In the path of destruction - eyewitness chronicles of Mount St. Helens
Richard B. Waitt
2015, Book
A geologist with intimate knowledge of Mount St. Helens, Richard Waitt chronicles the eruption through unforgettable, riveting narratives—the heart of a masterful chronology that also delivers engrossing science, history, and journalism....
Reducing nitrogen export from the corn belt to the Gulf of Mexico: agricultural strategies for remediating hypoxia
Eileen McLellan, Dale M. Robertson, Keith Schilling, Mark Tomer, Jill Kostel, Douglas G. Smith, Kevin King
2015, Journal of the American Water Resources Association (51) 263-289
SPAtially Referenced Regression on Watershed models developed for the Upper Midwest were used to help evaluate the nitrogen-load reductions likely to be achieved by a variety of agricultural conservation practices in the Upper Mississippi-Ohio River Basin (UMORB) and to compare these reductions to the 45% nitrogen-load reduction proposed to remediate...
Ground motion observations of the 2014 South Napa earthquake
Annemarie S. Baltay Sundstrom, John Boatwright
2015, Seismological Research Letters (86) 355-360
Ground motions of the South Napa earthquake (24 August 2014; M 6.0) were recorded at 19 stations within 20 km and 292 stations within 100 km of the rupture surface trace, generating peak ground motions in excess of 50%g and 50 cm/s in and near Napa Valley. This large dataset allows us to compare the...
Tectonic activity as a significant source of crustal tetrafluoromethane emissions to the atmosphere: observations in groundwaters along the San Andreas Fault
Daniel A. Deeds, Justin T. Kulongoski, Jens Muhle, Ray F. Weiss
2015, Earth and Planetary Science Letters (412) 163-172
Tetrafluoromethane (CF4) concentrations were measured in 14 groundwater samples from the Cuyama Valley, Mil Potrero and Cuddy Valley aquifers along the Big Bend section of the San Andreas Fault System (SAFS) in California to assess whether tectonic activity in this region is a significant source of crustal CF4 to the...
Genetic diversity and host specificity varies across three genera of blood parasites in ducks of the Pacific Americas Flyway
Andrew B. Reeves, Matthew M. Smith, Brandt W. Meixell, Joseph P. Fleskes, Andrew M. Ramey
2015, PLoS ONE (10)
Birds of the order Anseriformes, commonly referred to as waterfowl, are frequently infected by Haemosporidia of the genera Haemoproteus, Plasmodium, and Leucocytozoon via dipteran vectors. We analyzed nucleotide sequences of the Cytochrome b (Cytb) gene from parasites of these genera detected in six species of ducks from Alaska and California,...
The aging of America's reservoirs: In-reservoir and downstream physical changes and habitat implications
Kyle E. Juracek
2015, Journal of the American Water Resources Association (51) 168-184
Reservoirs are important for various purposes including flood control, water supply, power generation, and recreation. The aging of America's reservoirs and progressive loss of water storage capacity resulting from ongoing sedimentation, coupled with increasing societal needs, will cause the social, economic, environmental, and political importance of reservoirs to continually increase....
Vegetation burn severity mapping using Landsat-8 and WorldView-2
Zhuoting Wu, Barry R. Middleton, Robert Hetzler, John M. Vogel, Dennis G. Dye
2015, Photogrammetric Engineering and Remote Sensing (2) 143-154
We used remotely sensed data from the Landsat-8 and WorldView-2 satellites to estimate vegetation burn severity of the Creek Fire on the San Carlos Apache Reservation, where wildfire occurrences affect the Tribe's crucial livestock and logging industries. Accurate pre- and post-fire canopy maps at high (0.5-meter) resolution were created from...
Ecosystem-atmosphere exchange of CO2 in a temperate herbaceous peatland in the Sanjiang Plain of northeast China
Xiaoyan Zhu, Changchun Song, Christopher M. Swarzenski, Yuedong Guo, Xinhow Zhang, Jiaoyue Wang
2015, Ecological Engineering (75) 16-23
Northern peatlands contain a considerable share of the terrestrial carbon pool, which will be affected by future climatic variability. Using the static chamber technique, we investigated ecosystem respiration and soil respiration over two growing seasons (2012 and 2013) in a Carex lasiocarpa-dominated peatland in the Sanjiang Plain in China. We...
Aeolian responses to climate variability during the past century on Mesquite Lake Playa, Mojave Desert
John W. Whitney, George N. Breit, S.E. Buckingham, Richard L. Reynolds, Rian C. Bogle, Lifeng Luo, Harland L. Goldstein, John M. Vogel
2015, Geomorphology (230) 13-25
The erosion and deposition of sediments by wind from 1901 to 2013 have created large changes in surface features of Mesquite Lake playa in the Mojave Desert. The decadal scale recurrence of sand-sheet development, migration, and merging with older dunes appears related to decadal climatic changes of drought and wetness...
