Relating systematic molecular and textural properties of graptolite pyrolyzed via gold tube hydrous pyrolysis: Implications for thermal proxies in lower Paleozoic marine shales
Xiaowei Zheng, Hamed Sanei, Fujie Jiang, Qingyong Luo, Yewei Wang, Jennifer Nedzweckas, Brett J. Valentine, Martha Stokes, Liu Cao, Paul C. Hackley
2025, International Journal of Coal Geology (306)
A series of gold tube pyrolysis experiments (72 h, 300–550 °C, 50 MPa) conducted on a graptolite-rich lower Paleozoic marine shale generated pyrolysis residues for a comprehensive evaluation of the molecular and structural variability of three types of graptolite periderm. Organic petrology, Raman spectroscopy, and field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) with energy...
Methodology for defining and compiling abandoned and active hydrocarbon well inventories
Brian A. Varela, Marc L. Buursink
2025, Scientific Investigations Report 2025-5030
Hydrocarbon wells are not active forever; when they become permanently disused (abandoned), well infrastructure must be remediated or repurposed. Knowing which wells are abandoned is the initial and often complicated step in taking responsibility for well infrastructure. Each State creates laws and regulates hydrocarbon operations, which includes well abandonment. The...
Rhenium-osmium and oxygen isotope homogeneity during the 2022 Mauna Loa eruption and implications for basaltic magma storage
Emily A. Rhoads, Anton Kutyrev, Ilya N. Bindeman, Kendra J. Lynn, Frank A. Trusdell, Drew T. Downs, Hunter R. Edwards, Geoffrey W. Cook, James M.D. Day
2025, Bulletin of Volcanology (87)
Mauna Loa is one of the largest and most active volcanoes on Earth. The most recent eruption of Mauna Loa started on 27 November 2022, lasted for 13 days, and was preceded by the longest repose time of 38 years in its modern history. In this contribution, new trace- and highly siderophile-element...
Dynamic riskscapes for prey: Disentangling the impact of human and cougar presence on deer behavior using GPS smartphone locations
Heather Abernathy, Mark Dittmer, David Stoner, Kent Hersey, Kathryn A. Schoenecker, Pat Jackson, Kristin Engebretsen, Julie Young, George Wittemyer
2025, Ecography (2025)
Prey species adjust their behavior along human-use gradients by balancing risks from predators and humans. During hunting seasons, prey often exhibit strong antipredator responses to humans but may develop tolerance in suburban areas to exploit human-mediated resources. Additionally, areas with high human activity may offer reduced predation risk if apex...
Finding the hidden orogeny – The Proterozoic polymetamorphic history of northern New Mexico
Ian William Hillenbrand, Michael L Williams, Amy K. Gilmer, Karl E. Karlstrom, Michael J. Jercinovic, Daniel J Young
2025, Terra Nova (37) 304-315
Pressure–temperature–time-deformation histories provide key constraints on orogenic processes but can be affected by later overprinting. This is exemplified in the Proterozoic orogenic belts of southwestern Laurentia where competing tectonic models involve either a single progressive Mesoproterozoic event, the Picuris orogeny, or a polyorogenic history that also includes the ~1.65 Ga Mazatzal...
Practical genetic diversity protection: an accessible framework for IUCN subpopulation and Evolutionarily Significant Unit identification
Julia C. Geue, Laura D. Bertola, Paulette Bloomer, Anna Bruniche-Olsen, Jessica M. da Silva, J. Andrew DeWoody, Ancuta Fedorca, Jose A. Godoy, Catherine E. Grueber, Margaret Hunter, Christina Hvilsom, Isa-Rita M. Russo, Evelyn L. Jensen, Alexander Kopatz, Anna J. MacDonald, Silvia Pérez-Espona, Antoinette J. Piaggio, Jennifer C. Pierson, Helen Senn, Gernot Segelbacher, Paul Sunnucks, Cock van Oosterhout, Deborah M. Leigh
2025, Preprint
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) sets global conservation standards, including the Red List of Threatened Species and the Green Status of Species. Recent analyses showed that genetic diversity has not been effectively considered by IUCN species assessments, despite being fundamental to species’ fitness and adaptive potential. Incorporation...
