Publications
This list of Upper Midwest Water Science Center publications spans from 1899 to present. It includes both official USGS publications and journal articles authored by our scientists. To access the full, searchable catalog of USGS publications, please visit the USGS Publications Warehouse.
Filter Total Items: 2247
A multi-marker assessment of sewage contamination in streams using human-associated indicator bacteria, human-specific viruses, and pharmaceuticals
Human sewage contaminates waterways, delivering excess nutrients, pathogens, chemicals, and other toxic contaminants. Contaminants and various sewage indicators are measured to monitor and assess water quality, but these analytes vary in their representation of sewage contamination and the inferences about water quality they support. We measured the occurrence and concentration of multiple microbi
Authors
Peter L. Lenaker, Matthew A. Pronschinske, Steven R. Corsi, Joel P. Stokdyk, Hayley Olds, Deborah K. Dila, Sandra L. McLellan
Hydrologic study of green infrastructure in poorly drained urbanized soils at RecoveryPark, Detroit, Michigan, 2014–21
Uncontrolled stormwater runoff volume is a legacy stressor on sewer-system capacity that is further compromised by the effects of aging infrastructure. Green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) has been used in a variety of designs and configurations (for example, bioretention) with the goal of increasing evapotranspiration and infiltration in the local water cycle. In practice, GSIs have variable eff
Authors
Ralph J. Haefner, Christopher J. Hoard, William Shuster
Comparing modern identification methods for wild bees: Metabarcoding and image-based morphological taxonomic assignment
With the decline of bee populations worldwide, studies determining current wild bee distributions and diversity are increasingly important. Wild bee identification is often completed by experienced taxonomists or by genetic analysis. The current study was designed to compare two methods of identification including: (1) morphological identification by experienced taxonomists using images of field-c
Authors
Cassandra Smith, Robert S. Cornman, Jennifer A. Fike, Johanna M. Kraus, Sara J. Oyler-McCance, Carrie E Givens, Michelle Hladik, Mark W. Vandever, Dana W. Kolpin, Kelly Smalling
Design and calibration of a nitrate decision support tool for groundwater wells in Wisconsin, USA
This paper describes development of a nitrate decision support tool for groundwater wells (GW-NDST) that combines nitrate leaching and groundwater lag-times to compute well concentrations. The GW-NDST uses output from support models that simulate leached nitrate, groundwater age distributions, and nitrate reduction rates. The support models are linked through convolution to simulate nitrate transp
Authors
Paul F. Juckem, Nicholas Corson-Dosch, Laura A. Schachter, Christopher Green, Kelsie M. Ferin, Eric G. Booth, Christopher J. Kucharik, Brian P. Austin, Leon J. Kauffman
Timing and source of recharge to the Columbia River Basalt groundwater system in northeastern Oregon
Recharge to and flow within the Columbia River Basalt Group (CRBG) groundwater flow system of northeastern Oregon were characterized using isotopic, gas, and age-tracer samples from wells completed in basalt, springs, and stream base flow. Most groundwater samples were late-Pleistocene to early-Holocene; median age of well samples was 11,100 years. The relation between mean groundwater age and com
Authors
Henry M. Johnson, Kate E. Ely, Anna-Turi Maher
Evaluation of an impulse-response emulator for groundwater contaminant transport modeling
There is a significant need to develop decision support tools capable of delivering accurate representations of environmental conditions, such as ground and surface water solute concentrations, in a timely and computationally efficient manner. Such tools can be leveraged to assess a large number of potential management strategies for mitigating non-point source pollutants. Here, we assess the effe
Authors
Brent Porter Heerspink, Michael N. Fienen, Howard W. Reeves
A conceptual site model of contaminant transport pathways from the Bremerton Naval Complex to Sinclair Inlet, Washington, 2011–21
Historical activities on the Bremerton Naval Complex (BNC) in Puget Sound, Washington, have resulted in Sinclair Inlet sediments with elevated concentrations of contaminants, including organic contaminants such as polychlorinated biphenyls and trace elements including mercury. Six U.S. Geological Survey–U.S. Navy datasets have been collected since the last major assessment, in 2013, of soil and gr
Authors
Kathleen E. Conn, Sarah E. Janssen, Chad C. Opatz, Valerie A.L. Bright
Precipitation uncertainty estimation and rainfall-runoff model calibration using iterative ensemble smoothers
The introduction of iterative ensemble smoothers (IES) for parameter calibration opens avenues for expanding parameter space in surface water hydrologic modeling. Here, we have introduced independent parameters into a model calibration experiment to estimate errors in rainfall forcing data. This approach has the potential to estimate rainfall errors using other hydrological observations and to imp
Authors
Davide Zoccatelli, Daniel B. Wright, Jeremy T. White, Michael N. Fienen, Guo Yu
Lake water temperature modeling in an era of climate change: Data sources, models, and future prospects
Lake thermal dynamics have been considerably impacted by climate change, with potential adverse effects on aquatic ecosystems. To better understand the potential impacts of future climate change on lake thermal dynamics and related processes, the use of mathematical models is essential. In this study, we provide a comprehensive review of lake water temperature modeling. We begin by discussing the
Authors
Sebastiano Piccolroaz, Senlin Zhu, Robert Ladwig, Laura Carrea, Samantha K. Oliver, Adam Piotrowski, Mariusz Ptak, Ryuichiro Shinohara, Mariusz Sojka, Richard Woolway, David Z. Zhu
Quantitative microbial risk assessment for ingestion of antibiotic resistance genes from private wells contaminated by human and livestock fecal sources
We used quantitative microbial risk assessment to estimate ingestion risk for intI1, erm(B), sul1, tet(A), tet(W), and tet(X) in private wells contaminated by human and/or livestock feces. Genes were quantified with five human-specific and six bovine-specific microbial source-tracking (MST) markers in 138 well-water samples from a rural Wisconsin county. Daily ingestion risk (probability of swallo
Authors
Tucker R. Burch, Joel P. Stokdyk, Lisa Durso, Mark A. Borchardt
Prioritizing river basins for nutrient studies
Increases in fluxes of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) in the environment have led to negative impacts affecting drinking water, eutrophication, harmful algal blooms, climate change, and biodiversity loss. Because of the importance, scale, and complexity of these issues, it may be useful to consider methods for prioritizing nutrient research in representative drainage basins within a regional or n
Authors
Anthony J. Tesoriero, Dale M. Robertson, Christopher Green, John K. Böhlke, Judson Harvey, Sharon L. Qi
Peak streamflow trends in Wisconsin and their relation to changes in climate, water years 1921–2020
This study characterizes hydroclimatic variability and change in peak streamflow and daily streamflow in Wisconsin from water years 1921 through 2020. Nonstationarity in peak streamflow in Wisconsin can include monotonic trends, change points, and autocorrelation. Spatial patterns of nonstationarity in peak streamflow, daily streamflow, and monthly precipitation, temperature, and snowfall were exa
Authors
Sara B. Levin