U-Pb zircon age data for selected sedimentary, metasedimentary, and igneous rocks from northern and central Alaska
Thomas E. Moore
2014, Data Series 899
This publication contains the complete results of U-Pb zircon age dating studies of sedimentary and metasedimentary units from northern and central Alaska that are discussed and interpreted in other reports by the author. Most of the U-Pb ages are of detrital zircons from sandstones, although U-Pb ages from igneous and...
A new analysis of Mars "Special Regions": findings of the Second MEPAG Special Regions Science Analysis Group (SR-SAG2)
John D. Rummel, David W. Beaty, Melissa A. Jones, Corien Bakermans, Nadine G. Barlow, Penelope J. Boston, Vincent F. Chevrier, Benton C. Clark, Jean-Pierre P. de Vera, Raina V. Gough, John E. Hallsworth, James W. Head, Victoria J. Hipkin, Thomas L. Kieft, Alfred S. McEwen, Michael T. Mellon, Jill A. Mikucki, Wayne L. Nicholson, Christopher R. Omelon, Ronald Peterson, Eric E. Roden, Barbara Sherwood Lollar, Kenneth L. Tanaka, Donna Viola, James J. Wray
2014, Astrobiology (14) 887-968
A committee of the Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group (MEPAG) has reviewed and updated the description of Special Regions on Mars as places where terrestrial organisms might replicate (per the COSPAR Planetary Protection Policy). This review and update was conducted by an international team (SR-SAG2) drawn from both the biological...
Intrinsic variability in shell and soft tissue growth of the freshwater mussel Lampsilis siliquoidea
James H. Larson, Nathan L. Eckert, Michelle Bartsch
2014, PLoS ONE (9)
Freshwater mussels are ecologically and economically important members of many aquatic ecosystems, but are globally among the most imperiled taxa. Propagation techniques for mussels have been developed and used to boost declining and restore extirpated populations. Here we use a cohort of propagated mussels to estimate the intrinsic variability in...
Persistence of DNA in carcasses, slime and avian feces may affect interpretation of environmental DNA data
Christopher M. Merkes, S. Grace McCalla, Nathan R. Jensen, Mark P. Gaikowski, Jon J. Amberg
2014, PLoS ONE (9)
The prevention of non-indigenous aquatic invasive species spreading into new areas is a goal of many resource managers. New techniques have been developed to survey for species that are difficult to capture with conventional gears that involve the detection of their DNA in water samples (eDNA). This technique is currently...
Maintaining resilience in the face of climate change
Alejandro E. Camacho, T. Douglas Beard Jr.
2014, Book chapter, Social-ecological resilience and law
Climate change, when combined with more conventional stress from human exploitation, calls into question the capacity of both existing ecological communities and resource management institutions to experience disturbances while substantially retaining their same functions and identities (Zellmer and Gunderson 2009; Ruhl 2011). In other words, the physical and biological effects...
From streets to streams: assessing the toxicity potential in urban sediment
William R. Selbig
2014, Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management (10) 474-475
No abstract available....
The 3D Elevation Program: summary for Indiana
William J. Carswell Jr.
2014, Fact Sheet 2014-3113
Elevation data are essential to a broad range of applications, including forest resources management, wildlife and habitat management, national security, recreation, and many others. For the State of Indiana, elevation data are critical for flood risk management, agriculture and precision farming, natural resources conservation, infrastructure and construction management, aviation navigation...
Occurrence model for magmatic sulfide-rich nickel-copper-(platinum-group element) deposits related to mafic and ultramafic dike-sill complexes
Klaus J. Schulz, Laurel G. Woodruff, Suzanne W. Nicholson, Robert R. Seal II, Nadine M. Piatak, Val W. Chandler, John L. Mars
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2010-5070-I
Magmatic sulfide deposits containing nickel (Ni) and copper (Cu), with or without (±) platinum-group elements (PGE), account for approximately 60 percent of the world’s nickel production. Most of the remainder of the Ni production is derived from lateritic deposits, which form by weathering of ultramafic rocks in humid tropical conditions....