Development of a new semi-analytical model for cross-borehole flow experiments in fractured media
Delphine Roubinet, James Irving, Frederick D. Day-Lewis
2015, Advances in Water Resources (76) 97-108
Analysis of borehole flow logs is a valuable technique for identifying the presence of fractures in the subsurface and estimating properties such as fracture connectivity, transmissivity and storativity. However, such estimation requires the development of analytical and/or numerical modeling tools that are well adapted to the complexity of the problem....
Hillslope run-off thresholds with shrink–swell clay soils
Ryan D. Stewart, Majdi R. Abou Najm, David E. Rupp, John W. Lane Jr., Hamil C. Uribe, Jose Luis Arumi, John S. Selker
2015, Hydrological Processes (29) 557-571
Irrigation experiments on 12 instrumented field plots were used to assess the impact of dynamic soil crack networks on infiltration and run-off. During applications of intensity similar to a heavy rainstorm, water was seen being preferentially delivered within the soil profile. However, run-off was not observed until soil water content...
Inter-annual and spatial variability of Hamon potential evapotranspiration model coefficients
Gregory J. McCabe, Lauren E. Hay, Andy Bock, Steven L. Markstrom, R. Dwight Atkinson
2015, Journal of Hydrology (521) 389-394
Monthly calibrated values of the Hamon PET coefficient (C) are determined for 109,951 hydrologic response units (HRUs) across the conterminous United States (U.S.). The calibrated coefficient values are determined by matching calculated mean monthly Hamon PET to mean monthly free-water surface evaporation. For most locations and months the calibrated coefficients...
Suspended-sediment trapping in the tidal reach of an estuarine tributary channel
Maureen A. Downing-Kunz, David H. Schoellhamer
2015, Estuaries and Coasts (38) 2198-2212
Evidence of decreasing sediment supply to estuaries and coastal oceans worldwide illustrates the need for accurate and updated estimates. In the San Francisco Estuary (Estuary), recent research suggests a decrease in supply from its largest tributaries, implying the increasing role of smaller, local tributaries in sediment supply to this estuary....
Microscopical characterization of carbon materials derived from coal and petroleum and their interaction phenomena in making steel electrodes, anodes and cathode blocks for the Microscopy of Carbon Materials Working Group of the ICCP
G. Predeanu, C. Panaitescu, M. Bălănescu, G. Bieg, A.G. Borrego, M. A. Diez, Paul C. Hackley, B. Kwiecinska, M. Marques, Maria Mastalerz, M. Misz-Kennan, S. Pusz, I. Suarez-Ruiz, S. Rodrigues, A. K. Singh, A. K. Varma, A. Zdravkov, D. Zivotić
2015, International Journal of Coal Geology (139) 63-79
This paper describes the evaluation of petrographic textures representing the structural organization of the organic matter derived from coal and petroleum and their interaction phenomena in the making of steel electrodes, anodes and cathode blocks.This work represents the results of the Microscopy of Carbon Materials Working Group in...
Do shrubs reduce the adverse effects of grazing on soil properties?
David J. Eldridge, Genevieve Beecham, James B. Grace
2015, Ecohydrology (8) 1503-1513
Increases in the density of woody plants are a global phenomenon in drylands, and large aggregations of shrubs, in particular, are regarded as being indicative of dysfunctional ecosystems. There is increasing evidence that overgrazing by livestock reduces ecosystem functions in shrublands, but that shrubs may buffer the negative effects of...
A method for estimating the diffuse attenuation coefficient (KdPAR)from paired temperature sensors
Jordan S. Read, Kevin C. Rose, Luke A. Winslow, Emily K. Read
2015, Limnology and Oceanography: Methods (13) 53-61
A new method for estimating the diffuse attenuation coefficient for photosynthetically active radiation (KdPAR) from paired temperature sensors was derived. We show that during cases where the attenuation of penetrating shortwave solar radiation is the dominant source of temperature changes, time series measurements of water temperatures at multiple depths (z1 and z2)...
Factors influencing CO2 and CH4 emissions from coastal wetlands in the Liaohe Delta, northeast China
Linda Olsson, Siyuan Ye, Xueyang Yu, Mengjie Wei, Ken W. Krauss, Hans Brix
2015, Biogeosciences Discussions (12) 3469-3503
Many factors are known to influence greenhouse gas emissions from coastal wetlands, but it is still unclear which factors are most important under field conditions when they are all acting simultaneously. The objective of this study was to assess the effects of water table, salinity, soil temperature and vegetation on...
