Himalayan gneiss dome formation in the middle crust and exhumation by normal faulting: New geochronology of Gianbul dome, northwestern India
Forrest Horton, Jeffrey Lee, Bradley Hacker, Meilani Bowman-Kamaha’o, Michael A. Cosca
2015, Geological Society of America Bulletin (127) 162-180
A general lack of consensus about the origin of Himalayan gneiss domes hinders accurate thermomechanical modeling of the orogen. To test whether doming resulted from tectonic contraction (e.g., thrust duplex formation, antiformal bending above a thrust ramp, etc.), channel flow, or via the buoyant rise of anatectic melts, this study...
Modeled changes in extreme wave climates of the tropical Pacific over the 21st century: Implications for U.S. and U.S.-Affiliated atoll islands
J.B. Shope, Curt D. Storlazzi, Li H. Erikson, C.A. Hegermiller
2015, Conference Paper
Wave heights, periods, and directions were forecast for 2081–2100 using output from four coupled atmosphere–ocean global climate models for representative concentration pathway scenarios RCP4.5 and RCP8.5. Global climate model wind fields were used to drive the global WAVEWATCH-III wave model to generate hourly time-series of bulk wave parameters for 25...
Volcano warning systems: Chapter 67
Chris E. Gregg, Bruce F. Houghton, John W. Ewert
2015, Book chapter, Encyclopedia of Volcanoes, 2nd Edition
Messages conveying volcano alert level such as Watches and Warnings are designed to provide people with risk information before, during, and after eruptions. Information is communicated to people from volcano observatories and emergency management agencies and from informal sources and social and environmental cues. Any individual or agency can be...
Coevolution of bed surface patchiness and channel morphology: 2. Numerical experiments
Peter A. Nelson, Richard R. McDonald, Jonathan M. Nelson, William E. Dietrich
2015, Journal of Geophysical Research F: Earth Surface (120) 1708-1723
In gravel bed rivers, bed topography and the bed surface grain size distribution evolve simultaneously, but it is not clear how feedbacks between topography and grain sorting affect channel morphology. In this, the second of a pair of papers examining interactions between bed topography and bed surface sorting in gravel...
Hydrogeochemistry and microbiology of mine drainage: An update
D. Kirk Nordstrom, D.W Blowes, C.J. Ptacek
2015, Applied Geochemistry (57) 3-16
The extraction of mineral resources requires access through underground workings, or open pit operations, or through drillholes for solution mining. Additionally, mineral processing can generate large quantities of waste, including mill tailings, waste rock and refinery wastes, heap leach pads, and slag. Thus, through mining and mineral processing activities, large...
Annual and average estimates of water-budget components based on hydrograph separation and PRISM precipitation for gaged basins in the Appalachian Plateaus Region, 1900-2011
David L. Nelms, Terence Messinger, Kurt J. McCoy
2015, Data Series 944
As part of the U.S. Geological Survey’s Groundwater Resources Program study of the Appalachian Plateaus aquifers, annual and average estimates of water-budget components based on hydrograph separation and precipitation data from parameter-elevation regressions on independent slopes model (PRISM) were determined at 849 continuous-record streamflow-gaging stations from Mississippi to New York...
A stochastic population model to evaluate Moapa dace (Moapa coriacea) population growth under alternative management scenarios
Russell W. Perry, Edward Jones, G. Gary Scoppettone
2015, Open-File Report 2015-1126
The primary goal of this research project was to evaluate the response of Moapa dace (Moapa coriacea) to the potential effects of changes in the amount of available habitat due to human influences such as ground water pumping, barriers to movement, and extirpation of Moapa dace from the mainstem Muddy...
Regional variability in dust-on-snow processes and impacts in the Upper Colorado River Basin
S. McKenzie Skiles, Thomas H. Painter, Jayne Belnap, Lacey Holland, Richard L. Reynolds, Harland L. Goldstein, J. Lin
2015, Hydrological Processes (29) 5397-5413
Dust deposition onto mountain snow cover in the Upper Colorado River Basin frequently occurs in the spring when wind speeds and dust emission peaks on the nearby Colorado Plateau. Dust loading has increased since the intensive settlement in the western USA in the mid 1880s. The effects of dust-on-snow have...
