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

Filter Total Items: 16785

Block Island fault: A Paleozoic crustal boundary on the Long Island platform

A major fault cutting through most of the crust can be identified and mapped on the Long Island platform using multichannel seismic reflection profiles and magnetic data. The fault, here called the Block Island fault (BIF), strikes north-northeast, dips westward at low angle, and does not resemble the thin-skinned thrust faulting observed in the foreland of the Appalachians. The BIF is located wit
Authors
Deborah R. Hutchinson, Kim D. Klitgord, R. S. Detrick

A drowned Holocene barrier spit off Cape Ann, Massachusetts

Seismic profiles and bathymetric contours reveal a drowned barrier spit on Jeffreys Ledge off Cape Ann, Massachusetts. Seaward-dipping internal reflectors indicate that a regressive barrier formed during the early Holocene low sea-level stillstand. Preservation of the barrier spit may have been favored by its large size (as much as 20 m thick), by an ample sediment supply from unconsolidated glaci
Authors
Robert N. Oldale

Rapid postglacial shoreline changes in the western Gulf of Maine and the Paleo-Indian environment

Rapid shoreline regression and transgression along the western Gulf of Maine between 13,000 and 9000 years B.P. are inferred to have produced a nearshore marine environment low in biologic productivity. Paleo-Indians living near the coast of the Gulf were probably forced to rely on nonmarine resources landward of the late-glacial marine limit. Thus, Paleo-Indian sites of the time period in questio
Authors
Robert N. Oldale

Foraminiferal, lithic, and isotopic changes across four major unconformities at Deep Sea Drilling Project Site 548, Goban Spur

Sediment samples taken at close intervals across four major unconformities (middle Miocene/upper Miocene, lower Oligocene/upper Oligocene, lower Eocene/upper Eocene, lower Paleocene/upper Paleocene) at DSDP-IPOD Site 548, Goban Spur, reveal that coeval biostratigraphic gaps, sediment discontinuities, and seismic unconformities coincide with postulated low stands of sea level. Foraminiferal, lithic
Authors
C. Wylie Poag, Leslie A. Reynolds, James M. Mazzullo, Loyd D. Keigwin

A note on the effect of bottom currents on an ocean bottom seismometer

Two three-component ocean bottom seismometers and a current meter were deployed a few hundred meters apart on the southern Blake Plateau off the United States eastern coast to study the effect of near-bottom currents on the background noise level of seismometers. Although analysis of the data is limited somewhat by instrumental problems, the increase in current speed, which ranged from 2 to 25 cm/
Authors
Anne M. Tréhu

Effects of low-level dams on the distribution of sediment, trace metals, and organic substances in the lower Schuylkill River basin, Pennsylvania

Heavy use of the Schuylkill River for municipal water supplies and a history of accidental spills and discharges of trace metals and organic substances have been a concern of State and local officials for many years. The U.S. Geological Survey, as part of their River Quality Assessment Program, developed a study to assess the occurrence and distribution of trace substances that pose a threat to hu
Authors
Thomas H. Yorke, John K. Stamer, Gary L. Pederson

Distribution and transport of trace substances in the Schuylkill River basin from Berne to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

During the period from October 1978 to March 1981, the U.S. Geological Survey assessed the river quality of the Schuylkill River basin in Pennsylvania from the headwaters to the Fairmount Dam at Philadelphia (river mile 8.4). The assessment focused on the distribution and transport of trace metals and organic substances (trace substances). Trace metals included were arsenic, beryllium, cadmium, co
Authors
John K. Stamer, Thomas H. Yorke, Gary L. Pederson

Controls on phosphorus mobility in the Potomac River near the Blue Plains wastewater treatment plant

The Blue Plains wastewater treatment plant is the largest point source of phosphorus in the Potomac River basin, discharging an average of 2 metric tons of phosphorus into the river each day in 1980. An intensive study of the water and sediments in the vicinity of the treatment plant was conducted in 1979-80 in order to characterize the major factors controlling the mobility of effluent-derived ph
Authors
Paul P. Hearn,

Water-quality data-collection activities in Colorado and Ohio; Phase I, Inventory and evaluation of 1984 programs and costs

Pilot projects are being conducted in Colorado and Ohio to determine the extent to which existing water quality data, collected by different groups for various purposes and using different procedures, can be aggregated for use in addressing selected water quality questions of regional and national scope. The project has been divided into three phases; this report presents the results of the first
Authors
Janet Hren, Thomas H. Chaney, J. Michael Norris, Carolyn J. Oblinger Childress

Hydrologic data in small watersheds, coal-mining region, west-central Indiana, October 1980 to June 1983, and instrumentation and methods of collecting the data

Hydrologic data were collected in seven watersheds ranging in area from 0.11 to 4.87 square miles. Principal uses of land include farming in two of the watersheds, farming and forestry in one, farming and unreclaimed surface coal mines in one, reclaimed surface coal mines in two, and an unreclaimed surface coal mine in one. Methods and instrumentation used in collecting samples and measuring conce
Authors
D.E. Renn, R.F. Duwelius, C.R. Keeton, J.W. Tyler