999. In 2005, the U.S. Geological Survey...
Season of death, pathogen persistence and wildlife behaviour alter number of anthrax secondary infections from environmental reservoirs
Amelie C. Dolfi, Kyrre Kausrud, Kristyna Rysava, Celeste Champagne, Yen-Hua Huang, Zoe R. Barandongo, Wendy Christine Turner
2024, Proceedings of the Royal Society B (291)
An important part of infectious disease management is predicting factors that influence disease outbreaks, such as R, the number of secondary infections arising from an infected individual. Estimating R is particularly challenging for environmentally transmitted pathogens given time lags between cases and subsequent infections. Here, we calculated R for Bacillus anthracis infections arising from anthrax carcass sites...
Deep magmatic staging chambers for crustal layered mafic intrusions: An example from the Bushveld Complex of southern Africa
Janine Cole, Carol A. Finn, Susan J. Webb
2024, Precambrian Research (403)
The deep mafic magmatic staging chambers of layered mafic intrusions have been conjectured but not imaged. Their existence has long been postulated from geochemical models which require multiple magma injections from staging chambers to account for their multi-scale igneous layering and...
Yellowstone River fish bypass channel physical and hydraulic monitoring, Montana
J. Brooks Stephens, Jason S. Alexander, Seth A. Siefken
2024, Data Report 1189
The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Bureau of Reclamation, began monitoring the Yellowstone River fish bypass channel according to the specifications of the Lower Yellowstone Adaptive Management and Monitoring Plan. The fish bypass channel was constructed to provide upstream migrating fish with a route around a diversion dam....
Parasites alter food-web topology of a subarctic lake food web and its pelagic and benthic compartments
Shannon E. Moore, Anna Siwertsson, Kevin D. Lafferty, Armand M. Kuris, Miroslava Soldanova, Dana N. Morton, Raul Primicerio, Per-Arne Amundsen
2024, Oecologia (204) 257-277
We compared three sets of highly resolved food webs with and without parasites for a subarctic lake system corresponding to its pelagic and benthic compartments and the whole-lake food web. Key topological food-web metrics were calculated for each set of compartments to explore the role parasites...
Driophlox, a new genus of cardinalid (Aves: Passeriformes: Cardinalidae)
Ben F Scott, R. Terry Chesser, Philip Unitt, Kevin J Burns
2024, Zootaxa (5406) 497-500
No abstract available....
Using stochastic point pattern analysis to track regional orientations of magmatism during the transition to cenozoic extension and Rio Grande rifting, Southern Rocky Mountains
Joshua Mark Rosera, Sean P. Gaynor, Alexey Ulianov, Urs Schaltegger
2024, Tectonics (43)
The southern Rocky Mountains in Colorado and northern New Mexico hosted intracontinental magmatism that developed during a tectonic transition from shortening (Laramide orogeny, ca. 75 to 40 Ma) through extension and rifting. We present a novel approach that uses stochastic weighted bootstrap simulations of a large set of...
Detection probability and bias in machine-learning-based unoccupied aerial system non-breeding waterfowl surveys
Reid Viegut, Elisabeth B. Webb, Andrew Raedeke, Zhicheng Tang, Yang Zhang, Zhenduo Zhai, Zhiguang Liu, Shiqi Wang, Jiuyi Zheng, Yi Shang
2024, Drones (8)
Unoccupied aerial systems (UASs) may provide cheaper, safer, and more accurate and precise alternatives to traditional waterfowl survey techniques while also reducing disturbance to waterfowl. We evaluated availability and perception bias based on machine-learning-based non-breeding waterfowl count estimates derived from aerial imagery collected using a DJI Mavic Pro 2 on...
An update of hydrologic conditions and distribution of selected constituents in water, eastern Snake River aquifer and perched groundwater zones, Idaho National Laboratory, Idaho, emphasis 2019–21
Kerri C. Treinen, Allison R. Trcka, Jason C. Fisher
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5128
Since 1952, wastewater discharged to infiltration ponds (also called “percolation ponds”) and disposal wells at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) has affected water quality in the eastern Snake River Plain (ESRP) aquifer and perched groundwater zones underlying the INL. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), in cooperation with the U.S. Department...
Upstream experience and experimental translocation of invasive bigheaded carps results in increased upstream passage success at a navigation lock in a large river
Andrea K. Fritts, Daniel Gibson-Reinemer, Brent Knights, Amanda S. Milde, Jessica C. Stanton, Marybeth K. Brey, Douglas Appel, Aaron R. Cupp, Sarah Tripp, James T. Lamer, Mark W. Fritts
2024, River Research and Applications (40) 575-586
Fish movements in regulated rivers can be challenging to study because anthropogenic modifications, such as locks and dams, can influence animal behavior. Upper Mississippi River Lock and Dam 19 (LD 19), for example, is an invasive carp movement bottleneck due to an impassable dam....
