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.
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Considerations for creating equitable and inclusive communication campaigns associated with ShakeAlert, the earthquake early warning system for the West Coast of the USA
PurposeThe 2019 Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction (GAR) cites earthquakes as the most damaging natural hazard globally, causing billions of dollars of damage and killing thousands of people. Earthquakes have the potential to drastically impact physical, social and economic landscapes; to reduce this risk, earthquake early warning (EEW) systems have been developed. However, these
Authors
Mariah Ramona Jenkins, Sara McBride, Meredith Morgoch, Hollie Smith
The Coalition for Conservation Genetics: Working across organizations to build capacity and achieve change in policy and practice
The Coalition for Conservation Genetics (CCG) brings together four eminent organizations with the shared goal of improving the integration of genetic information into conservation policy and practice. We provide a historical context of conservation genetics as a field and reflect on current barriers to conserving genetic diversity, highlighting the need for collaboration across traditional divides
Authors
Francine Kershaw, Michael W. Bruford, W. Chris Funk, Catherine E. Grueber, Sean M. Hoban, Margaret Hunter, Linda Laikre, Anna J. MacDonald, Mariah H. Meek, Cinnamon Mittan, David O´Brien, Rob Ogden, Robyn E. Shaw, Cristiano Vernesi, Gernot Segelbacher
Riparian forest productivity decline initiated by streamflow diversion then amplified by atmospheric drought 40 years later
Riparian trees and their annual growth rings can be used to reconstruct drought histories related to streamflow. Because the death of individual trees reduces competition for survivors, however, tree-ring chronologies based only on surviving trees may underestimate drought impacts. This problem can be addressed by calculating productivity at the stand scale to account for tree mortality and establ
Authors
Derek M. Schook, J. M. Friedman, Jamie D. Hoover, Steven E. Rice, Richard D. Thaxton, David J. Cooper
California Deepwater Investigations and Groundtruthing (Cal DIG) I, volume 3 — Benthic habitat characterization offshore Morro Bay, California
Coastal and Marine Ecological Classification Standard (CMECS) geoform, substrate, and biotic component geographic information system (GIS) products were developed for the U.S. Exclusive Economic Zone (U.S. EEZ) of south-central California in the region of Santa Lucia Bank motivated by interest in development of offshore wind-energy capacity and infrastructure. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management
Authors
Guy R. Cochrane, Linda A. Kuhnz, Lisa Gilbane, Peter Dartnell, Maureen A. L. Walton, Charles K. Paull
Hydroclimatic conditions, wildfire, and species assemblages influence co-occurrence of bull trout and tailed frogs in northern Rocky Mountain streams
Although bull trout (Salvelinus confluentus) and tailed frogs (Ascaphus montanus) have co-existed in forested Pacific Northwest streams for millennia, these iconic cold-water specialists are experiencing rapid environmental change caused by a warming climate and enhanced wildfire activity. Our goal was to inform future conservation by examining the habitat associations of each species and conditio
Authors
David Pilliod, Robert Arkle, Russel F Thurow, Dan J Isaak
Evaluating sources of bias in pedigree-based estimates of breeding population size
Applications of genetic-based estimates of population size are expanding, especially for species for which traditional demographic estimation methods are intractable due to the rarity of adult encounters. Estimates of breeding population size (NS) are particularly amenable to genetic-based approaches as the parameter can be estimated using pedigrees reconstructed from genetic data gathered from di
Authors
Shannon L. White, Nicholas M Sard, Harold M Brundage III, Robin L. Johnson, Barbara A. Lubinski, Michael S. Eackles, Ian A Park, Dewayne A. Fox, David C. Kazyak
Resist-accept-direct (RAD) considerations for climate change adaptation in fisheries: The Wisconsin experience
Decision-makers in inland fisheries management must balance ecologically and socially palatable objectives for ecosystem services within financial or physical constraints. Climate change has transformed the potential range of ecosystem services available. The Resist-Accept-Direct (RAD) framework offers a foundation for responding to climate-induced ecosystem modification; however, ecosystem trajec
Authors
Zachary S. Feiner, Aaron D. Shultz, Greg G. Sass, Ashley Trudeau, Matthew G. Mitro, Colin J. Dassow, Alexander W. Latzka, Daniel A. Isermann, Bryan M. Maitland, Jared Joseph Homola, Holly Susan Embke, Michael Preul
Estimating species misclassification with occupancy dynamics and encounter rates: A semi-supervised, individual-level approach
1. Large-scale, long-term biodiversity monitoring is essential to conservation, land management, and identifying threats to biodiversity. However, multispecies surveys are prone to various types of observation error, including false positive/negative detection, and misclassification, where a species is thought to have been encountered but not correctly identified. Previous methods assume an imperf
Authors
Anna Spiers, Andy Royle, Christa Torrens, Maxwell Joseph
Reevaluation of the role of blocked Oropsylla hirsuta prairie dog fleas (Siphonaptera: Ceratophyllidae) in Yersinia pestis (Enterobacterales: Enterobacteriaceae) transmission
Prairie dogs in the western United States experience periodic epizootics of plague, caused by the flea-borne bacterial pathogen Yersinia pestis. An early study indicated that Oropsylla hirsuta (Baker), often the most abundant prairie dog flea vector of plague, seldom transmits Y. pestis by the classic blocked flea mechanism. More recently, an alternative early-phase mode of transmission has been p
Authors
Adélaïde Miarinjara, David A. Eads, David M. Bland, Marc R. Matchett, Dean E. Biggins, B. Joseph Hinnebusch
Microbially induced anaerobic oxidation of magnetite to maghemite in a hydrocarbon-contaminated aquifer
Iron mineral transformations occurring in hydrocarbon-contaminated sites are linked to the biodegradation of the hydrocarbons. At a hydrocarbon-contaminated site near Bemidji, Minnesota, USA, measurements of magnetic susceptibility (MS) are useful for monitoring the natural attenuation of hydrocarbons related to iron cycling. However, a transient MS, previously observed at the site, remains poorly
Authors
Leonard O. Ohenhen, Joshua M. Feinberg, Lee Slater, Dimitrios Ntarlagiannis, Isabelle M. Cozzarelli, Miriam Rios-Sanchez, Carl W. Isaacson, Alexis Stricker, Estella A. Atekwana
Environmental filtering controls soil biodiversity in wet tropical ecosystems
The environmental factors controlling soil biodiversity along resource gradients remain poorly understood in wet tropical ecosystems. Aboveground biodiversity is expected to be driven by changes in nutrient availability in these ecosystems, however, much less is known about the importance of nutrient availability in driving soil biodiversity. Here, we combined a cross-continental soil survey acros
Authors
Haiying Cui, Peter M. Vitousek, Sasha C. Reed, Wei Sun, Blessing Sokoya, Adebola R. Bamigboye, Jay Prakash Verma, Arpan Mukherjee, Gabriel F. Peñaloza-Bojacá, Alberto L. Teixido, Pankaj Trivedi, Ji-Zheng He, Hang-Wei Hu, Kenny Png, Manuel Delgado-Baquerizo
Insights into the geometry and evolution of the southern San Andreas Fault from geophysical data, southern California
Two new joint gravity-magnetic models in northern Coachella Valley provide additional evidence for a steep northeast dip of the Mission Creek strand of the southern San Andreas fault (southern California, USA). Gravity modeling indicates a steep northeast dip of the Banning fault in the upper 1–2 km in northern Coachella Valley. The Mission Creek strand and its continuation to the southeast (Coach
Authors
Victoria Langenheim, Gary S. Fuis