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.
Mission Area Publications
Mission Area Publications
We are focused on some of the most significant issues society faces, and our science is making a substantial contribution to the well-being of the Nation and the world. Learn more about the major topics our research covers and the programs focused on those topics.
Filter Total Items: 171804
Invasive species control and management: The sea lamprey story
Control of invasive species is a critical component of conservation biology given the catastrophic damage that they can cause to the ecosystems they invade. This is particularly evident with sea lamprey (Petromyzon marinus) in the Laurentian Great Lakes. Native to the Atlantic Ocean, the sea lamprey's ability to osmoregulate in fresh water, its wide thermal tolerance, generalist diet, and high fec
Authors
Michael P. Wilkie, Nicholas S. Johnson, Margaret F. Docker
Linking evolutionary potential to extinction risk: Applications and future directions
Extinction-risk assessments play a major role in prioritizing conservation action at national and international levels. However, quantifying extinction risk is challenging, especially when including the full suite of adaptive responses to environmental change. In particular, evolutionary potential (EP), the capacity to evolve genetically based changes that increase fitness under changing condition
Authors
Brenna R. Forester, Erik A. Beever, Catherine Darst, Jennifer Szymanski, W. Chris Funk
New generation hyperspectral sensors DESIS and PRISMA provide improved agricultural crop classifications
Using new remote sensing technology to study agricultural crops will support advances in food and water security. The recently launched, new generation spaceborne hyperspectral sensors, German DLR Earth Sensing Imaging Spectrometer (DESIS) and Italian PRecursore IperSpettrale della Missione Applicativa (PRISMA), provide unprecedented data in hundreds of narrow spectral bands for the study of the E
Authors
Itiya Aneece, Prasad Thenkabail
Warming-driven erosion and sediment transport in cold regions
Rapid atmospheric warming since the mid-twentieth century has increased temperature-dependent erosion and sediment-transport processes in cold environments, affecting food, energy and water security. In this Review, we summarize landscape changes in cold environments and provide a global inventory of increases in erosion and sediment yield driven by cryosphere degradation. Anthropogenic climate ch
Authors
Tinghu Zhang, Dongfeng Li, Amy E. East, Desmond E. Walling, Stuart N. Lane, Irina Overeem, Achim A. Beylich, Michele N Koppes, Xixi Lu
USGS Telemetry Project
No abstract available.
Authors
Marybeth K. Brey, Brent C. Knights, Jessica Stanton, Sean Bailey, Travis J. Harrison, Douglas Appel, Andrea K. Fritts, James J. Duncker, P. Ryan Jackson
Perspectives on challenges and opportunities at the restoration-policy interface in the U.S.A.
As we advance into the United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, understanding the relationship between science, management, and policy is increasingly important given the paucity of research evaluating the ability of existing policy to address contemporary environmental challenges. Despite their inherent interdependence, restoration ecology as a scientific discipline, ecological restoration
Authors
Ella M. Samuel, Rachel M. Mitchell, Daniel E. Winkler
Identifying mechanisms underlying individual body size increases in a changing, highly seasonal environment: The growing trout of West Brook
As air temperature increases, it has been suggested that smaller individual body size may be a general response to climate warming. However, for ectotherms inhabiting cold, highly seasonal environments, warming temperatures may increase the scope for growth and result in larger body size.In a long-term study of individual brook trout Salvelinus fontinalis and brown trout Salmo trutta inhabiting a
Authors
Benjamin Letcher, Keith Nislow, Matthew J. O'Donnell, Andrew R. Whiteley, Jason Coombs, Todd L. Dubreuil, Daniel Turek
Occurrence of a reproducing wild population of Channa aurolineata (Pisces: Channidae) in the Manatee River drainage, Florida
We report on the discovery of a wild, reproducing population of Channa aurolineata (Pisces: Channidae) in west-central Florida (USA), and first documented occurrence of snakeheads in the Gulf Coast region. Channa aurolineata is a large, predatory fish of the bullseye snakehead “Marulius group” species complex from Asia. Adult and juvenile specimens were captured in June 2020 in a 1.8-hectare pond
Authors
Leo Nico, Matthew Neilson, Robert H. Robins, John M. Pfeiffer, Matthew Kail, Zachary S. Randall, Eric A. Johnson
Gaining decision-maker confidence through community consensus: Developing environmental DNA standards for data display on the USGS Nonindigenous Aquatic Species database
To advance national efforts for the detection and biosurveillance of aquatic invasive species (AIS), we employed a community consensus process to enable the incorporation of environmental DNA (eDNA) detection data into the U.S. Geological Survey’s (USGS) Nonindigenous Aquatic Species (NAS) database (https://nas.er.usgs.gov/eDNA/). Our goal was to identify minimum standards and best practices for t
Authors
Jason Ferrante, Wesley M. Daniel, Jonathan (Contractor) Adam Freedman, Katy E. Klymus, Matthew Neilson, Yale Passamaneck, Christopher B. Rees, Adam J. Sepulveda, Margaret Hunter
Juvenile green sturgeon (Acipenser medirostris) movement during autumn and winter in the lower Sacramento River, California, 2016–20
A collaborative acoustic telemetry study was conducted to describe behavior and movement patterns of juvenile green sturgeon (Acipenser medirostris) in the lower Sacramento River, California during 2016–19. For the study, juvenile green sturgeon were collected, tagged, and released in the Sacramento River between river kilometer (rkm) 467 and rkm 419 near Red Bluff, California. Telemetry monitorin
Authors
Amy C. Hansen, Robert D. Chase, Tobias J. Kock, Russell W. Perry, Josh J. Gruber, William R. Poytress
Mismatch between temperature and discharge disrupts spawning cues in a fluvial specialist, blue sucker Cycleptus elongatus
Seasonal movements cued by environmental variables are a critical component of riverine fish life history. Life-history events for species such as blue sucker Cycleptus elongatus are likely cued by discharge and temperature and may be disrupted if those life-history events and environmental regimes are mismatched. However, this effect may be dependent upon the habitat occupied when environmental c
Authors
Matthew Ross Acre, Timothy B. Grabowski, Daniel J. Leavitt, Nathan G. Smith, Allison A. Pease, Preston T. Bean, Dakus Geeslin
Materials flow in the United States—A global context, 1900–2020
IntroductionDuring the last 12 decades (1900–2020), the amounts of raw materials used in the United States have increased significantly due to economic development, technological innovations, and population growth. Data on materials are presented here to provide an overview of the annual quantities (measured in physical terms) required for the standard of living in the United States and to provide
Authors
Grecia R. Matos