The cost of reproduction: differential resource specialization in female and male California sea otters
Emma A. Elliott Smith, Seth D. Newsome, James A. Estes, M. Tim Tinker
2015, Oecologia (178) 17-29
Intraspecific variation in behavior and diet can have important consequences for population and ecosystem dynamics. Here, we examine how differences in reproductive investment and spatial ecology influence individual diet specialization in male and female southern sea otters (Enhydra lutris nereis). We hypothesize that greater reproductive constraints and smaller home...
Anomalous solute transport in saturated porous media: Relating transport model parameters to electrical and nuclear magnetic resonance properties
Ryan D Swanson, Andrew Binley, Kristina Keating, Samantha France, Gordon Osterman, Frederick D. Day-Lewis, Kamini Singha
2015, Water Resources Research (51) 1264-1283
The advection-dispersion equation (ADE) fails to describe commonly observed non-Fickian solute transport in saturated porous media, necessitating the use of other models such as the dual-domain mass-transfer (DDMT) model. DDMT model parameters are commonly calibrated via curve fitting, providing little insight into the relation between effective parameters and physical properties...
Flow cytometric method for measuring chromatin fragmentation in fixed sperm from yellow perch (Perca flavescens)
Jill A. Jenkins, Rassa O. Draugelis-Dale, Alfred E. Pinkney, Luke R. Iwanowicz, Vicki Blazer
2015, Theriogenology (83) 920-931
Declining harvests of yellow perch, Perca flavescens, in urbanized watersheds of Chesapeake Bay have prompted investigations of their reproductive fitness. The purpose of this study was to establish a flow cytometric technique for DNA analysis of fixed samples sent from the field to provide reliable gamete quality measurements. Similar to the...
Vegetation and non-native ungulate monitoring at the Big Island National Wildlife Refuge Complex 2010–2014.
Steven C. Hess, Christina R. Leopold, Steven J. Kendall
2015, Technical Report HCSU-062
The Hakalau Forest Unit (HFU) of Big Island National Wildlife Refuge Complex (BINWRC) has intensively managed feral cattle (Bos taurus) and pigs (Sus scrofa) and monitored non-native ungulate presence and distribution during surveys of all managed areas since 1988. We: 1) provide results from recent ungulate surveys at HFU to...
Variations in community exposure to lahar hazards from multiple volcanoes in Washington State (USA)
Angela K. Diefenbach, Nathan J. Wood, John W. Ewert
2015, Journal of Applied Volcanology (4)
Understanding how communities are vulnerable to lahar hazards provides critical input for effective design and implementation of volcano hazard preparedness and mitigation strategies. Past vulnerability assessments have focused largely on hazards posed by a single volcano, even though communities and officials in many parts of the world must plan for...
Evaluation of satellite rainfall estimates for drought and flood monitoring in Mozambique
Carolien Tote, Domingos Patricio, Hendrik Boogaard, Raymond van der Wijngaart, Elena Tarnavsky, Christopher C. Funk
2015, Remote Sensing (7) 1758-1776
Satellite derived rainfall products are useful for drought and flood early warning and overcome the problem of sparse, unevenly distributed and erratic rain gauge observations, provided their accuracy is well known. Mozambique is highly vulnerable to extreme weather events such as major droughts and floods and thus, an understanding of...
Magmatic gas emissions at Holocene volcanic features near Mono Lake, California, and their relation to regional magmatism
D. Bergfeld, William C. Evans, James F. Howle, Andrew G. Hunt
2015, Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research (292) 70-83
Silicic lavas have erupted repeatedly in the Mono Basin over the past few thousand years, forming the massive domes and coulees of the Mono Craters chain and the smaller island vents in Mono Lake. We report here on the first systematic study of magmatic CO2 emissions from these features, conducted during...
Differences between main-channel and off-channel food webs in the upper Mississippi River revealed by fatty acid profiles of consumers
James H. Larson, Michelle Bartsch, Steve Gutreuter, Brent C. Knights, Lynn Bartsch, William B. Richardson, Jonathan M. Vallazza, Michael T. Arts
2015, Inland Waters (5) 101-106
Large river systems are often thought to contain a mosaic of patches with different habitat characteristics driven by differences in flow and mixing environments. Off-channel habitats (e.g., backwater areas, secondary channels) can become semi-isolated from main-channel water inputs, leading to the development of distinct biogeochemical environments. Observations of adult bluegill...
