Hydrogeologic characterization of the Cahuilla Valley and Terwilliger Valley Groundwater Basins, Riverside County, California
Christina L. Stamos, Allen H. Christensen, Geoffrey Cromwell, Meghan C. Dick, Christopher P. Ely, Elizabeth R. Jachens, Sarah E. Ogle, Mackenzie M. Shepherd
2025, Scientific Investigations Report 2025-5073
The relation between the groundwater and the amount of natural recharge to the Cahuilla Valley and Terwilliger Valley groundwater basins is not well understood. During the 20th century, the reliance on groundwater near Anza, California, used for agricultural, domestic, and municipal reasons has increased, and there is the potential for...
Disentangling geomorphic equifinality in sediment and hydrologic connectivity through the analyses of landscape drivers of hysteresis
Jong Cho, J. William Lund, Grady Ball, Jeb E. Brown, Allen C. Gellis, Laura N. Gurley, Scott Douglas Hamshaw, Jeffrey Stephen Kwang, Andrew Roy Laws, Gregory E. Noe, Gretchen P. Oelsner, Francis Parchaso, Cara L. Peterman-Phipps, Katherine Skalak, Nicholas Alan Sutfin
2025, Earth Surface Processes and Landforms (50)
Sources, transport mechanisms and pathways of fine sediment in river systems are dependent on a multitude of climatic, geomorphic and anthropogenic factors, resulting in geomorphic equifinality, in which it is difficult to parse how different landscape processes affect sediment transport across different spatiotemporal scales. The objectives of this study are...
Leveraging wildfire to augment forest management and amplify forest resilience
Kristen I. Shive, Clarke Alexandra Knight, Zachary L Steel, Charlotte K. Stanley, Kristen N. Wilson
2025, Ecosphere (16)
Successive catastrophic wildfire seasons in western North America have escalated the urgency around reducing fire risk to communities and ecosystems. In historically frequent-fire forests, fuel buildup as a result of fire exclusion is contributing to increased fire severity. The probability of high-severity fire can be reduced by active forest management...
The stratigraphic record of the mid-Piacenzian warm period on the Atlantic Coastal Plain
Harry J. Dowsett, Whittney Spivey
2025, Stratigraphy (22) 81-97
Anthropogenic climate change is an existential threat to our planet, impacting everything from the delicate balance of ecosystems to the availability of vital resources. Coastal regions, particularly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change due to rising sea levels and changing weather patterns, are experiencing increased erosion, flooding, and habitat...
Discovery of late Holocene-aged Acropora palmata reefs in Dry Tortugas National Park, Florida, USA: The past as a key to the future?
Anastasios Stathakopoulos, Lauren Toth, Peter Alexander Bacon Modys, Selena Anne-Marie Johnson, Ilsa B. Kuffner
2025, The Depositional Record (11) 808-828
Emblematic of global coral-reef ecosystem decline, the coral ecosystem-engineer Acropora palmata is now rare throughout much of the western Atlantic. Understanding when and where this foundation species occurred during the past can provide information about the environmental limits defining its distribution through space and time. In this paper, the present, historical and...
Changes in streamflow seasonality associated with hydroclimatic variability in the north-central United States among three discrete temporal periods, 1946–2020
Nancy A. Barth, Harper N. Wavra, Anthony R Koebele, Steven K. Sando
2025, Journal of Hydrology—Regional Studies (57)
Study regionNorth-central United StatesStudy focusThis study uses circular statistics to characterize the seasonal properties of annual maximum (AMS) and peaks-over-threshold (POT) streamflow time series for 841 and 623 selected U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) streamgages, respectively, without regulation or substantial diversion...
International data gaps at the Center for Engineering Strong Motion Data
Han Shao, Jeff Brody, Lisa Sue Schleicher, Kristin Marano, Jamison Haase Steidl, Eric M. Thompson, Mike Hearne, James Luke Blair
2025, Conference Paper
The Center for Engineering Strong Motion Data (CESMD) is utilized by seismologists, engineers, and disaster management professionals in the US and has historically achieved and distributed waveforms from across the globe for significant earthquakes. The increased access to the waveforms via Web API (Application Programming Interface) offers a unique opportunity...
