Combined effects of compact cevelopment, transportation investments, and road user pricing on vehicle miles traveled in urbanized areas
Reid Ewing, Shima Hamidi, Frank Gallivan, Arthur C. Nelson, James B. Grace
2014, Transportation Research Record (2397) 117-124
Vehicle miles traveled (VMT) is the primary determinant of traffic congestion, vehicle crashes, greenhouse gas emissions, and other effects of transportation. Two previous studies have sought to explain VMT levels in urbanized areas. This study updates and expands on previous work with more recent data, additional metrics, and structural equation...
Monitoring and research to describe geomorphic effects of the 2011 controlled flood on the Green River in the Canyon of Lodore, Dinosaur National Monument, Colorado and Utah
Erich R. Mueller, Paul E. Grams, John C. Schmidt, Joseph E. Hazel Jr., Matt Kaplinski, Jason A. Alexander, Keith Kohl
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2014-5022
In 2011, a large magnitude flow release from Flaming Gorge Reservoir, Wyoming and Utah, occurred in response to high snowpack in the middle Rocky Mountains. This was the third highest recorded discharge along the Green River downstream of Flaming Gorge Dam, Utah, since its initial closure in November 1962 and...
Climate change impacts on the temperature and magnitude of groundwater discharge from shallow, unconfined aquifers
Barret L. Kurylyk, Kerry T.B MacQuarrie, Clifford I. Voss
2014, Water Resources Research (50) 3253-3274
Cold groundwater discharge to streams and rivers can provide critical thermal refuge for threatened salmonids and other aquatic species during warm summer periods. Climate change may influence groundwater temperature and flow rates, which may in turn impact riverine ecosystems. This study evaluates the potential impact of climate change on the...
Guidelines for a priori grouping of species in hierarchical community models
Krishna Pacifici, Elise Zipkin, Jaime Collazo, Julissa I. Irizarry, Amielle A. DeWan
2014, Ecology and Evolution (4) 877-888
Recent methodological advances permit the estimation of species richness and occurrences for rare species by linking species-level occurrence models at the community level. The value of such methods is underscored by the ability to examine the influence of landscape heterogeneity on species assemblages at large spatial scales. A salient advantage...
Ecotypic variation in recruitment of reintroduced bighorn sheep: implications for translocation
Brett P. Wiedmann, Glen A. Sargeant
2014, Journal of Wildlife Management (78) 394-401
European settlement led to extirpation of native Audubon's bighorn sheep (formerly Ovis canadensis auduboni) from North Dakota during the early 20th century. The North Dakota Game and Fish Department subsequently introduced California bighorn sheep (formerly O. c. californiana) that were indigenous to the Williams Lake region of British Columbia, Canada,...
A 17-year record of environmental tracers in spring discharge, Shenandoah National Park, Virginia, USA: use of climatic data and environmental conditions to interpret discharge, dissolved solutes, and tracer concentrations
Eurybiades Busenberg, Niel Plummer
2014, Aquatic Geochemistry (20) 267-290
A 17-year record (1995–2012) of a suite of environmental tracer concentrations in discharge from 34 springs located along the crest of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Shenandoah National Park (SNP), Virginia, USA, reveals patterns and trends that can be related to climatic and environmental conditions. These data include a 12-year...
Animal reintroductions: an innovative assessment of survival
Erin L. Muths, Larissa L. Bailey, Mary Kay Watry
2014, Biological Conservation (172) 200-208
Quantitative evaluations of reintroductions are infrequent and assessments of milestones reached before a project is completed, or abandoned due to lack of funding, are rare. However, such assessments, which are promoted in adaptive management frameworks, are critical. Quantification can provide defensible estimates of biological success, such as the number of...
Reconnaissance of pharmaceuticals and wastewater indicators in streambed sediments of the lower Columbia River basin, Oregon and Washington
Elena Nilsen, Edward T. Furlong, Robert Rosenbauer
2014, Journal of the American Water Resources Association (50) 291-301
One by-product of advances in modern chemistry is the accumulation of synthetic chemicals in the natural environment. These compounds include contaminants of emerging concern (CECs), some of which are endocrine disrupting compounds (EDCs) that can have detrimental reproductive effects. The role of sediments in accumulating these types of...
A capture-recapture model of amphidromous fish dispersal
W. Smith, Thomas J. Kwak
2014, Journal of Fish Biology (84) 897-912
Adult movement scale was quantified for two tropical Caribbean diadromous fishes, bigmouth sleeper Gobiomorus dormitor and mountain mullet Agonostomus monticola, using passive integrated transponders (PITs) and radio-telemetry. Large numbers of fishes were tagged in Rio Mameyes, Puerto Rico, U.S.A., with PITs and monitored at three fixed locations over a 2-5...
