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Publications

The following list of California Water Science Center publications includes both official USGS publications and journal articles authored by our scientists.

Filter Total Items: 1734

Characterization of waste rock associated with acid drainage at the Penn Mine, California, by ground-based visible to short-wave infrared reflectance spectroscopy assisted by digital mapping

Prior to remediation at the abandoned Cu-Zn Penn Mine in the Foothills massive sulfide belt of the Sierra Nevada, CA, acid mine drainage (AMD) was created, in part, by the subaerial oxidation of sulfides exposed on several waste piles. To support remediation efforts, a mineralogical study of the waste piles was undertaken by acquiring reflectance spectra (measured in the visible to short-wave infr
Authors
S.I.C. Montero, G.H. Brimhall, Charles N. Alpers, G.A. Swayze

Applications of 3D hydrodynamic and particle tracking models in the San Francisco bay-delta estuary

Three applications of three-dimensional hydrodynamic and particle-tracking models are currently underway by the United States Geological Survey in the San Francisco Bay-Delta Estuary. The first application is to the San Francisco Bay and a portion of the coastal ocean. The second application is to an important, gated control channel called the Delta Cross Channel, located within the northern porti
Authors
P. E. Smith, John M. Donovan, H.F.N. Wong

Suspended sediment fluxes in a tidal wetland: Measurement, controlling factors, and error analysis

Suspended sediment fluxes to and from tidal wetlands are of increasing concern because of habitat restoration efforts, wetland sustainability as sea level rises, and potential contaminant accumulation. We measured water and sediment fluxes through two channels on Browns Island, at the landward end of San Francisco Bay, United States, to determine the factors that control sediment fluxes on and off
Authors
N. K. Ganju, D. H. Schoellhamer, B.A. Bergamaschi

Total mercury concentrations in fillets of bluegill, redear sunfish, largemouth bass, and other fishes from Lake Natoma, Sacramento County, California

This study was conducted during September-October 2002 to verify preliminary findings of elevated total mercury concentrations in skinless fillets of sportfishes inhabiting Lake Natoma. Although we measured total mercury concentrations, most mercury in fish flesh occurs in the methylated form. In August 2000, other investigators collected a small number of fish containing mercury concentrations th
Authors
M. K. Saiki, B.A. Martin, T.W. May, Charles N. Alpers

Aquatic assemblages of the highly urbanized Santa Ana River Basin, California

We assessed the structure of periphyton, benthic macroinvertebrate, and fish assemblages and their associations with environmental variables at 17 sites on streams of the highly urbanized Santa Ana River basin in Southern California. All assemblages exhibited strong differences between highly urbanized sites in the valley and the least-impacted sites at the transition between the valley and undeve
Authors
Larry R. Brown, Carmen A. Burton, Kenneth Belitz

Averaged indicators of secondary flow in repeated acoustic Doppler current profiler crossings of bends

Cross‐stream velocity was measured in a large river bend at high spatial resolution over three separate survey episodes. A suite of methods for resolving cross‐stream velocity distributions was tested on data collected using acoustic Doppler current profilers (ADCP) in the sand‐bedded Sacramento River, California. The bend was surveyed with repeated ADCP crossings at eight cross sections during a
Authors
R.L. Dinehart, J.R. Burau

Glyphosate, other herbicides, and transformation products in Midwestern streams, 2002

 The use of glyphosate has increased rapidly, and there is limited understanding of its environmental fate. The objective of this study was to document the occurrence of glyphosate and the transformation product aminomethylphosphonic acid (AMPA) in Midwestern streams and to compare their occurrence with that of more commonly measured herbicides such as acetochlor, atrazine, and metolachlor. Water
Authors
William A. Battaglin, Dana W. Kolpin, Elisabeth A. Scribner, Kathryn M. Kuivila, Mark W. Sandstrom

The composition of coexisting jarosite-group minerals and water from the Richmond mine, Iron Mountain, California

Jarosite-group minerals accumulate in the form of stalactites and fine-grained mud on massive pyrite in the D drift of the Richmond mine, Iron Mountain, California. Water samples were collected by placing beakers under the dripping stalactites and by extracting pore water from the mud using a centrifuge. The water is rich in Fe3+ and SO4 2−, with a pH of approximately 2.1, which is significantly h
Authors
Heather E. Jamieson, Clare Robinson, Charles N. Alpers, D. Kirk Nordstrom, Alexei Poustovetov, Heather A. Lowers

Phytoplankton community ecology: Principles applied in San Francisco Bay

In his seminal 1961 paper 'The paradox of the plankton' Am Nat 95:137-147, G. E. Hutchinson asked why many species of phytoplankton can coexist while competing for a small number of limiting resources in an unstructured habitat. Hutchinson anticipated the resolution of his paradox, recognizing that communities are organized by processes beyond resource competition including species interactions, h
Authors
J. E. Cloern, R. Dufford

Major and trace element composition of copiapite-group minerals and coexisting water from the Richmond mine, Iron Mountain, California

Copiapite-group minerals of the general formula AR4(SO4)6(OH)2·nH2O, where A is predominantly Mg, Fe2+, or 0.67Al3+, R is predominantly Fe3+, and n is typically 20, are among several secondary hydrous Fe sulfates occurring in the inactive mine workings of the massive sulfide deposit at Iron Mountain, CA, a USEPA Superfund site that produces extremely acidic drainage. Samples of copiapite-group min
Authors
H.E. Jamieson, C. Robinson, Charles N. Alpers, R. Blaine McCleskey, D. Kirk Nordstrom, Ronald C. Peterson

Preliminary results from a shallow water benthic grazing study

The nutrient-rich, shallow waters of San Francisco Bay support high rates of primary production, limited not by nutrients but by light availability and benthic grazing (Alpine and others 1992; Cloern 1982). Phytoplankton blooms are an important food source for upper trophic levels. Consequently animal populations, such as fish, may suffer under conditions of high benthic bivalve grazing. It has be
Authors
N.L. Jones, Stephen G. Monismith, Janet K. Thompson

Transtensional deformation in the Lake Tahoe region, California and Nevada, USA

Dextral transtensional deformation is occurring along the Sierra Nevada–Great Basin boundary zone (SNGBBZ) at the eastern edge of the Sierra Nevada microplate. In the Lake Tahoe region of the SNGBBZ, transtension is partitioned spatially and temporally into domains of north–south striking normal faults and transitional domains with conjugate strike-slip faults. The normal fault domains, which have
Authors
Richard A. Schweickert, M.M. Lahren, K.D. Smith, J. F. Howle, G. Ichinose