Seismic velocity changes from repetitive seismicity at Mauna Loa prior to and during its 2022 eruption
Alicia J. Hotovec-Ellis
2024, Bulletin of Volcanology (87)
Mauna Loa’s short-lived eruption from late November to early December 2022 marked the culmination of nearly a decade of elevated seismic activity and geodetic inflation. The volcano has been monitored by a network of permanent, short period and broadband seismometers. I used the continuous waveform data from that network starting...
Peak streamflow trends in South Dakota and their relation to changes in climate, water years 1921–2020
Nancy A. Barth, Steven K. Sando
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5064-I
Peak-flow (flood) frequency analysis is essential to water-resources management applications, including the design of critical infrastructure such as bridges and culverts, and floodplain mapping. Federal guidelines for performing peak-flow flood frequency analyses are presented in a U.S. Geological Survey Techniques and Methods Report known as Bulletin 17C. A basic assumption...
Spread and frequency of explosive silicic volcanism of the Carpathian-Pannonian Region during Early Miocene: Clues from the SW Pannonian Basin and the Dinaridesion during Early Miocene: clues from the SW Pannonian Basin and the Dinarides
Mihovil Brlek, Nina Trinajstic, Sean Patrick Gaynor, Steffen Kutterolf, Folkmar Hauff, Julie Schindlbeck-Belo, Sanja Suica, Kuo-Lung Wang, Hao-Yang Lee, Elena Watts, Svetoslav V. Georgiev, Vlatko Brcic, Marko Spelic, Ivan Misur, Duje Kukoc, Blair Schoene, Reka Lukacs
2024, Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research (445)
Explosive silicic volcanism of the Carpathian-Pannonian Region (CPR) is increasingly recognized as the primary source of tephra across the Alpine-Mediterranean region during the Early and Middle Miocene. However, the tephrostratigraphic framework for this period of volcanic activity is still incomplete. We present new multi-proxy data from Lower Miocene ignimbrites and...
Evaluating hydrologic model performance for characterizing streamflow drought in the conterminous United States
Caelan Simeone, Sydney Foks, Erin Towler, Timothy O. Hodson, Thomas M. Over
2024, Water (16)
Hydrologic models are the primary tools that are used to simulate streamflow drought and assess impacts. However, there is little consensus about how to evaluate the performance of these models, especially as hydrologic modeling moves toward larger spatial domains. This paper presents a comprehensive multi-objective approach to systematically evaluating the...
Ground deformation and gravity for volcano monitoring
Emily K. Montgomery-Brown, Kyle R. Anderson, Ingrid A. Johanson, Michael P. Poland, Ashton F. Flinders
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2024-5062-D
IntroductionWhen magma accumulates or migrates, it can cause pressurization and related ground deformation. Characterization of surface deformation provides important constraints on the potential for future volcanic activity, especially in combination with seismic activity, gas emissions, and other indicators. A wide variety of techniques and instrument types have been applied to...
Geologic map of the northwest flank of Mauna Loa volcano, Island of Hawai‘i, Hawaii
Frank A. Trusdell, John P. Lockwood
2024, Scientific Investigations Map 2932-E
Mauna Loa, the largest active volcano on Earth, has erupted 34 times since written descriptions became available in A.D. 1832. The most recent eruption of Mauna Loa occurred on November 27, 2022, after a 38 year hiatus; it lasted for 12 days. Some eruptions began with only brief seismic unrest,...
Reservoir evolution, downstream sediment transport, downstream channel change, and synthesis of geomorphic responses of Fall Creek and Middle Fork Willamette River to water years 2012–18 streambed drawdowns at Fall Creek Lake, Oregon
Mackenzie K. Keith, J. Rose Wallick, Liam N. Schenk, Laurel E. Stratton Garvin, Gabriel W. Gordon, Heather M. Bragg
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5135
Executive SummaryChapter A. IntroductionFall Creek Dam impounds Fall Creek Lake, a 10-kilometer-long reservoir in western Oregon and is operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) primarily for flood-risk management (or flood control) in late autumn through early spring months, as well as for water quality, irrigation, recreation, and...