Small reservoir distribution, rate of construction, and uses in the upper and middle Chattahoochee basins of the Georgia Piedmont, USA, 1950-2010
Amber R. Ignatius, John W. Jones
2014, ISPRS International Journal of Geo-information (3) 460-480
Construction of small reservoirs affects ecosystem processes in numerous ways including fragmenting stream habitat, altering hydrology, and modifying water chemistry. While the upper and middle Chattahoochee River basins within the Southeastern United States Piedmont contain few natural lakes, they have a high density of small reservoirs (more than 7500 small...
Ghost of habitat past: historic habitat affects the contemporary distribution of giant garter snakes in a modified landscape.
Brian J. Halstead, Glenn D. Wylie, Michael L. Casazza
2014, Animal Conservation (17) 144-153
Historic habitat conditions can affect contemporary communities and populations, but most studies of historic habitat are based on the reduction in habitat extent or connectivity. Little is known about the effects of historic habitat on contemporary species distributions when historic habitat has been nearly completely removed, but species persist in...
Capturing interactions between nitrogen and hydrological cycles under historical climate and land use: Susquehanna watershed analysis with the GFDL land model LM3-TAN
M. Lee, S. Malyshev, E. Shevliakova, Paul C. D. Milly, P. R. Jaffe
2014, Biogeosciences (11) 5809-5826
We developed a process model LM3-TAN to assess the combined effects of direct human influences and climate change on terrestrial and aquatic nitrogen (TAN) cycling. The model was developed by expanding NOAA's Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory land model LM3V-N of coupled terrestrial carbon and nitrogen (C-N) cycling and including new...
Pesticide Toxicity Index: a tool for assessing potential toxicity of pesticide mixtures to freshwater aquatic organisms
Lisa H. Nowell, Julia E. Norman, Patrick W. Moran, Jeffrey D. Martin, Wesley W. Stone
2014, Science of the Total Environment (476-477) 144-157
Pesticide mixtures are common in streams with agricultural or urban influence in the watershed. The Pesticide Toxicity Index (PTI) is a screening tool to assess potential aquatic toxicity of complex pesticide mixtures by combining measures of pesticide exposure and acute toxicity in an additive toxic-unit model. The PTI is determined...
Behavioural cues surpass habitat factors in explaining prebreeding resource selection by a migratory diving duck
Shawn T. O’Neil, Jeffrey M. Warren, John Y. Takekawa, Susan E. W. De La Cruz, Kyle A. Cutting, Michael W. Parker, Julie L. Yee
2014, Animal Behaviour (90) 21-29
Prebreeding habitat selection in birds can often be explained in part by habitat characteristics. However, females may also select habitats on the basis of fidelity to areas of previous reproductive success or use by conspecifics. The relative influences of sociobehavioural attributes versus habitat characteristics in habitat selection has been primarily...
Biological effects of desert dust in respiratory epithelial cells and a murine model
Andrew J. Ghio, Suryanaren T. Kummarapurugu, Haiyan Tong, Joleen M. Soukup, Lisa A. Dailey, Elizabeth Boykin, M. Ian Gilmour, Peter Ingram, Victor L. Roggli, Harland L. Goldstein, Richard L. Reynolds
2014, Inhalation Toxicology (26) 299-309
As a result of the challenge of recent dust storms to public health, we tested the postulate that desert dust collected in the southwestern United States imparts a biological effect in respiratory epithelial cells and an animal model. Two samples of surface sediment were collected from separate dust sources in...
Identifying legal, ecological and governance obstacles and opportunities for adapting to climate change
Barbara Cosens, Lance Gunderson, Craig R. Allen, Melinda H. Benson
2014, Sustainability (6) 2338-2356
Current governance of regional scale water management systems in the United States has not placed them on a path toward sustainability, as conflict and gridlock characterize the social arena and ecosystem services continue to erode. Changing climate may continue this trajectory, but it also provides a catalyst for renewal of...
Infiltration and runoff generation processes in fire-affected soils
John A. Moody, Brian A. Ebel
2014, Hydrological Processes (28) 3432-3453
Post-wildfire runoff was investigated by combining field measurements and modelling of infiltration into fire-affected soils to predict time-to-start of runoff and peak runoff rate at the plot scale (1 m2). Time series of soil-water content, rainfall and runoff were measured on a hillslope burned by the 2010 Fourmile Canyon Fire west...
Snowshoe hares display limited phenotypic plasticity to mismatch in seasonal camouflage
Marketa Zimova, L. Scott Mills, Paul M. Lukacs, Michael S. Mitchell
2014, Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences (281)
As duration of snow cover decreases owing to climate change, species undergoing seasonal colour moults can become colour mismatched with their background. The immediate adaptive solution to this mismatch is phenotypic plasticity, either in phenology of seasonal colour moults or in behaviours that reduce mismatch or its consequences. We observed...
