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Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center

2022 Annual Report

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Mapping methane reduction potential of tidal wetland restoration in the United States

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Opportunities to improve alignment with the FAIR Principles for U.S. Geological Survey data

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Scientific literature and information products produced by Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center staff

Featured Journal Article

Herring River, Wellfleet, MA

Calibrating optical turbidity measurements with suspended-sediment concentrations from the Herring River in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, from November 2018 to November 2019

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Featured USGS Series

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Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center—2022 Annual Report.  The 2022 annual report highlights accomplishments, includes a list of publications, and summarizes the work of the center and each of the science groups.

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Sound Waves

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Coastal and Marine Research News from Across the USGS

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Filter Total Items: 1691

Development of a coupled wave-flow-vegetation interaction model

Emergent and submerged vegetation can significantly affect coastal hydrodynamics. However, most deterministic numerical models do not take into account their influence on currents, waves, and turbulence. In this paper, we describe the implementation of a wave-flow-vegetation module into a Coupled-Ocean-Atmosphere-Wave-Sediment Transport (COAWST) modeling system that includes a flow model (ROMS) an
Authors
Alexis Beudin, Tarandeep S. Kalra, Neil K. Ganju, John C. Warner
By
Natural Hazards Mission Area, Coastal and Marine Hazards and Resources Program, Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center, Hurricane Sandy

Spatially integrative metrics reveal hidden vulnerability of microtidal salt marshes

Salt marshes are valued for their ecosystem services, and their vulnerability is typically assessed through biotic and abiotic measurements at individual points on the landscape. However, lateral erosion can lead to rapid marsh loss as marshes build vertically. Marsh sediment budgets represent a spatially integrated measure of competing constructive and destructive forces: a sediment surplus may r
Authors
Neil K. Ganju, Zafer Defne, Matthew L. Kirwan, Sergio Fagherazzi, Andrea D'Alpaos, Luca Carniello
By
Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center

Spectral wave dissipation by submerged aquatic vegetation in a back-barrier estuary

Submerged aquatic vegetation is generally thought to attenuate waves, but this interaction remains poorly characterized in shallow-water field settings with locally generated wind waves. Better quantification of wave–vegetation interaction can provide insight to morphodynamic changes in a variety of environments and also is relevant to the planning of nature-based coastal protection measures. Towa
Authors
Daniel J. Nowacki, Alexis Beudin, Neil K. Ganju
By
Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center

Volume change associated with formation and dissociation of hydrate in sediment

Gas hydrate formation and dissociation in sediments are accompanied by changes in the bulk volume of the sediment and can lead to changes in sediment properties, loss of integrity for boreholes, and possibly regional subsidence of the ground surface over areas where methane might be produced from gas hydrate in the future. Experiments on sand, silts, and clay subject to different effective stress
Authors
Carolyn D. Ruppel, J. Y. Lee, J. Carlos Santamarina
By
Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center

Overview of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission collaborative research program to assess tsunami hazard for nuclear power plants on the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts

In response to the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission (US NRC) initiated a long-term research program to improve understanding of tsunami hazard levels for nuclear facilities in the United States. For this effort, the US NRC organized a collaborative research program with the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and the National Oceanic and Atmosphe
Authors
A.M. Kammerer, Uri S. ten Brink, V.V. Titov
By
Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center

Barrier island breach evolution: Alongshore transport and bay-ocean pressure gradient interactions

Physical processes controlling repeated openings and closures of a barrier island breach between a bay and the open ocean are studied using aerial photographs and atmospheric and hydrodynamic observations. The breach site is located on Pea Island along the Outer Banks, separating Pamlico Sound from the Atlantic Ocean. Wind direction was a major control on the pressure gradients between the bay and
Authors
Ilgar Safak, John C. Warner, Jeffrey H. List
By
Natural Hazards Mission Area, Coastal and Marine Hazards and Resources Program, Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center, Hurricane Sandy

Observations of seismicity and ground motion in the northeast U.S. Atlantic margin from ocean bottom seismometer data

