Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Publications

Results from our Program’s research and minerals information activities are published in USGS publications series as well as in outside journals.  To follow Minerals Information Periodicals, subscribe to the Mineral Periodicals RSS feed.

Filter Total Items: 2294

Digital coordinates and age of more than 13,000 foraminifers samples collected by Chevron Petroleum geologists in California

The general location and age of more than 33,500 mostly foraminifer samples from Chevron surface localities in nearly 600 U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) 7.5' quadrangles from California were provided by Brabb and Parker (2003). Barren and non-diagnostic samples plus many that have no paleontologic information were omitted to provide a revised list for more than 27,000 of these samples by Brabb and
Authors
William T. Malmblorg, William B. West, Earl E. Brabb, John M. Parker

Mineral Commodity Summaries 2008

Each chapter of the 2008 edition of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Mineral Commodity Summaries (MCS) includes information on events, trends, and issues for each mineral commodity as well as discussions and tabular presentations on domestic industry structure, Government programs, tariffs, 5-year salient statistics, and world production and resources. The MCS is the earliest comprehensive source
Authors

View_SPECPR: Software for Plotting Spectra (Installation Manual and User's Guide, Version 1.2)

This document describes procedures for installing and using the 'View_SPECPR' software system to plot spectra stored in SPECPR (SPECtrum Processing Routines) files. The View_SPECPR software is comprised of programs written in IDL (Interactive Data Language) that run within the ENVI (ENvironment for Visualizing Images) image processing system. SPECPR files are used by earth-remote-sensing scientist
Authors
Raymond F. Kokaly

Mercury geochemistry of gold placer tailings, sediments, bedrock, and waters in the lower Clear Creek area, Shasta County, California— Report of investigations, 2001-2003

Clear Creek, one of the major tributaries of the upper Sacramento River, drains the eastern Trinity Mountains. Alluvial plain and terrace gravels of lower Clear Creek, at the northwest edge of the Sacramento Valley, contain placer gold that has been mined since the Gold Rush by various methods including hydraulic mining and dredging. In addition, from the 1950s to the 1980s aggregate-mining operat
Authors
Roger P. Ashley, James J. Rytuba

Newly discovered Paleocene and Eocene rocks near Fairfield, California, and correlation with rocks in Vaca Valley and the so-called Martinez Formation or Stage

Discovery of a 3-foot thick sandstone bed with abundant Turritellid gastropods of late Paleocene age about 4 miles northeast of Fairfield and on the southwest flank of Cement Hill, Solano County provides an opportunity to reevaluate the relationships of lower Tertiary formations in this part of California. Cement Hill is named for travertine deposits in and on top of sandstone of Late Cretaceous a
Authors
Earl E. Brabb, Donn Ristau, David Bukry, Kristin McDougall, Alvin A. Almgren, LouElla Saul, Annika Sanfilippo

Chemical Analyses of Ground Water in the Carson Desert near Stillwater, Churchill County, Nevada, 2005

This report presents the chemical analyses of ground-water samples collected in 2005 from domestic wells located in the Stillwater area of the Carson Desert (fig. 1). These data were evaluated for evidence of mixing with nearby geothermal waters (Fosbury, 2007). That study used several methods to identify mixing zones of ground and geothermal waters using trace elements, chemical equilibria, water
Authors
DeEtta Fosbury, Mark Walker, Lisa L. Stillings

Mercury Release from the Rathburn Mine, Petray Mine, and Bear Valley Saline Springs, Colusa County, California 2004-2006

This report summarizes data obtained from field sampling of mine tailings and waste rock at the Rathburn and Petray Mines that was initiated in July 17, 2001 and water and sediment in regional springs and tributaries that drain from the mine area into Bear Creek on December 14, 2004 and February 16 and May 27, 2005. Although it was initially assumed that the mines were the cause of elevated levels
Authors
Aaron J. Slowey, James J. Rytuba

Porphyry copper deposits of the world: Database and grade and tonnage models, 2008

This report is an update of earlier publications about porphyry copper deposits (Singer, Berger, and Moring, 2002; Singer, D.A., Berger, V.I., and Moring, B.C., 2005). The update was necessary because of new information about substantial increases in resources in some deposits and because we revised locations of some deposits so that they are consistent with images in GoogleEarth. In this report w
Authors
Donald A. Singer, Vladimir I. Berger, Barry C. Moring

Leachate Geochemical Results for Ash and Burned Soil Samples from the October 2007 Southern California Wildfires

This report is the second release of leachate geochemical data included as part of a multidisciplinary study of ash and burned soil samples from the October 2007 wildfires in southern California. Geochemical data for the first set of samples were released in an Open-File Report (Plumlee and others, 2007). This study is a continuation of that work. The objectives of this leaching study are to aid
Authors
Philip L. Hageman, Geoffrey S. Plumlee, Deborah A. Martin, Todd M. Hoefen, Gregory P. Meeker, Monique Adams, Paul J. Lamothe, Michael W. Anthony

Paleomagnetic study of late Miocene through Pleistocene igneous rocks from the southwestern USA: Results from the historic collections of the U.S. Geological Survey Menlo Park laboratory

Seventy sites from the southwestern United States provide paleomagnetic results that meet certain minimum criteria and can be considered for the Time‐Averaged Field Initiative (TAFI). The virtual geomagnetic poles for these 70 units are circularly distributed, and their mean is nearly coincident with the rotational axis. When other published data for the southwestern United States are included (N
Authors
Edward A. Mankinen

Lithofacies, Age, and Sequence Stratigraphy of the Carboniferous Lisburne Group in the Skimo Creek Area, Central Brooks Range

The Lisburne Group, a mainly Carboniferous carbonate succession that is widely distributed across northern Alaska, contains notable amounts of oil and gas at Prudhoe Bay. Detailed studies of the Lisburne in the Skimo Creek area, central Brooks Range, delineate its lithofacies, age, conodont biofacies, depositional environments, and sequence stratigraphy and provide new data on its hydrocarbon sour
Authors
Julie A. Dumoulin, Michael T. Whalen, Anita G. Harris

Preliminary integrated geologic map databases for the United States: Digital data for the reconnaissance geologic map for Prince William Sound and the Kenai Peninsula, Alaska

The growth in the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) has highlighted the need for digital geologic maps that have been attributed with information about age and lithology. Such maps can be conveniently used to generate derivative maps for manifold special purposes such as mineral-resource assessment, metallogenic studies, tectonic studies, and environmental research. This report is part o