Publications
Browse more than 160,000 publications authored by our scientists over the past 100+ year history of the USGS. Publications available are: USGS-authored journal articles, series reports, book chapters, other government publications, and more.
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Mission Area Publications
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Spatial variability in vertical accretion and carbon sequestration in salt marsh soils of an urban estuary
Salt marshes in New York City’s Jamaica Bay have been disappearing and deteriorating since early 1900s, resulting in the loss of long-term accumulated carbon storage. However, the spatial variations and mechanisms in vertical accretion and soil organic carbon (SOC) sequestration across this highly urbanized estuary remains unclear. In this study, we collected soil cores to a depth of ~ 50 cm acros
Authors
Hongqing Wang, Gregg Snedden, Ellen K. Hartig, Q. Chen
Reference genome of an iconic lizard in western North America, Blainville’s horned lizard Phrynosoma blainvillii
Genome assemblies are increasingly being used to identify adaptive genetic variation that can help prioritize the population management of protected species. This approach may be particularly relevant to species like Blainville’s horned lizard, Phrynosoma blainvillii, due to its specialized diet on noxious harvester ants, numerous adaptative traits for avoiding predation (e.g. cranial horns, dorso
Authors
Jonathan Q. Richmond, Jimmy A. McGuire, Merly Escalona, Mohan P. A. Marimuthu, Oanh Nguyen, Samuel Sacco, Eric Beraut, Erin Toffelmier, Robert N. Fisher, Ian J. Wang, H.B. Shaffer
Compensatory mortality explains rodent resilience to an invasive predator
Invasive Burmese pythons (Python bivittatus) in the Everglades of Florida, United States, have drastically reduced populations of mammals, yet populations of some rodents appear unaffected by the invasion. To understand this pattern, we radio-tagged cotton rats (Sigmodon hispidus) in areas of high and low python occurrence densities (hereafter occurrence) and quantified the effects of python occur
Authors
Marina E. McCampbell, Maggie Hunter, John V. Stechly, Kaitlyn N. Leist, Kristen Hart, Robert A. McCleery
Status and trends of the Lake Huron prey fish community, 1976-2022
The United States Geological Survey-Great Lakes Science Center has monitored annual changes in the offshore prey fish community of Lake Huron since 1973. Monitoring of prey fish populations in Lake Huron is based on a bottom trawl survey that targets demersal (benthic) species and an acoustic-midwater trawl survey that targets pelagic species and life stages. Status of the main basin prey fish com
Authors
Darryl W. Hondorp, Timothy P. O'Brien, Edward F. Roseman, Peter C. Esselman
Rapid modeling of compound flooding across broad coastal regions and the necessity to include rainfall driven processes: A case study of Hurricane Florence (2018)
In this work, we show that large-scale compound flood models developed for North and South Carolina, USA, can skillfully simulate multiple drivers of coastal flooding as confirmed by measurements collected during Hurricane Florence (2018). Besides the accuracy of representing observed water levels, the importance of individual processes was investigated. We demonstrate that across the area of inte
Authors
Tim Leijnse, Cornelis M. Nederhoff, Jennifer Anne Thomas, Kai Alexander Parker, Maarten van Ormondt, Li H. Erikson, Robert T. McCall, Ap van Dongeren, Andrea C. O'Neill, Patrick L. Barnard
Rift basins and intraplate earthquakes: New high-resolution aeromagnetic data provide insights into buried structures of the Charleston, South Carolina seismic zone
The delineation of faults that pose seismic risk in intraplate seismic zones and the mapping of features associated with failed rift basins can help our understanding of links between the two. We use new high-resolution aeromagnetic data, previous borehole sample information, and reprocessed seismic reflection profiles to image subsurface structures and evaluate recent fault activity within the Ch
Authors
Anjana K. Shah, Thomas L. Pratt, J. Wright Horton,
Shoreface sediment availability offshore of a rapidly migrating, mixed-energy barrier island
Less is known about sediment exchanges between shorefaces and mixed-energy barrier islands (MEBI) than between shorefaces and wave-dominated barrier islands. We used seismic stratigraphy from Cedar Island, Virginia, USA to understand the interplay between shoreface deposits and MEBI morphodynamics. Interpretations reveal that the shelf and shoreface are extensively dissected by breach and inlet ch
Authors
Emily A. Wei, Jennifer L. Miselis
Incorporating wave climate complexity into modeling lower shoreface morphology and transport
The lower shoreface, a transitional subaqueous region extending from the seaward limit of the surf zone to beyond the closure depth, serves as a sediment reservoir and pathway in sandy beach environments over annual to millennial time scales. Despite the important role this region plays in shoreline dynamics, the morphodynamics of the lower shoreface remain poorly quantified and understood. To bet
Authors
Megan Gillen, Andrew D. Ashton, Jennifer L. Miselis, Daniel J. Ciarletta, Emily A. Wei, Christopher R. Sherwood
Guidance for parameterizing post-fire hydrologic models with in situ infiltration measurements
Wildfire can alter soil-hydraulic properties, often resulting in an increased prevalence of infiltration-excess overland flow and greater potential for debris-flow hazards. Mini disk tension infiltrometers (MDIs) can be used to estimate soil hydraulic properties, such as field-saturated hydraulic conductivity (Kfs) and wetting front potential (Hf), and their spatial variability following wildfire.
Authors
T. Liu, Luke A. McGuire, Ann Youberg, Alexander N. Gorr, Francis K. Rengers
Review and development of best practices for toxicity tests with dreissenid mussels
Since their introduction to North America in the 1980s, research to develop effective control tools for invasive mussels (Dreissena polymorpha and D. rostriformis bugensis) has been ongoing across various research institutions using a range of testing methods. Inconsistencies in experimental methods and reporting present challenges for comparing data, repeating experiments, and applying results. T
Authors
Diane L. Waller, Sherri Pucherelli, Matthew Barbour, Samantha Tank, Matthew J Meulemans, Jeremy K. Wise, Angelique Dahlberg, David C. Aldridge, Renata Claudi, W. Gregory Cope, Patricia L. Gillis, Donna Kashian, Denise A. Mayer, Kelly A. Stockton-Fiti, Wai Hing Wong
Assessing environmental oil spill based on fluorescence images of water samples and deep learning
Measuring oil concentration in the aquatic environment is essential for determining the potential exposure, risk, or injury for oil spill response and natural resource damage assessment. Conventional analytical chemistry methods require samples to be collected in the field, shipped, and processed in the laboratory, which is also rather time-consuming, laborious, and costly. For rapid field respons
Authors
D. P. Liu, Ming Liu, Guangyu Sun, Zhiqian Zhou, Duolin Wang, Fei He, Jiaxin Li, Jiacheng Xie, Ryan Gettler, Eric Brunson, Jeffery Steevens, Dong Xu
New capabilities in MT3D-USGS for simulating unsaturated-zone heat transport
Changes in climate and land use will alter groundwater heat transport dynamics in the future. These changes will in turn affect watershed processes (e.g., nutrient cycling) as well as watershed characteristics (e.g., distribution and persistence of cold-water habitat). Thus, groundwater flow and heat transport models at watershed scales that can characterize and quantify thermal impacts of surfac
Authors
Eric D. Morway, Daniel T. Feinstein, Randall J. Hunt, Richard W. Healy