Basin effects from 3D simulated ground motions in the Greater Los Angeles region for use in seismic-hazard analyses
Morgan P. Moschetti, Eric M. Thompson, Kyle Withers
2024, Earthquake Spectra (40) 1042-1065
We develop basin-depth-scaling models (i.e. “basin terms”) from the long-period (T≥2s) simulated ground motions of the Southern California Earthquake Center (SCEC) CyberShake project for use in seismic hazard analyses at sites within the sedimentary basins of southern California. Basin terms use the Next Generation Attenuation (NGA)-West-2 ground-motion models (GMMs)...
Assessing spatial variability of nutrients, phytoplankton, and related water-quality constituents in the California Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta at the landscape scale—2018 high resolution mapping surveys
Brian A. Bergamaschi, Tamara E. C. Kraus, Bryan D. Downing, Elizabeth B. Stumpner, Katy O’Donnell, Jeffrey A. Hansen, Jeniffer Soto Perez, Emily T. Richardson, Angela M. Hansen, Alan Gelber
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5060
Executive Summary This study examined the abundance and distribution of nutrients and phytoplankton in the tidal aquatic environments of the Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta (Delta) and Suisun Bay, comprising three spatial surveys conducted in May, July, and October of 2018 that used continuous underway high frequency sampling and measurements onboard a...
Monitoring of wave, current, and sediment dynamics along the Fog Point Living Shoreline, Glenn Martin National Wildlife Refuge, Maryland
H. Wang, Q. Chen, W.D. Capurso, N. Wang, L.M. Niemoczynski, M. Whitbeck, L. Zhu, G.A. Snedden, C.A. Wilson, M.S. Brownley
2024, Open-File Report 2024-1004
Living shorelines with salt marsh species, rock breakwaters, and sand nourishment were built along the coastal areas in the Glenn Martin National Wildlife Refuge, Maryland, in 2016 in response to Hurricane Sandy (2012). The Fog Point living shoreline at Glenn Martin National Wildlife Refuge was designed with the “headland -...
Physics to fish—Understanding the factors that create and sustain native fish habitat in the San Francisco Estuary
Larry R. Brown, David E. Ayers, Brian A. Bergamaschi, Jon R. Burau, Evan T. Dailey, Bryan D. Downing, Maureen A. Downing-Kunz, Frederick V. Feyrer, Brock M. Huntsman, Tamara E. C. Kraus, Tara Morgan, Jessica R. Lacy, Francis Parchaso, Catherine A. Ruhl, Elizabeth B. Stumpner, Paul Stumpner, Janet Thompson, Matthew J. Young
2024, Open-File Report 2023-1087
Executive SummaryThe Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) operates the Central Valley Project (CVP), one of the nation’s largest water projects. Reclamation has an ongoing need to improve the scientific basis for adaptive management of the CVP and, by extension, joint operations with California’s State Water Project. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)...
Snake River Fall Chinook Salmon research and monitoring
Russell Perry, Dalton Hance, John Plumb, Kenneth F. Tiffan, Brad Bickford, Scott Louis Benson, Tobyn Rhodes, Steve Brink, Brad Alcorn
Kenneth F. Tiffan, editor(s)
2024, Report
In Chapter 1, we report on development and application of an integrated population model (IPM) for the natural-origin fall Chinook salmon population upstream of Lower Granite Dam. This year’s efforts represent the third update to the model. Initial efforts focused on generating juvenile and adult abundance estimates, with...