The effects of numerical-model complexity and observation type on estimated porosity values
Jeffrey Starn, Amvrossios C. Bagtzoglou, Christopher T. Green
2015, Hydrogeology Journal (23) 1121-1128
The relative merits of model complexity and types of observations employed in model calibration are compared. An existing groundwater flow model coupled with an advective transport simulation of the Salt Lake Valley, Utah (USA), is adapted for advective transport, and effective porosity is adjusted until simulated tritium concentrations match concentrations...
Coastal vertebrate exposure to predicted habitat changes due to sea level rise
Elizabeth A. Hunter, Nathan P. Nibbelink, Clark R. Alexander, Kyle Barrett, Lara F. Mengak, Rachel Guy, Clinton T. Moore, Robert J. Cooper
2015, Environmental Management 1-10
Sea level rise (SLR) may degrade habitat for coastal vertebrates in the Southeastern United States, but it is unclear which groups or species will be most exposed to habitat changes. We assessed 28 coastal Georgia vertebrate species for their exposure to potential habitat changes due to SLR using output from...
Design, analysis, and interpretation of field quality-control data for water-sampling projects
David K. Mueller, Terry L. Schertz, Jeffrey D. Martin, Mark W. Sandstrom
2015, Techniques and Methods 4-C4
The process of obtaining and analyzing water samples from the environment includes a number of steps that can affect the reported result. The equipment used to collect and filter samples, the bottles used for specific subsamples, any added preservatives, sample storage in the field, and shipment to the laboratory have...
Mapping of coal quality using stochastic simulation and isometric logratio transformation with an application to a Texas lignite
Ricardo A. Olea, James A. Luppens
2015, International Journal of Coal Geology (152) 80-93
Coal is a chemically complex commodity that often contains most of the natural elements in the periodic table. Coal constituents are conventionally grouped into four components (proximate analysis): fixed carbon, ash, inherent moisture, and volatile matter. These four parts, customarily measured as weight losses and expressed as percentages, share all...
Truth, models, model sets, AIC, and multimodel inference: a Bayesian perspective
Richard J. Barker, William A. Link
2015, Journal of Wildlife Management (79) 730-738
Statistical inference begins with viewing data as realizations of stochastic processes. Mathematical models provide partial descriptions of these processes; inference is the process of using the data to obtain a more complete description of the stochastic processes. Wildlife and ecological scientists have become increasingly concerned with the conditional nature of...
Comparing spatial capture–recapture modeling and nest count methods to estimate orangutan densities in the Wehea Forest, East Kalimantan, Indonesia
Stephanie N. Spehar, Brent Loken, Yaya Rayadin, J. Andrew Royle
2015, Biological Conservation (191) 185-193
Accurate information on the density and abundance of animal populations is essential for understanding species' ecology and for conservation planning, but is difficult to obtain. The endangered orangutan (Pongo spp.) is an example; due to its elusive behavior and low densities, researchers have relied on methods...
Estimating the abundance of the Southern Hudson Bay polar bear subpopulation with aerial surveys
Martyn E. Obbard, Seth P. Stapleton, Kevin R. Middel, Isabelle Thibault, Vincent Brodeur, Charles Jutras
2015, Polar Biology (38) 1713-1725
The Southern Hudson Bay (SH) polar bear subpopulation occurs at the southern extent of the species’ range. Although capture–recapture studies indicate abundance was likely unchanged between 1986 and 2005, declines in body condition and survival occurred during the period, possibly foreshadowing a future decrease in abundance. To obtain a current...
Holocene climate variability in Texas, USA: An integration of existing paleoclimate data and modeling with a new, high-resolution speleothem record
Corinne I. Wong, Jay L. Banner, MaryLynn Musgrove
2015, Quaternary Science Reviews (127) 155-173
Delineating the climate processes governing precipitation variability in drought-prone Texas is critical for predicting and mitigating climate change effects, and requires the reconstruction of past climate beyond the instrumental record. We synthesize existing paleoclimate proxy data and climate simulations to provide an overview of climate variability in Texas during the...
