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Publications

Below is a list of the most recent EROS peer-reviewed scientific papers, reports, fact sheets, and other publications. You can search all our publication holdings by type, topic, year, and order.

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Filter Total Items: 2456

Past role and future outlook of the Conservation Reserve Program for supporting honey bees in the Great Plains

Human dependence on insect pollinators continues to grow even as pollinators face global declines. The Northern Great Plains (NGP), a region often referred to as America’s last honey bee (Apis mellifera) refuge, has undergone rapid land-cover change due to cropland expansion and weakened land conservation programs. We conducted a trend analysis and estimated conversion rates of Conservation Reserv
Authors
Clint R.V. Otto, Haochi Zheng, Alisa L. Gallant, Rich Iovanna, Benjamin L. Carlson, Matthew Smart, Skip Hyberg

Quantifying variance across spatial scales as part of fire regime classifications

The emergence of large‐scale fire classifications and products informed by remote sensing data has enabled opportunities to include variability or heterogeneity as part of modern fire regime classifications. Currently, basic fire metrics such as mean fire return intervals are calculated without considering spatial variance in a management context. Fire return intervals are also only applicable at
Authors
Scholtz Rheinhardt, Samuel D. Fuhlendorf, Sherry A. Leis, Joshua J. Picotte, Dirac Twidwell

Distinguishing Southern Africa precipitation response by strength of El Niño events and implications for decision-making

December–February precipitation in southern Africa during recent El Niño events is studied by distinguishing circulation and precipitation responses during strong and moderate-to-weak events. We find that while both strong and moderate-to-weak El Niño events tend to dry southern Africa, the pattern and magnitude of precipitation anomalies in the region are different, with strong El Niño events res
Authors
Catherine Pomposi, Chris Funk, Shraddhanaand Shukla, Tamuka Magadzire

Coastal National Elevation Database

The Coastal National Elevation Database (CoNED) Applications Project develops enhanced topographic (land elevation) and bathymetric (water depth) datasets that serve as valuable resources for coastal hazards research (Danielson and others, 2016; Thatcher and others, 2016). These datasets are used widely for mapping inundation zones from riverine flood events, hurricanes, and sea-level rise and for
Authors
Jeffrey J. Danielson, Sandra K. Poppenga, Dean J. Tyler, Monica Palaseanu-Lovejoy, Dean B. Gesch

Rapid crop cover mapping for the conterminous United States

Timely crop cover maps with sufficient resolution are important components to various environmental planning and research applications. Through the modification and use of a previously developed crop classification model (CCM), which was originally developed to generate historical annual crop cover maps, we hypothesized that such crop cover maps could be generated rapidly during the growing season
Authors
Devendra Dahal, Bruce K. Wylie, Daniel Howard

National Satellite Land Remote Sensing Data Archive

The National Satellite Land Remote Sensing Data Archive is managed on behalf of the Secretary of the Interior by the U.S. Geological Survey’s Earth Resources Observation and Science Center. The Land Remote Sensing Policy Act of 1992 (51 U.S.C. §601) directed the U.S. Department of the Interior to establish a permanent global archive consisting of imagery over land areas obtained from satellites or
Authors
John Faundeen, Ryan Longhenry

Mapping cropland waterway buffers for switchgrass development in the eastern Great Plains, USA

Switchgrass (Panicum virgatum L.), a highly productive perennial grass, has been recommended as one potential source for cellulosic biofuel feedstocks. Previous studies indicate that planting perennial grasses (e.g., switchgrass) in high‐topographic‐relief cropland waterway buffers can improve local environmental conditions and sustainability. The main advantages of this land management practice i
Authors
Yingxin Gu, Bruce K. Wylie

The role of environmental driving factors in historical and projected carbon dynamics of wetland ecosystems in Alaska

Wetlands are critical terrestrial ecosystems in Alaska, covering ~177,000 km2, an area greater than all the wetlands in the remainder of the United States. To assess the relative influence of changing climate, atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration, and fire regime on carbon balance in wetland ecosystems of Alaska, a modeling framework that incorporates a fire disturbance model and two bio
Authors
Zhou Lyu, Helene Genet, Yujie He, Qianlai Zhuang, A. David McGuire, Alec Bennett, Amy Breen, Joy Clein, Eugenie S. Euskirchen, Kristofer Johnson, Tom Kurkowski, Neal J. Pastick, T. Scott Rupp, Bruce K. Wylie, Zhiliang Zhu

Spatiotemporal analysis of Landsat-8 and Sentinel-2 data to support monitoring of dryland ecosystems

Drylands are the habitat and source of livelihood for about two fifths of the world’s population and are highly susceptible to climate and anthropogenic change. To understand the vulnerability of drylands to changing environmental conditions, land managers need to effectively monitor rates of past change and remote sensing offers a cost-effective means to assess and manage these vast landscapes. H
Authors
Neal J. Pastick, Bruce K. Wylie, Zhuoting Wu

U.S. Geological Survey science for the Wyoming Landscape Conservation Initiative—2016 annual report

This is the ninth annual report highlighting U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) science and decision-support activities conducted for the Wyoming Landscape Conservation Initiative (WLCI). The activities address specific management needs identified by WLCI partner agencies. In fiscal year (FY) 2016, there were 26 active USGS WLCI science-based projects. Of these 26 projects, one project was new for FY20
Authors
Zachary H. Bowen, Ellen Aikens, Cameron L. Aldridge, Patrick J. Anderson, Timothy J. Assal, Anna D. Chalfoun, Geneva W. Chong, Cheryl A. Eddy-Miller, Steven L. Garman, Steve Germaine, Collin G. Homer, Aaron N. Johnston, Matthew J. Kauffman, Daniel J. Manier, Cynthia P. Melcher, Kirk A. Miller, Annika W. Walters, Jerrod D. Wheeler, Daniel J. Wieferich, Anna B. Wilson, Teal B. Wyckoff, Linda Zeigenfuss

An initial validation of Landsat 5 and 7 derived surface water temperature for U.S. lakes, reservoirs, and estuaries

The United States Harmful Algal Bloom and Hypoxia Research Control Act of 2014 identified the need for forecasting and monitoring harmful algal blooms (HAB) in lakes, reservoirs, and estuaries across the nation. Temperature is a driver in HAB forecasting models that affects both HAB growth rates and toxin production. Therefore, temperature data derived from the U.S. Geological Survey Landsat 5 The
Authors
Blake A. Schaeffer, John Iiames, John L. Dwyer, Erin Urquhart, Wilson Salls, Jennifer Rover, Bridget Seegers

Fusing MODIS with Landsat 8 data to downscale weekly normalized difference vegetation index estimates for central Great Basin rangelands, USA

Data fused from distinct but complementary satellite sensors mitigate tradeoffs that researchers make when selecting between spatial and temporal resolutions of remotely sensed data. We integrated data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) sensor aboard the Terra satellite and the Operational Land Imager sensor aboard the Landsat 8 satellite into four regression-tree model
Authors
Stephen P. Boyte, Bruce K. Wylie, Matthew B. Rigge, Devendra Dahal