Tradeoffs and win-wins between large landscape conservation and wildlife viewing in protected areas
Hilary Byerly Flint, Aaron Joey Enriquez, Drew Bennett, Leslie Richardson, Arthur Middleton
2025, Conservation Science and Practice (7)
Wildlife conservation around protected areas is critical and costly, yet its beneficiaries—particularly protected area visitors who enjoy viewing wide-ranging wildlife—rarely contribute towards landscape-scale conservation. We characterize the importance of wildlife viewing in two U.S. protected areas: Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks. We surveyed park visitors (N = 991) and used the...
Inferring snowpack contributions and the mean elevation of source water to streamflow in the Willamette River, Oregon using water stable isotopes
J. Renee Brooks, Henry M. Johnson, Keira R. Johnson, Steven P. Cline, Randy Comeleo, WIlliam Rugh, Lisandra Trine
2025, Hydrological Processes (39)
Snowpacks are an important water source for mountainous rivers, worldwide. The timing and volume of streamflow in systems reliant on snowmelt can be affected by changes in snow accumulation and melt time. In the Cascade Range (western USA), seasonal snowpacks are predicted to decrease by over 50% within the next...
Stable occupancy of conservation-priority birds amid community shifts across 16 years on Iowa wetland easements
Lindsey A.W. Gapinski, Karen E. Kinkead, Adam K. Janke, Stephen J. Dinsmore, Todd Bishop, Anna Maureen Tucker
2025, Ornithological Applications (127)
Intensive agriculture in the Prairie Pothole Region of Iowa, USA has resulted in significant wetland drainage and wildlife population declines. However, easement programs are increasingly used to protect and restore wetlands and revitalize biodiversity. Short-term responses (i.e., 1–5 years) of birds to wetland restorations are well-documented, but...
Metal fingerprints of Eocene rhyolite magmas coincident with Carlin-type gold deposition in Nevada USA
Celestine N. Mercer, Hannah R. Babel, Cameron Mark Mercer, Albert H. Hofstra
2025, Minerals (15)
Eocene magmatic systems contemporaneous with world-class Carlin-type Au deposits in Nevada (USA) have been proposed by some researchers as a key ingredient for Au mineralization, though evidence conclusively demonstrating their genetic relationship remains tenuous. This study provides the first direct evidence of the pre-eruptive metal budget of volatile- and metal-charged...
Geomorphological evidence of near-surface ice at candidate landing sites in northern Amazonis Planitia, Mars
Erica Luzzi, Jennifer L. Heldmann, Kaj E. Williams, Giacomo Nodjoumi, Ariel Deutsch, Alexander Sehlke
2025, JGR Planets (130)
This work presents geomorphological analyses of an area at the boundary between Arcadia Planitia and northern Amazonis Planitia, situated in the northern mid-latitudes of Mars. Recent studies have indicated the presence of substantial volumes of near-surface excess ice in Arcadia Planitia, making this region a promising candidate for future human...
Groundwater dominates snowmelt runoff and controls streamflow efficiency in the western United States
Paul D. Brooks, D. Kip Solomon, Stephanie Kampf, Sara Warix, Carleton R. Bern, David Barnard, Holly R. Barnard, Gregory T. Carling, Rosemary Carroll, Jon Chorover, Adrian Harpold, Kathleen Lohse, Fabiola Meza, Jennifer McIntosh, Bethany Neilson, Megan Sears, Margaret Wolf
2025, Communications Earth & Environment (6)
Climate change in seasonally snow-covered mountain catchments is reducing water supply and decreasing streamflow predictability. Here, we use tritium age dating to show that contrary to the common assumption that snowmelt quickly contributes to runoff, streamflow during snowmelt in western US catchments is dominated by older groundwater. The average age of...