The 2023 US 50-State National Seismic Hazard Model: Overview and implications
Mark D. Petersen, Allison Shumway, Peter M. Powers, Edward H. Field, Morgan P. Moschetti, Kishor S. Jaiswal, Kevin R. Milner, Sanaz Rezaeian, Arthur D. Frankel, Andrea L. Llenos, Andrew J. Michael, Jason M. Altekruse, Sean Kamran Ahdi, Kyle Withers, Charles Mueller, Yuehua Zeng, Robert E. Chase, Leah M. Salditch, Nico Luco, Kenneth S. Rukstales, Julie A. Herrick, Demi Leafar Girot, Brad T. Aagaard, Adrian Bender, Michael L. Blanpied, Richard W. Briggs, Oliver S. Boyd, Brandon Clayton, Christopher DuRoss, Eileen L. Evans, Peter J. Haeussler, Alexandra Elise Hatem, Kirstie Lafon Haynie, Elizabeth H. Hearn, Kaj M. Johnson, Zachary Alan Kortum, N. Simon Kwong, Andrew James Makdisi, Henry Mason, Daniel McNamara, Devin McPhillips, P. Okubo, Morgan T. Page, Frederick Pollitz, Justin Rubinstein, Bruce E. Shaw, Zheng-Kang Shen, Brian Shiro, James Andrew Smith, William J. Stephenson, Eric M. Thompson, Jessica Ann Thompson Jobe, Erin A. Wirth, Robert C. Witter
2024, Earthquake Spectra (40) 5-88
The US National Seismic Hazard Model (NSHM) was updated in 2023 for all 50 states using new science on seismicity, fault ruptures, ground motions, and probabilistic techniques to produce a standard of practice for public policy and other engineering applications (defined for return periods greater than ∼475...
Potentiometric surfaces (2013, 2015), groundwater quality (2010–15), and water-level changes (2011–13, 2013–15) in the Sparta-Memphis aquifer in Arkansas
Anna M. Nottmeier, Katherine J. Knierim, Phillip D. Hays
2023, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5103
The Sparta-Memphis aquifer, present across much of eastern Arkansas, is the second most used groundwater resource in the State, with the Mississippi River Valley alluvial aquifer being the primary groundwater resource. The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with Arkansas Department of Agriculture-Natural Resources Division, Arkansas Geological Survey, Natural Resources Conservation...
Long-term water-quality constituent trends in the Little Arkansas River, south-central Kansas, 1995–2021
Mandy L. Stone, Brian J. Klager
2023, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5102
The Equus Beds aquifer and Cheney Reservoir are primary sources for the city of Wichita’s current (2023) water supply. The Equus Beds aquifer storage and recovery (ASR) project was developed by the city of Wichita in the early 1990s to meet future water demands using the Little Arkansas River as...
Early Pliocene (Zanclean) stratigraphic framework for PRISM5/PlioMIP3 time slices
Harry J. Dowsett, Marci M. Robinson, Kevin M. Foley, Steve Hunter, Aisling M Dolan, Julia C. Tindall
2023, Stratigraphy (20) 225-231
Global reconstructions of Pliocene climate provide important insights into how the climate system operates under elevated temperatures and atmospheric CO2 levels. These reconstructions have been used extensively in paleoclimate modeling experiments for comparison to simulated conditions, and as boundary conditions.Most previous work focused on the Late Pliocene interval known as...
Transferring deep learning models for hydrographic feature extraction from IfSAR data in Alaska
Larry V. Stanislawski, Nattapon Jaroenchai, Shaowen Wang, Ethan J. Shavers, Alexander Duffy, Philip T. Thiem, Zhe Jiang, Adam Camerer
2023, Conference Paper
The National Hydrography Dataset (NHD) managed by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) is being updated with higher-quality feature representations through efforts that derive hydrography from 3DEP HR elevation datasets. Deriving hydrography from elevation through traditional flow routing and interactive methods is a complex, time-consuming process that must be tailored for...
Comprehensive water-quality trend analysis for selected sites and constituents in the International Souris River Basin, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, Canada, and North Dakota, United States, 1970–2020
Rochelle A. Nustad, Wyatt S. Tatge
2023, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5084
The Souris River Basin is an international basin in southeast Saskatchewan, north-central North Dakota, and southwest Manitoba. Sustained exceedances of water-quality objectives for total phosphorus, sodium, sulfate, total dissolved solids, and total iron have been reported since the late 1990s at the two binational sites on the Souris River (Souris...