Uncertainty analysis of a groundwater flow model in east-central Florida
Nicasio Sepulveda, John E. Doherty
2014, Groundwater
A groundwater flow model for east-central Florida has been developed to help water-resource managers assess the impact of increased groundwater withdrawals from the Floridan aquifer system on heads and spring flows originating from the Upper Floridan aquifer. The model provides a probabilistic description of predictions of interest to water-resource managers,...
Basin-scale simulation of current and potential climate changed hydrologic conditions in the Lake Michigan Basin, United States
Daniel E. Christiansen, John F. Walker, Randall J. Hunt
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2014-5175
The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) is the largest public investment in the Great Lakes in two decades. A task force of 11 Federal agencies developed an action plan to implement the initiative. The U.S. Department of the Interior was one of the 11 agencies that entered into an interagency...
Exploring the long-term balance between net precipitation and net groundwater exchange in Florida seepage lakes
Terrie M. Lee, Laura A. Sacks, Amy Swancar
2014, Journal of Hydrology (519) 3054-3068
The long-term balance between net precipitation and net groundwater exchange that maintains thousands of seepage lakes in Florida’s karst terrain is explored at a representative lake basin and then regionally for the State’s peninsular lake district. The 15-year water budget of Lake Starr includes El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO)-related extremes...
Population viability and connectivity of the Louisiana black bear (Ursus americanus luteolus)
Jared S. Laufenberg, Joseph D. Clark
2014, Open-File Report 2014-1228
In 1992, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) granted Ursus americanus luteolus (Louisiana black bear) threatened status under the U.S. Endangered Species Act of 1973, listing loss and fragmentation of habitat as the primary threats. A study was developed by the U.S. Geological Survey in cooperation with the University of Tennessee,...
Radiocarbon dating loess deposits in the Mississippi Valley using terrestrial gastropod shells (Polygyridae, Helicinidae, and Discidae)
Jeffery S. Pigati, John P. McGeehin, Daniel Muhs, David A. Grimley, Jeffrey C. Nekola
2014, Aeolian Research (16) 25-33
Small terrestrial gastropod shells (mainly Succineidae) have been used successfully to date late Quaternary loess deposits in Alaska and the Great Plains. However, Succineidae shells are less common in loess deposits in the Mississippi Valley compared to those of the Polygyridae, Helicinidae, and Discidae families. In this study, we conducted...
Evaluation of the Raven sUAS to detect and monitor greater sage-grouse leks within the Middle Park population
Leanne Hanson, Christopher L. Holmquist-Johnson, Michelle L. Cowardin
2014, Open-File Report 2014-1205
Staff from the U.S. Geological Survey Fort Collins Science Center and the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Hot Sulphur Springs Office began discussions in 2011 for a proof of concept study to test the Raven RQ-11A small Unmanned Aircraft System (Raven sUAS) for its suitability to detect and monitor greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus...
Stochastic modeling of a lava-flow aquifer system
Collin Cronkite-Ratcliff, Geoffrey A. Phelps
2014, Open-File Report 2014-1179
This report describes preliminary three-dimensional geostatistical modeling of a lava-flow aquifer system using a multiple-point geostatistical model. The purpose of this study is to provide a proof-of-concept for this modeling approach. An example of the method is demonstrated using a subset of borehole geologic data and aquifer test data from...
Turbidity and suspended sediment in the upper Esopus Creek watershed, Ulster County, New York
Michael R. McHale, Jason Siemion
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2014-5200
Suspended-sediment concentrations (SSCs) and turbidity were measured for 2 to 3 years at 14 monitoring sites throughout the upper Esopus Creek watershed in the Catskill Mountains of New York State. The upper Esopus Creek watershed is part of the New York City water-supply system that supplies water to more than...
Area- and depth- weighted averages of selected SSURGO variables for the conterminous United States and District of Columbia
Michael Wieczorek
2014, Data Series 866
This digital data release consists of seven data files of soil attributes for the United States and the District of Columbia. The files are derived from National Resources Conservations Service’s (NRCS) Soil Survey Geographic database (SSURGO). The data files can be linked to the raster datasets of soil mapping unit...