Multibeam sonar (DIDSON) assessment of American shad (Alosa sapidissima) approaching a hydroelectric dam
Ann B. Grote, Michael M. Bailey, Joseph D. Zydlewski, Joseph E. Hightower
2014, Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences (71) 545-558
We investigated the fish community approaching the Veazie Dam on the Penobscot River, Maine, prior to implementation of a major dam removal and river restoration project. Multibeam sonar (dual-frequency identification sonar, DIDSON) surveys were conducted continuously at the fishway entrance from May to July in 2011. A 5% subsample of...
The effects of atmospheric nitrogen deposition on terrestrial and freshwater biodiversity
Jill Baron, Mary C. Barber, Mark Adams, Julius I. Agboola, Edith B. Allen, William J. Bealey, Roland Bobbink, Maxim V. Bobrovsky, William D. Bowman, Cristina Branquinho, Mercedes M. C. Bustamente, Christopher L. Clark, Edward C. Cocking, Cristina Cruz, Eric A. Davidson, O. Tom Denmead, Teresa Dias, Nancy B. Dise, Alan Feest, James N. Galloway, Linda H. Geiser, Frank S. Gilliam, Ian J. Harrison, Larisa G. Khanina, Xiankai Lu, Esteban Manrique, Raul Ochoa-Hueso, Jean P. H. B. Ometto, Richard Payne, Thomas Scheuschner, Lucy J. Sheppard, Gavin L. Simpson, Y. V. Singh, Carly J. Stevens, Ian Strachan, Harald Sverdrup, Naoko Tokuchi, Hans van Dobben, Sarah Woodin
2014, Book chapter, Nitrogen deposition, critical loads and biodiversity
This chapter reports the findings of a Working Group on how atmospheric nitrogen (N) deposition affects both terrestrial and freshwater biodiversity. Regional and global scale impacts on biodiversity are addressed, together with potential indicators. Key conclusions are that: the rates of loss in biodiversity are greatest at the lowest and...
Landsat-8: Science and product vision for terrestrial global change research
David P. Roy, M.A. Wulder, Thomas R. Loveland, C. E. Woodcock, R. G. Allen, M. C. Anderson, D. Helder, J. R. Irons, D.M. Johnson, R. Kennedy, T. A. Scambos, Crystal B. Schaaf, J. R. Schott, Y. Sheng, E. F. Vermote, A.S. Belward, R. Bindschadler, W.B. Cohen, F. Gao, J. D. Hipple, Patrick Hostert, J. Huntington, C.O. Justice, A. Kilic, Valeriy Kovalskyy, Z. P. Lee, Leo Lymburner, J. G. Masek, Joel McCorkel, Y. Shuai, R. Trezza, James Vogelmann, R.H. Wynne, Z. Zhu
2014, Remote Sensing of Environment (145) 154-172
Landsat 8, a NASA and USGS collaboration, acquires global moderate-resolution measurements of the Earth's terrestrial and polar regions in the visible, near-infrared, short wave, and thermal infrared. Landsat 8 extends the remarkable 40 year Landsat record and has enhanced capabilities including new spectral bands in the blue and cirrus cloud-detection portion...
Response and recovery lessons from the 2010-2011 earthquake sequence in Canterbury, New Zealand
Mark Pierepiekarz, David Johnston, Kelvin Berryman, John Hare, Joan S. Gomberg, Robert A. Williams, Craig S. Weaver
2014, Book, Christchurch Earthquakes Workshop
The impacts and opportunities that result when low-probability moderate earthquakes strike an urban area similar to many throughout the US were vividly conveyed in a one-day workshop in which social and Earth scientists, public officials, engineers, and an emergency manager shared their experiences of the earthquake sequence that struck the...
Effects of a flooding event on a threatened black bear population in Louisiana
Kaitlin C. O'Connell-Goode, Carrie L. Lowe, Joseph D. Clark
2014, Animal Conservation (17) 476-485
The Louisiana black bear, Ursus americanus luteolus, is listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act as a result of habitat loss and human-related mortality. Information on population-level responses of large mammals to flooding events is scarce, and we had a unique opportunity to evaluate the viability of the Upper...
Structural controls on geothermal circulation in Surprise Valley, California: A re-evaluation of the Lake City fault zone
Anne E. Egger, Jonathan M.G. Glen, Darcy McPhee
2014, GSA Bulletin (126) 523-531
Faults and fractures play an important role in the circulation of geothermal fluids in the crust, and the nature of that role varies according to structural setting and state of stress. As a result, detailed geologic and geophysical mapping that relates thermal springs to known structural features is essential to...
Simulation of zones of contribution to wells at site GM–38, Naval Weapons Industrial Reserve Plant, Bethpage, New York
Paul Misut
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2014-5036
A three-dimensional groundwater-flow model is coupled with the particle-tracking program MODPATH to delineate zones of contribution to wells pumping from the Magothy aquifer and supplying water to a chlorinated volatile organic compound removal plant at site GM–38, Naval Weapons Industrial Reserve Plant, Bethpage, New York. By use of driller’s logs,...
