USGS scientist monitoring instruments onboard a high-speed mapping boat.
USGS scientist monitoring instruments onboard a high-speed mapping boat.
Hydrologic technicians deploying a flow sensor on a shoal in San Francisco Bay to investigate phytoplankton production and nutrient transformations.
Hydrologic technicians deploying a flow sensor on a shoal in San Francisco Bay to investigate phytoplankton production and nutrient transformations.
A view from the office: USGS scientists heading out to deploy sensors for sediment nutrient storage and release in Rodeo Lagoon.
A view from the office: USGS scientists heading out to deploy sensors for sediment nutrient storage and release in Rodeo Lagoon.
USGS laboratory technician filtering for chlorophyll-a.
USGS laboratory technician filtering for chlorophyll-a.
Scientists aboard research vessel Aiken conduct water-quality mapping in support of wastewater-derived nutrients project.
Scientists aboard research vessel Aiken conduct water-quality mapping in support of wastewater-derived nutrients project.
The Biogeochemistry (BGC) Group uses an interdisciplinary approach to address surface water quality issues and food web dynamics throughout California, particularly in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and San Francisco Bay.
Study areas include:
- Drivers of phytoplankton community composition and abundance and harmful algal bloom-related toxins
- Long-term continuous monitoring of numerous water quality constituents, phytoplankton, phytoplankton community structure, dissolved organic carbon and nitrogen as well as other constituents important to aquatic systems
- Changes in wastewater-derived nutrients and effects on phytoplankton community structure
- Effects of flow and water residence time on nutrient cycling and phytoplankton
- The impacts of invasive aquatic vegetation on water quality, water residence time, and native phytoplankton
- Assessing the role of wetlands in the Delta with respect to such topics as mercury, nutrients, drinking water quality and phytoplankton production
- Assessing the potential of tidal wetlands to mitigate land subsidence and sequester carbon
- Supporting improved water quality management through development of new sensors, analyses and techniques such as direct residence time measurements, custom sensor technologies, wide-area high-speed mapping surveys, remote sensing calibration and validation and other related activities
Media
Sources/Usage: Public Domain. View Media Details
The BGC Group specializes in the application of in-situ optical sensors that monitor short- and long-term water quality trends. These sensors measure a host of biogeochemical parameters and capture continuous temporal trends – including those that may go undetected through traditional discrete sampling. The BGC Group also employs novel high-resolution boat-based mapping surveys, conducting intensive sampling for a diverse variety of biogeochemical parameters throughout the Bay-Delta.
These studies and data will help resource managers assess response to management actions and predict how the Bay-Delta will respond to future changes. The high frequency, real-time data can act as an early warning system for unanticipated, short-lived, or rapidly changing conditions, such as those due to spills, harmful algal blooms, and altered water-quality resulting from storms or levee breaches. The BGC group additionally specialize in the creation of novel data dissemination techniques in effort to ease open data acquisition, ultimately aiming to advance Bay-Delta science.
Additional Biogeochemistry Group staff include:
- Malanyon Adams
- Amelia Ayers
- Tom Bergamaschi
- Heidi Bockisch
- Dylan Burau
- Patrick Dellwo
- Nicholas Framsted
- Patrick Haluska
- Ashley Heath
- Alek Hernes
- Tim Ivanov
- Colin Keating
- Kyle Leathers
- Ariana Maestas
- Schuyler Nardelli
- Erica Nejad
- Diana Oros
- Zoë Siman-Tov
- Crystal Sturgeon
- Leslie Troutman
- Maura Uebner
Below are other science projects associated with this project.
Filter Total Items: 17
Assessing Sediment Nutrient Storage and Release in California's Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta
Sediments represent an important pool of nutrients in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta (Delta). The exchange of nutrients between the water column and the benthos impacts water quality and effects phytoplankton, harmful algal blooms, aquatic vegetation, and drinking water quality. To date, there is very limited information about nutrient pools in Delta sediments, nor how these nutrients are...
Evaluating the effects of wastewater-derived nutrients on phytoplankton abundance and community structure in the San Francisco Estuary and Delta
Planned upgrades to the Sacramento Regional wastewater treatment plant (SRWTP) will substantially reduce nutrient discharge and also alter the types and amounts of nutrients being distributed across the San Francisco Delta and Estuary (Delta). One highly anticipated outcome of lower nutrients is improved productivity in the phytoplankton communities that supply aquatic food webs, which should...