Digital Mapping Techniques '11–12 workshop proceedings
David R. Soller
2014, Open-File Report 2014-1167
The Digital Mapping Techniques '11 (DMT'11) workshop was hosted by Virginia Division of Geology and Mineral Resources and The College of William & Mary, and coordinated by the National Geologic Map Database project. Conducted May 22-25 on the campus of The College of William & Mary, in Williamsburg, Virginia, it...
A landscape-based reconnaissance survey of estrogenic activity in streams of the upper Potomac, upper James,and Shenandoah Rivers, USA
John A. Young, Luke R. Iwanowicz, Adam J. Sperry, Vicki Blazer
2014, Environmental Monitoring and Assessment (186) 5531-5545
Endocrine-disrupting compounds (EDCs) are becoming of increasing concern in waterways of the USA and worldwide. What remains poorly understood, however, is how prevalent these emerging contaminants are in the environment and what methods are best able to determine landscape sources of EDCs. We describe the development of a spatially structured...
World-Wide Standardized Seismograph Network: a data users guide
Jon R. Peterson, Charles R. Hutt
2014, Open-File Report 2014-1218
The purpose of this report, which is based on an unpublished draft prepared in the 1970s, is to provide seismologists with the information they may need to use the WWSSN data set as it becomes available in a more easily accessible and convenient format on the Internet. The report includes...
Surveying the South Pole-Aitken basin magnetic anomaly for remnant impactor metallic iron
Joshua T.S. Cahill, Justin Hagerty, David M. Lawrence, Rachel L. Klima, David T. Blewett
2014, Icarus (243) 27-30
The Moon has areas of magnetized crust ("magnetic anomalies"), the origins of which are poorly constrained. A magnetic anomaly near the northern rim of South Pole-Aitken (SPA) basin was recently postulated to originate from remnant metallic iron emplaced by the SPA basin-forming impactor. Here, we remotely examine the regolith of...
Measurement of unsaturated hydraulic properties and evaluation of property-transfer models for deep sedimentary interbeds, Idaho National Laboratory, Idaho
Kimberlie Perkins, Brittany D. Johnson, Benjamin B. Mirus
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2014-5206
Operations at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) have the potential to contaminate the underlying Eastern Snake River Plain (ESRP) aquifer. Methods to quantitatively characterize unsaturated flow and recharge to the ESRP aquifer are needed to inform water-resources management decisions at INL. In particular, hydraulic properties are needed to parameterize distributed...
Assessing inundation hazards to nuclear powerplant sites using geologically extended histories of riverine floods, tsunamis, and storm surges
Jim O’Connor, Brian F. Atwater, Timothy A. Cohn, Thomas M. Cronin, Mackenzie K. Keith, Christopher G. Smith, Mason Jr.
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2014-5207
Most nuclear powerplants in the United States are near rivers, large lakes, or oceans. As evident from the Fukushima Daiichi, Japan, disaster of 2011, these water bodies pose inundation threats. Geologic records can extend knowledge of rare hazards from flooding, storm surges, and tsunamis. This knowledge can aid in assessing...
A ground-based magnetic survey of Frenchman Flat, Nevada National Security Site and Nevada Test and Training Range, Nevada: data release and preliminary interpretation
Jeffrey D. Phillips, Bethany L. Burton, Erika Curry-Elrod, Sigmund Drellack
2014, Open-File Report 2014-1187
The Nevada National Security Site (NNSS, formerly the Nevada Test Site) is located in southern Nevada approximately 105 kilometers (km) (65 miles) northwest of Las Vegas. Frenchman Flat is a sedimentary basin located on the eastern edge of NNSS and extending eastward into the adjacent Nevada Test and Training Range...
Landsat 8 operational land imager on-orbit geometric calibration and performance
James C. Storey, Mike Choate, Kenton Lee
2014, Remote Sensing (6) 11127-11152
The Landsat 8 spacecraft was launched on 11 February 2013 carrying the Operational Land Imager (OLI) payload for moderate resolution imaging in the visible, near infrared (NIR), and short-wave infrared (SWIR) spectral bands. During the 90-day commissioning period following launch, several on-orbit geometric calibration activities were performed to refine the...
