Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Publications

These publications showcase the significant science conducted in our Science Centers.

Filter Total Items: 16780

North American Commission on Stratigraphic Nomenclature Report 12 – Revision of article 37, lithodemic units, of the North American Stratigraphic Code

At the 71st Annual Meeting of the North American Commission on Stratigraphic Nomenclature, 26 September, 2016, in Denver, Colorado, the Commission voted unanimously to accept the revision of Article 37 of the North American Stratigraphic Code (North American Commission on Stratigraphic Nomenclature, 2005), printed below. It replaces all older versions of this Article. An application for this revis
Authors
Robert M. Easton, Lucy E. Edwards, Randall C. Orndorff, Manuel Duguet, Ismael Ferrusquia-Villafranca

Global nonfuel mineral exploration trends 2001-2015

The mission of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) National Minerals Information Center (NMIC) is to collect, analyze and disseminate information on the domestic and international supply of and demand for minerals and mineral materials essential to the U.S. economy and national security. Understanding mineral exploration activities and trends assists government policy makers, minerals industry decis
Authors
Nick Karl, David R. Wilburn

An integrated population model for bird monitoring in North America

Integrated population models (IPMs) provide a unified framework for simultaneously analyzing data sets of different types to estimate vital rates, population size, and dynamics; assess contributions of demographic parameters to population changes; and assess population viability. Strengths of an IPM include the ability to estimate latent parameters and improve the precision of parameter estimates.
Authors
Farshid S. Ahrestani, James F. Saracco, John R. Sauer, Keith L. Pardieck, J. Andrew Royle

Trends in snowmelt-related streamflow timing in the conterminous United States

Changes in snowmelt-related streamflow timing have implications for water availability and use as well as ecologically relevant shifts in streamflow. Historical trends in snowmelt-related streamflow timing (winter-spring center volume date, WSCVD) were computed for minimally disturbed river basins in the conterminous United States. WSCVD was computed by summing daily streamflow for a seasonal wind
Authors
Robert W. Dudley, Glenn A. Hodgkins, Michael McHale, Michael J. Kolian, Benjamin Renard

Inner-shelf ocean dynamics and seafloor morphologic changes during Hurricane Sandy

Hurricane Sandy was one of the most destructive hurricanes in US history, making landfall on the New Jersey coast on Oct 30, 2012. Storm impacts included several barrier island breaches, massive coastal erosion, and flooding. While changes to the subaerial landscape are relatively easily observed, storm-induced changes to the adjacent shoreface and inner continental shelf are more difficult to eva
Authors
John C. Warner, William C. Schwab, Jeffrey H. List, Ilgar Safak, Maria Liste, Wayne E. Baldwin

Goose migration across the Himalayas: Migratory routes and movement patterns of Bar-headed Geese

No abstract available.
Authors
John Y. Takekawa, Eric C. Palm, Diann J. Prosser, Lucy Hawkes, Nyambayar Batbayar, Sivananinthaperumal Balachandran, Ze Luo, Xiangming Xiao, Scott H. Newman

Migratory ducks and protected wetlands in India

India is the most important wintering ground for migratory ducks in the Central Asian Flyway. Because of its latitudinal and climatic extent, the country provides a diversity of wetland habitats for migratory ducks (Ali & Ripley 1978). India is the seventh largest country in the world with an area of about 3.3 million km2 or 2.4% of the world’s land-area. Mainland India stretches nearly 3200 km fr
Authors
Tsewang Namgail, John Y. Takekawa, Sivananinthaperumal Balachandran, Taej Mundkur, Ponnusamy Sathiyaselvam, Diann J. Prosser, Tracy McCracken, Scott H. Newman

The 3.6 ka Aniakchak tephra in the Arctic Ocean: A constraint on the Holocene radiocarbon reservoir age in the Chukchi Sea

The caldera-forming eruption of the Aniakchak volcano in the Aleutian Range on the Alaskan Peninsula at 3.6 cal kyr BP was one of the largest Holocene eruptions worldwide. The resulting ash is found as a visible sediment layer in several Alaskan sites and as a cryptotephra on Newfoundland and Greenland. This large geographic distribution, combined with the fact that the eruption is relatively well
Authors
Christof Pearce, Aron Varhelyi, Stefan Wastegård, Francesco Muschitiello, Natalia Barrientos Macho, Matt O'Regan, Thomas M. Cronin, Laura Gemery, Igor Semiletov, Jan Backman, Martin Jakobsson

Himalayan thoroughfare: Migratory routes of ducks over the rooftop of the world

No abstract available.
Authors
Tsewang Namgail, John Y. Takekawa, Sivananinthaperumal Balachandran, Eric C. Palm, Taej Mundkur, Victor Martin Velez, Diann J. Prosser, Scott H. Newman

Implanting 8-mm passive integrated transponder tags into small Brook Trout: Effects on growth and survival in the laboratory

Passive integrated transponder (PIT) tags are commonly used to investigate relationships between individual fish and their environment. The recent availability of smaller tags has provided the opportunity to tag smaller fish. In this study, we implanted 8-mm PIT tags into small Brook Trout Salvelinus fontinalis (35–50 mm FL; 0.35–1.266 g) and compared tag retention, growth rates, and survival of P
Authors
Matthew J. O'Donnell, Benjamin H. Letcher

The role of uplift and erosion in the persistence of saline groundwater in the shallow subsurface

In many regions of the world, the shallow (<300 m) subsurface is replenished with meteoric recharge within a few centuries or millennia, but in some regions saline groundwater persists despite abundant rainfall. Analyses of the flushing rate of shallow groundwater usually consider the permeability and recharge rate and a static landscape. The influence of landscape evolution can become important o
Authors
Richard M. Yager, Kurt J. McCoy, Clifford I. Voss, Ward E. Sanford, Richard B. Winston

Ecology of the macrophyte Podostemum ceratophyllum Michx. (Hornleaf riverweed), a widespread foundation species of eastern North American rivers

Podostemum ceratophyllum, commonly called Hornleaf Riverweed, occurs in mid-order montane and piedmont rivers of eastern North America, where the plant grows submerged and attached to rocks and stable substrates in swift, aerated water. Multiple studies, mostly conducted in the southern portions of the plant’s range, have shown that Podostemum can variously influence benthic communities in flowing
Authors
James Wood, Mary Freeman