Monitoring Cyanotoxins in California's Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta: Fixed Stations and High-Resolution Mapping Surveys
California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta (Delta) provides drinking water to about 30 million people and irrigation water to the agriculturally rich Central Valley. The Delta is also home to numerous threatened and endangered native species. The health of the Delta's aquatic ecosystems, and fish in particular, have long been in a state of decline. This is associated with decreasing...
Creating a Model to Predict Future Carbon Levels in Tidally-driven Marshes
Tidal marshes are important ecosystems in the San Francisco-Bay Delta. They remove carbon from the atmosphere, they build up soils that buffer our communities from sea level rise, they provide critical habitat and food resources for a diversity of species, and they reduce excessive nutrients which have a negative impact on water quality. As a result of land-use change and urbanization, the San...
Trends in Dissolved Organic Carbon (DOC) in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta
Water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta contains high concentrations of disinfection byproduct-forming (DBP-forming) materials when treated for potable use. DBPs form when dissolved organic compounds (DOC) in water react with disinfectants such as chlorine and ozone during the water treatment process. The amount of DBPs that form is a function of both the amount and source of the DOC, both of...
Methylmercury and Low Dissolved Oxygen Events in Suisun Marsh
The primary purpose of the USGS portion of this proposed study is to evaluate if spectrophotometric and spectrofluorometric methods are useful for identifying organic sources of oxygen demand by analyzing water-quality samples (DO, BOD, Chl, SSC, Salinity, THg, MeHg) collected by other agencies and project participants. Sources to be evaluated include algal production, vegetation, soils, and...
Mercury and Dissolved Organic Matter in Delta Wetlands
Between 1860 and 1914, hydraulic mining activities sent more than 800,000,000 cubic yards of mercury-laden sediment into the Delta altering the landscape, water flows, and contributing to the leveeing and reclamation of the Delta's marshes. Transport of mercury from historic mining areas continues today. The sedimentary supply of mercury to the Delta and in Delta sediments (cinnabar, metacinnabar...
Sources of Disinfection Byproduct-forming Material in the State Water Project
Water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta contains high concentrations of disinfection byproduct-forming (DBP-forming) materials when treated for potable use. DBPs form when dissolved organic compounds (DOC) in water react with disinfectants such as chlorine and ozone during the water-treatment process. The amount of DBPs that form is a function of the amount and source of the DOC, both of which...
High-Speed Mapping of Nutrient Distributions and Water Quality Survey - Lower South San Francisco Bay
This project aims to characterize spatial heterogeneity for key water quality parameters, and pilot the use of underway-flowthrough mapping of biogeochemical properties as a cost-effective approach to monitoring.
Dynamics of zooplankton in the Cache Slough Complex
Our purpose is to investigate what controls the distribution and abundance of fish prey within the Cache Slough Complex (CSC).
Phytoplankton production and nutrient transformations in shallow water wetland habitats
The objectives of this study are to quantify and characterize (1) phytoplankton production on Liberty Island, (2) utilization and transformation of nutrients, and (3) attenuation/loss of phytoplankton as the material is transported from Liberty Iisland into Cache Slough.
Nitrogen Dynamics Along the Sacramento River and Links to Phytoplankton Dynamics: Resolving Spatial and Temporal Variability Using In-Situ, High-Frequency Measurements and Other Tools
The overall project objective is to further our understanding of the link between nitrogen and phytoplankton dynamics in the Sacramento River and to elucidate effects of wastewater treatment plant effluent on food web dynamics.
The Biogeochemistry (BGC) Group uses an interdisciplinary approach to address surface water quality issues and food web dynamics throughout California, particularly in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and San Francisco Bay.
Study areas include:
- Drivers of phytoplankton community composition and abundance and harmful algal bloom-related toxins
- Long-term continuous monitoring of numerous water quality constituents, phytoplankton, phytoplankton community structure, dissolved organic carbon and nitrogen as well as other constituents important to aquatic systems
- Changes in wastewater-derived nutrients and effects on phytoplankton community structure
- Effects of flow and water residence time on nutrient cycling and phytoplankton
- The impacts of invasive aquatic vegetation on water quality, water residence time, and native phytoplankton
- Assessing the role of wetlands in the Delta with respect to such topics as mercury, nutrients, drinking water quality and phytoplankton production
- Assessing the potential of tidal wetlands to mitigate land subsidence and sequester carbon
- Supporting improved water quality management through development of new sensors, analyses and techniques such as direct residence time measurements, custom sensor technologies, wide-area high-speed mapping surveys, remote sensing calibration and validation and other related activities
Media
Sources/Usage: Public Domain. View Media Details
The BGC Group specializes in the application of in-situ optical sensors that monitor short- and long-term water quality trends. These sensors measure a host of biogeochemical parameters and capture continuous temporal trends – including those that may go undetected through traditional discrete sampling. The BGC Group also employs novel high-resolution boat-based mapping surveys, conducting intensive sampling for a diverse variety of biogeochemical parameters throughout the Bay-Delta.