Renewed inflation of Long Valley Caldera, California (2011 to 2014)
Emily Montgomery-Brown, Charles W. Wicks Jr., Peter F. Cervelli, John O. Langbein, Jerry L. Svarc, David R. Shelly, David P. Hill, Michael Lisowski
2015, Geophysical Research Letters (42) 5250-5257
Slow inflation began at Long Valley Caldera in late 2011, coinciding with renewed swarm seismicity. Ongoing deformation is concentrated within the caldera. We analyze this deformation using a combination of GPS and InSAR (TerraSAR-X) data processed with a persistent scatterer technique. The extension rate of the dome-crossing baseline during this...
Didymosphenia geminata in the Upper Esopus Creek: current status, variability, and controlling factors
Scott D. George, Barry P. Baldigo
2015, PLoS ONE (10) 1-20
In May of 2009, the bloom-forming diatom Didymosphenia geminata was first identified in the Upper Esopus Creek, a key tributary to the New York City water-supply and a popular recreational stream. The Upper Esopus receives supplemental flows from the Shandaken Portal, an underground aqueduct delivering waters from a nearby basin. The presence...
An evaluation of fish behavior upstream of the water temperature control tower at Cougar Dam, Oregon, using acoustic cameras, 2013
Noah S. Adams, Collin D. Smith, John M. Plumb, Gabriel S. Hansen, John W. Beeman
2015, Open-File Report 2015-1124
This report describes the initial year of a 2-year study to determine the feasibility of using acoustic cameras to monitor fish movements to help inform decisions about fish passage at Cougar Dam near Springfield, Oregon. Specifically, we used acoustic cameras to measure fish presence, travel speed, and direction adjacent to...
Metamodels to bridge the gap between modeling and decision support
Michael N. Fienen, Bernard T. Nolan, Daniel T. Feinstein, J. Jeffrey Starn
2015, Groundwater (53) 511-512
Alteration, slope-classified alteration, and potential lahar inundation maps of volcanoes for the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) Volcano Archive
John C. Mars, Bernard E. Hubbard, David Pieri, Justin Linick
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2015-5035
This study identifies areas prone to lahars from hydrothermally altered volcanic edifices on a global scale, using visible and near infrared (VNIR) and short wavelength infrared (SWIR) reflectance data from the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) and digital elevation data from the ASTER Global Digital Elevation Model...
Primative components, crustal assimilation, and magmatic degassing of the 2008 Kilauea summit eruption
Michael C. Rowe, Carl R. Thornber, Tim R. Orr
2015, Book chapter, Hawaiian volcanoes, from source to surface
Simultaneous summit and rift zone eruptions at Kīlauea starting in 2008 reflect a shallow eruptive plumbing system inundated by a bourgeoning supply of new magma from depth. Olivine-hosted melt inclusions, host glass, and bulk lava compositions of magma erupted at both the summit and east rift zone demonstrate chemical continuity...
A collision risk model to predict avian fatalities at wind facilities: an example using golden eagles, Aquila chrysaetos
Leslie New, Emily Bjerre, Brian A. Millsap, Mark C. Otto, Michael C. Runge
2015, PLoS ONE (10) 1-12
Wind power is a major candidate in the search for clean, renewable energy. Beyond the technical and economic challenges of wind energy development are environmental issues that may restrict its growth. Avian fatalities due to collisions with rotating turbine blades are a leading concern and there is considerable uncertainty surrounding...
Testing the thermal-niche oxygen-squeeze hypothesis for estuarine striped bass
Richard T. Kraus, D.H. Secor, Rebecca L. Wingate
2015, Environmental Biology of Fishes (98) 2083-2092
In many stratified coastal ecosystems, conceptual and bioenergetics models predict seasonal reduction in quality and quantity of fish habitat due to high temperatures and hypoxia. We tested these predictions using acoustic telemetry of 2 to 4 kg striped bass (Morone saxatilis Walbaum) and high-resolution spatial water quality sampling in the...
Southern San Andreas Fault seismicity is consistent with the Gutenberg-Richter magnitude-frequency distribution
Morgan T. Page, Karen Felzer
2015, Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America (105) 2070-2080
The magnitudes of any collection of earthquakes nucleating in a region are generally observed to follow the Gutenberg-Richter (G-R) distribution. On some major faults, however, paleoseismic rates are higher than a G-R extrapolation from the modern rate of small earthquakes would predict. This, along with other observations, led to formulation...