Earthquake data from two short-period ocean-bottom seismometer (OBS) networks deployed for over a year on the continental slope off New York and southern New England were used to evaluate seismicity and ground motions along the continental margin. Our OBS networks located only one earthquake of Mc∼1.5 near the shelf edge during six months of recording, suggesting that seismic activity (MLg>3.0) of
Authors
Claudia Flores, Uri S. ten Brink, Jeffrey J. McGuire, John A. Collins
By
Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center

Temperature response of soil respiration largely unaltered with experimental warming

The respiratory release of carbon dioxide (CO2) from soil is a major yet poorly understood flux in the global carbon cycle. Climatic warming is hypothesized to increase rates of soil respiration, potentially fueling further increases in global temperatures. However, despite considerable scientific attention in recent decades, the overall response of soil respiration to anticipated climatic warming
Authors
Joanna C. Carey, Jianwu Tang, Pamela H. Templer, Kevin D. Kroeger, Thomas W. Crowther, Andrew J. Burton, Jeffrey S. Dukes, Bridget Emmett, Serita D. Frey, Mary A. Heskel, Lifen Jiang, Megan B. Machmuller, Jacqueline Mohan, Anne Marie Panetta, Peter B. Reich, Sabine Reinsch, Xin Wang, Steven D. Allison, Chris Bamminger, Scott D. Bridgham, Scott L. Collins, Giovanbattista de Dato, William C. Eddy, Brian J. Enquist, Marc Estiarte, John Harte, Amanda Henderson, Bart R. Johnson, Klaus Steenberg Larsen, Yiqi Luo, Sven Marhan, Jerry M. Melillo, Josep Penuelas, Laurel Pfeifer-Meister, Christian Poll, Edward B. Rastetter, Andrew B. Reinmann, Lorien L. Reynolds, Inger K. Schmidt, Gaius R. Shaver, Aaron L. Strong, Vidya Suseela, Albert Tietema
By
John Wesley Powell Center for Analysis and Synthesis, Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center

Observations of pockmark flow structure in Belfast Bay, Maine, Part 1: current-induced mixing

Field observations of current profiles and temperature, salinity, and density structure were used to examine vertical mixing within two pockmarks in Belfast Bay, Maine. The first is located in 21 m water depth (sea level to rim), nearly circular in shape with a 45 m rim diameter and 12 m rim-to-bottom relief. The second is located in 25 m water depth, more elongated in shape with an approximately
Authors
Christina L. Fandel, Thomas C. Lippmann, James D. Irish, Laura L. Brothers
By
Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center

Observations of pockmark flow structure in Belfast Bay, Maine, Part 3: implications for sediment transport

Current observations and sediment characteristics acquired within and along the rim of two pockmarks in Belfast Bay, Maine, were used to characterize periods of sediment transport and to investigate conditions favorable to the settling of suspended sediment. Hourly averaged Shields parameters determined from horizontal current velocity profiles within the center of each pockmark never exceed the c
Authors
Christina L. Fandel, Thomas C. Lippmann, Diane L. Foster, Laura L. Brothers
By
Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center

Observations of pockmark flow structure in Belfast Bay, Maine, Part 2: evidence for cavity flow

Pockmark flow circulation patterns were investigated through current measurements along the rim and center of two pockmarks in Belfast Bay, Maine. Observed time-varying current profiles have a complex vertical and directional structure that rotates significantly with depth and is strongly dependent on the phase of the tide. Observations of the vertical profiles of horizontal velocities in relation
Authors
Christina L. Fandel, Thomas C. Lippmann, Diane L. Foster, Laura L. Brothers
By
Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center

Smartphone-based distributed data collection enables rapid assessment of shorebird habitat suitability

Understanding and managing dynamic coastal landscapes for beach-dependent species requires biological and geological data across the range of relevant environments and habitats. It is difficult to acquire such information; data often have limited focus due to resource constraints, are collected by non-specialists, or lack observational uniformity. We developed an open-source smartphone application
Authors
E. Robert Thieler, Sara L. Zeigler, Luke Winslow, Megan Hines, Jordan S. Read, Jordan I. Walker
By
Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center