Deep structure of Siletzia in the Puget Lowland: Imaging an obducted plateau and accretionary thrust belt with potential fields
Megan L. Anderson, Richard J. Blakely, Ray Wells, Joseph D. Dragovich
2024, Tectonics (43)
Detailed understanding of crustal components and tectonic history of forearcs is important due to their geological complexity and high seismic hazard. The principal component of the Cascadia forearc is Siletzia, a composite basaltic terrane of oceanic origin. Much is known about the lithology and age of the...
Life-history connections to long-term fish population trends in a species-rich temperate river
Andrew J. Nagy, Mary Freeman, Brian J. Irwin, Seth J. Wenger
2024, Ecology of Freshwater Fish (33)
Fishes exhibit a diverse range of traits encompassing life-history strategies, feeding behaviours and spawning behaviours. These traits mediate fish population responses to changing environmental conditions such as those caused by anthropogenic stressors. The Conasauga River, located in northwestern Georgia and southeastern Tennessee, USA, hosts a...
Stress-driven recurrence and precursory moment-rate surge in caldera collapse earthquakes
Paul Segall, Mark V. Matthews, David R. Shelly, Taiyi Wang, Kyle R. Anderson
2024, Nature Geoscience (17) 264-269
Predicting the recurrence times of earthquakes and understanding the physical processes that immediately precede them are two outstanding problems in seismology. Although geodetic measurements record elastic strain accumulation, most faults have recurrence intervals longer than available measurements. Foreshocks provide the principal observations of processes before mainshocks,...
A global assessment of environmental and climate influences on wetland macroinvertebrate community structure and function
Luis B. Epele, Emilio A. Williams-Subiza, Matthew S. Bird, Aurelie Boissezon, Dani Boix, Elaine Demierre, Conor Fair, Patricia Garcia, Stephanie Gascon, Marta G. Grech, Hamish S. Greig, Michael Jeffries, Jamie M. Kneitel, Olga Loskutova, Leonardo Maltchik, Luz M. Manzo, Gabriela Mataloni, Kyle McLean, Musa C. Mlambo, Beat Oertli, Mateus M. Pires, Jordi Sala, Erica E. Scheibler, Cristina Stenert, Haitao Wu, Scott A Wissinger, Darold P. Batzer
2024, Global Change Biology (30)
Estimating organisms' responses to environmental variables and taxon associations across broad spatial scales is vital for predicting their responses to climate change. Macroinvertebrates play a major role in wetland processes, but studies simultaneously exploring both community structure and community trait responses to environmental gradients are still lacking. We compiled a...
Hydrology and water quality of a dune-and-swale wetland adjacent to the Grand Calumet River, Indiana, 2019–22
Shawn Naylor, Amy M. Gahala
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5122
Adverse ecological and water-quality effects associated with industrial land-use changes are common for littoral wetlands connected to river mouth ecosystems in the Grand Calumet River-Indiana Harbor Canal Area of Concern. These effects can be exacerbated by recent high Lake Michigan water levels that are problematic for wetland restoration. Wetlands in...
Chemical composition of leachates from hydraulic fracturing proppants from surficial releases in southeastern New Mexico
Matthew S. Varonka, Terry G. Gregston, Michael Villalobos, Jacqueline Benefield, William H. Orem
2024, Environmental Science & Technology Letters (11) 243-249
Resin-coated proppants (RCPs) are used in hydraulic fracturing of oil and gas wells to improve well performance; however, these proppants could be a cause for environmental concern if they are disposed of improperly. In this study, we investigate the water-leachable organic and...
Precision of four calcified structures for age estimation of Black Carp
Patrick Kroboth, Anne Marie Herndon, Cortney Cox, Jesse Robert Fischer
2024, North American Journal of Fisheries Management (44) 235-243
ObjectiveBlack Carp Mylopharyngodon piceus is an emerging invasive species in North America with an expanding population in the Mississippi River basin. Current aging methods use a suite of structures for age estimation, and a single structure is needed to minimize processing time, to maximize consistency of age and growth...
Local and systemic replicative fitness for viruses in specialist, generalist, and non-specialist interactions with salmonid hosts
David James Paez, Gael Kurath, Rachel L. Powers, Kerry A. Naish, Maureen K. Purcell
2024, Journal of General Virology (105)
Host tissues represent diverse resources or barriers for pathogen replicative fitness. We tested whether viruses in specialist, generalist, and non-specialist interactions replicate differently in local entry tissue (fin), and systemic target tissue (kidney) using infectious hematopoietic necrosis virus (IHNV) and three salmonid fish hosts. Virus tissue replication was...
