Publications
Explore scientific publications from the USGS St. Petersburg Coastal and Marine Science Center.
Filter Total Items: 917
Tampa Bay coastal wetlands: nineteenth to twentieth century tidal marsh-to-mangrove conversion
Currently, mangroves dominate the tidal wetlands of Tampa Bay, Florida, but an examination of historic navigation charts revealed dominance of tidal marshes with a mangrove fringe in the 1870s. This study's objective was to conduct a new assessment of wetland change in Tampa Bay by digitizing nineteenth century topographic and public land surveys and comparing these to modern coastal features at f
Authors
Ellen A. Raabe, Laura C. Roy, Carole C. McIvor
Probabilistic prediction of barrier-island response to hurricanes
Prediction of barrier-island response to hurricane attack is important for assessing the vulnerability of communities, infrastructure, habitat, and recreational assets to the impacts of storm surge, waves, and erosion. We have demonstrated that a conceptual model intended to make qualitative predictions of the type of beach response to storms (e.g., beach erosion, dune erosion, dune overwash, inun
Authors
Nathaniel G. Plant, Hilary F. Stockdon
Stuart R. Stidolph diatom atlas
The "Stuart R. Stidolph Diatom Atlas" is a comprehensive volume of diatom taxa identified and micrographed by Stuart R. Stidoph during the 1980s and 1990s. The samples were collected from marine coasts of various geographic regions within tropical and subtropical climates. The plates included within this report have never been published and are being published by the USGS as an online reference so
Authors
S.R. Stidolph, F.A.S. Sterrenburg, K. E. L. Smith, A. Kraberg
Benthic foraminiferal census data from Mobile Bay, Alabama--counts of surface samples and box cores
A study was undertaken in order to understand recent environmental change in Mobile Bay, Alabama. For this study a series of surface sediment and box core samples was collected. The surface benthic foraminiferal data provide the modern baseline conditions of the bay and can be used as a reference for changing paleoenvironmental parameters recorded in the box cores. The 14 sampling locations were c
Authors
Kathryn A. Richwine, Lisa E. Osterman
Cultured fungal associates from the deep-sea coral Lophelia pertusa
The cold-water coral Lophelia pertusa provides important habitat to many deep-sea fishes and invertebrates. Studies of the microbial taxa associated with L. pertusa thus far have focused on bacteria, neglecting the microeukaryotic members. This is the first study to culture fungi from living L. pertusa and to investigate carbon source utilization by the fungal associates. Twenty-seven fungal isola
Authors
Julia P. Galkiewicz, Sarah H. Stellick, Michael A. Gray, Christina A. Kellogg
An apparent "vital effect" of calcification rate on the Sr/Ca temperature proxy in the reef coral Montipora capitata
Measuring the strontium to calcium ratio in coral skeletons reveals information on seawater temperatures during skeletal deposition, but studies have shown additional variables may affect the ratio. Here we measured Sr/Ca in the reef coral, Montipora capitata, grown in six mesocosms continuously supplied with seawater from the adjacent reef flat. Three mesocosms were ambient controls, and three ha
Authors
Ilsa Kuffner, Paul L. Jokiel, Kuulei Rodgers, Andreas Andersson, Fred T. Mackenzie
Hotspot of accelerated sea-level rise on the Atlantic coast of North America
Climate warming does not force sea-level rise (SLR) at the same rate everywhere. Rather, there are spatial variations of SLR superimposed on a global average rise. These variations are forced by dynamic processes, arising from circulation and variations in temperature and/or salinity, and by static equilibrium processes, arising from mass redistributions changing gravity and the Earth's rotation a
Authors
Asbury H. Sallenger,, Kara S. Doran, Peter A. Howd
Baseline surveys to detect trophic changes in shallow hard-bottom communities induced by the Dry Tortugas National Park Research Natural Area
No abstract available.
Authors
Ilsa B. Kuffner, Valerie J. Paul, Raphael Ritson-Williams, T. Don Hickey, Linda J. Walters
Isotope geochemistry and fluxes of carbon and organic matter in tropical small mountainous river systems and adjacent coastal waters of the Caribbean
Recent studies have shown that small mountainous rivers (SMRs) may act as sources of aged and/or refractory carbon (C) to the coastal ocean, which may increase organic C burial at sea and subsidize coastal food webs and heterotrophy. However, the characteristics and spatial and temporal variability of C and organic matter (OM) exported from tropical SMR systems remain poorly constrained. To addres
Authors
Ryan Moyer, James Bauer, Andrea Grottoli
Use of vertical temperature gradients for prediction of tidal flat sediment characteristics
Sediment characteristics largely govern tidal flat morphologic evolution; however, conventional methods of investigating spatial variability in lithology on tidal flats are difficult to employ in these highly dynamic regions. In response, a series of laboratory experiments was designed to investigate the use of temperature diffusion toward sediment characterization. A vertical thermistor array was
Authors
Jennifer L. Miselis, K. Todd Holland, Allen H. Reed, Andrei Abelev
Extension of 239+240Pu sediment geochronology to coarse-grained marine sediments
Sediment geochronology of coastal sedimentary environments dominated by sand has been extremely limited because concentrations of natural and bomb-fallout radionuclides are often below the limit of measurement using standard techniques. ICP-MS analyses of 239+240Pu from two sites representative of traditionally challenging (i.e., low concentration) environments provide a "proof of concept" and dem
Authors
Steven A. Kuehl, Michael E. Ketterer, Jennifer L. Miselis
National assessment of hurricane-induced coastal erosion hazards--Gulf of Mexico
Sandy beaches provide a natural barrier between the ocean and inland communities, ecosystems, and resources. However, these dynamic environments move and change in response to winds, waves, and currents. During a hurricane, these changes can be large and sometimes catastrophic. High waves and storm surge act together to erode beaches and inundate low-lying lands, putting inland communities at risk
Authors
Hilary F. Stockdon, Kara S. Doran, David M. Thompson, Kristin L. Sopkin, Nathaniel G. Plant, Asbury H. Sallenger