One-hundred fundamental, open questions to integrate methodological approaches in lake ice research
Joshua Culpepper, Sapna Sharma, Grant Gunn, Madeline Magee, Michael Frederick Meyer, Eric Anderson, Christoper D. Arp, Sarah Cooley, Wayana Dolan, Hilary Dugan, Claude R. Duguay, Benjamin C. Jones, Georgiy Kirillin, Robert Ladwig, Matti Lepparanta, Di Long, John J. Magnuson, Tamlin Pavelsky, Sebastiano Piccolroaz, Dale M. Robertson, Bethel Steele, Manu Tom, Gesa A. Weyhenmeyer, R. Iesytn Woolway, Marguerite A. Xenopoulos, Xiao Yang
2025, Water Resources Research (616)
The rate of technological innovation within aquatic sciences outpaces the collective ability of individual scientists within the field to make appropriate use of those technologies. The process of in situ lake sampling remains the primary choice to comprehensively understand an aquatic ecosystem at local scales; however, the impact of climate change on lakes necessitates...
Reproductive characteristics and spawning potential ratio modeling of a vulnerable riverine specialist in the lower unchannelized Missouri River, USA
Lindsey A.P. LaBrie, Tanner L. Carlson, Jeff S. Wesner, Chelsey A. Pasbrig, Steven R. Chipps, Benjamin J. Schall
2025, Fisheries Research (286)
Reproductive characteristics for populations of imperiled, non-game species are not regularly studied but may be important for identifying factors associated with their population sustainability. Understanding reproductive traits of vulnerable species, particularly long-lived species, may provide insight for implementing management actions to respond to potential overharvest. This study aimed to assess...
Occurrence of pesticides in Oregon coastal waters
Bria Bleil, Elise F. Granek, Michelle Hladik
2025, Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (44) 2098-2107
Pesticides are used globally for a wide range of applications including agricultural, forestry, roadsides, freshwater systems, and personal use. While pesticides have ensured efficient crop production, they are frequently transported away from application sites and are found in almost all terrestrial and aquatic environments. Pesticides are frequently detected in watersheds...
Overview of The SCEC/USGS Community Stress Drop Validation Study using the 2019 Ridgecrest earthquake sequence
Rachel E. Abercrombie, Annemarie S. Baltay Sundstrom, Shanna Chu, Taka’aki Taira, Dino Bindi, Oliver S. Boyd, Xiaowei Chen, Elizabeth S. Cochran, Emma Devin, Douglas Dreger, William Ellsworth, Fan Wenyuan, Rebecca Harrington, Yihe Huang, Kilian Kemna, Meichen Liu, Adrien Oth, Grace Alexandra Parker, Colin Pennington, Matteo Picozzi, Christine J. Ruhl, Peter Shearer, Daniele Spallarossa, Daniel Trugman, Ian Vandevert, Qimin Wu, Clara Yoon, Ellen Yu, Gregory C. Beroza, Tom Eulenfeld, Trey Knudson, Kevin Mayeda, Paola Morasca, James S. Neely, Jorge I. Roman-Nieves, Claudio Satriano, Mariano Supino, William R. Walter, Ralph Archuleta, Gail Marie Atkinson, Giovanna Calderoni, Chen Ji, Hongfeng Yang, Jiewen Zhang
2025, Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America (115) 734-759
We present initial findings from the ongoing Community Stress Drop Validation Study to compare spectral stress‐drop estimates for earthquakes in the 2019 Ridgecrest, California, sequence. This study uses a unified dataset to independently estimate earthquake source parameters through various methods. Stress drop, which denotes the change in average shear stress...
Maintaining frog monitoring and population on the Las Cienegas National Conservation Area
Javan Mathias Bauder, Chris L. Prewitt, David Hall
2025, Cooperator Science Series CSS-167-2025
This report summarizes and analyzes the data collected on the Chiricahua Leopard Frog (CLF) populations on the Las Ciénegas National Conservation Area (LCNCA) in southeast Arizona, U.S.A., during the reporting period covered under this funding agreement from September 2020 through October 2024 and place this analysis in historical context of...
Introduction to the special section on improving measurements of earthquake source parameters
Annemarie S. Baltay Sundstrom, Rachel E. Abercrombie, Adrien Oth, Takahiko Uchide
2025, Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America (115) 723-733
Earthquake source parameters such as magnitude, seismic moment, source dimension, stress drop, and radiated energy are fundamental to understanding earthquake physics, and are also key ingredients in earthquake ground‐motion modeling, rupture simulation, and statistical seismology. However, the uncertainties in these parameters estimated from the radiated seismic wavefield are large due...
Gillnet sampling methods for monitoring status and trends of Clear Lake Hitch in Clear Lake, Lake County, California
Frederick Feyrer, Matthew J. Young, Brock Huntsman, Veronica Violette, Justin K. Clause, Jordan Buxton, Danielle Palm, Marissa L. Wulff, Jeff Gronemyer, Luis Santana
2025, Open-File Report 2025-1018
The Clear Lake Hitch (Lavinia exilicauda chi) is a minnow endemic to Clear Lake, Lake County, California. This species is listed as a threatened species under the California Endangered Species Act and has been petitioned for listing under the United States Endangered Species Act. In 2017, the U.S. Geological Survey,...
Utility of a swath laser rangefinder for characterizing mass movement flow depth and landslide initiation
Maciej Obryk, Emily Christina Bedinger, Alexandra M. Iezzi, Emily H Bryant, Kate E. Allstadt, David L. George, Benjamin B. Mirus
2025, Landslides (22) 2693-2700
Mass movements such as debris flows and landslides are some of the deadliest and most destructive natural hazards occurring mostly in alpine and volcanic settings. With ever-growing populations located downslope from known debris flow channels, early warning systems can help prevent loss of life. Geophysical and technological advances have improved...
An early Holocene wet period in the southwestern United States
Kathleen B. Springer, Adam M. Hudson, Jeffrey S. Pigati, Katharine W. Huntington, Andrew J. Schauer
2025, Geology (53) 631-635
Multiple generations of spring-fed streams traversed ∼800 km2 of the Las Vegas Valley in southern Nevada between ca. 10.9 ka and 8.5 ka, depositing an extensive tufa network. The scale of this network and diversity of tufa morphologies is novel in North America and offers an opportunity to obtain quantitative paleoclimate...
Spatially explicit capture-mark-recapture to evaluate demographic status of the Louisiana black bear
Joseph D. Clark, Heidi L. Adams, Ben Augustine, John R. Berry III, Dustin Champagne, Maria Davidson, John Hanks, Jared S. Laufenberg, Sean M. Murphy
2025, Journal of Wildlife Management (89)
Louisiana black bears (Ursus americanus luteolus) occur in semi-isolated fragments of bottomland hardwood forest in the lower Mississippi Alluvial Valley and were listed as threatened under the United States Endangered Species Act in 1992. A population viability analysis based on radio-telemetry and capture-mark-recapture (CMR) data collected from 2002 to 2012...
Sources and risk factors for nitrate, pathogens, and fecal contamination of private wells in rural southwestern Wisconsin, USA
Joel P. Stokdyk, Aaron D. Firnstahl, Kenneth Bradbury, Maureen A. Muldoon, Burney Kieke Jr., Mark A. Borchardt
2025, Water Research (275)
Household well water can be degraded by contaminants from the land's surface, but private well owners lack means to protect the source water from neighboring disturbances. Rural residents of southwestern Wisconsin, USA, rely on private well water, and the combination of land use and fractured carbonate bedrock makes groundwater vulnerable...
Nonstationary flood frequency analysis using regression in the north-central United States
Sara B. Levin
2025, Scientific Investigations Report 2025-5034
Traditional flood frequency methods assume that the statistical properties of peak streamflow do not change with time and may not be appropriate for many areas in the north-central United States. This study examines a nonstationary flood frequency analysis method that uses ordinary least squares linear regression to estimate flood magnitudes...
The crystalline silica respiratory hazard from rhyolitic lava dome eruptions in New Zealand's Taupo Volcanic Zone: A case study from the 1315 CE Kaharoa eruption
Claire J. Horwell, Helen M. Emerson, Paul Ashwell, David Damby, Steve Self, Claire Nattrass, Rebecca J. Carey, Bruce F. Houghton
2025, Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research (461)
The rhyolitic Kaharoa 1315 CE eruption was a complex, long-lived event from Tarawera volcano, New Zealand. Explosive phases were followed by around 5 years of lava dome extrusion and collapse which produced block-and-ash flows (BAF). Lava domes generate crystalline silica in the form of cristobalite, and rhyolitic magmas often contain quartz...