These studies and data will help resource managers assess response to management actions and predict how the Bay-Delta will respond to future changes. The high frequency, real-time data can act as an early warning system for unanticipated, short-lived, or rapidly changing conditions, such as those due to spills, harmful algal blooms, and altered water-quality resulting from storms or levee breaches. The BGC group additionally specialize in the creation of novel data dissemination techniques in effort to ease open data acquisition, ultimately aiming to advance Bay-Delta science.
Additional Biogeochemistry Group staff include:
- Malanyon Adams
- Amelia Ayers
- Tom Bergamaschi
- Heidi Bockisch
- Dylan Burau
- Patrick Dellwo
- Nicholas Framsted
- Patrick Haluska
- Ashley Heath
- Alek Hernes
- Tim Ivanov
- Colin Keating
- Kyle Leathers
- Ariana Maestas
- Schuyler Nardelli
- Erica Nejad
- Diana Oros
- Zoë Siman-Tov
- Crystal Sturgeon
- Leslie Troutman
- Maura Uebner
Below are other science projects associated with this project.
Filter Total Items: 17
Assessing Sediment Nutrient Storage and Release in California's Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta
Sediments represent an important pool of nutrients in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta (Delta). The exchange of nutrients between the water column and the benthos impacts water quality and effects phytoplankton, harmful algal blooms, aquatic vegetation, and drinking water quality. To date, there is very limited information about nutrient pools in Delta sediments, nor how these nutrients are...
Evaluating the effects of wastewater-derived nutrients on phytoplankton abundance and community structure in the San Francisco Estuary and Delta
Planned upgrades to the Sacramento Regional wastewater treatment plant (SRWTP) will substantially reduce nutrient discharge and also alter the types and amounts of nutrients being distributed across the San Francisco Delta and Estuary (Delta). One highly anticipated outcome of lower nutrients is improved productivity in the phytoplankton communities that supply aquatic food webs, which should...
Monitoring Cyanotoxins in California's Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta: Fixed Stations and High-Resolution Mapping Surveys
California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta (Delta) provides drinking water to about 30 million people and irrigation water to the agriculturally rich Central Valley. The Delta is also home to numerous threatened and endangered native species. The health of the Delta's aquatic ecosystems, and fish in particular, have long been in a state of decline. This is associated with decreasing...
Creating a Model to Predict Future Carbon Levels in Tidally-driven Marshes
Tidal marshes are important ecosystems in the San Francisco-Bay Delta. They remove carbon from the atmosphere, they build up soils that buffer our communities from sea level rise, they provide critical habitat and food resources for a diversity of species, and they reduce excessive nutrients which have a negative impact on water quality. As a result of land-use change and urbanization, the San...
Trends in Dissolved Organic Carbon (DOC) in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta
Water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta contains high concentrations of disinfection byproduct-forming (DBP-forming) materials when treated for potable use. DBPs form when dissolved organic compounds (DOC) in water react with disinfectants such as chlorine and ozone during the water treatment process. The amount of DBPs that form is a function of both the amount and source of the DOC, both of...
Methylmercury and Low Dissolved Oxygen Events in Suisun Marsh
The primary purpose of the USGS portion of this proposed study is to evaluate if spectrophotometric and spectrofluorometric methods are useful for identifying organic sources of oxygen demand by analyzing water-quality samples (DO, BOD, Chl, SSC, Salinity, THg, MeHg) collected by other agencies and project participants. Sources to be evaluated include algal production, vegetation, soils, and...
Mercury and Dissolved Organic Matter in Delta Wetlands
Between 1860 and 1914, hydraulic mining activities sent more than 800,000,000 cubic yards of mercury-laden sediment into the Delta altering the landscape, water flows, and contributing to the leveeing and reclamation of the Delta's marshes. Transport of mercury from historic mining areas continues today. The sedimentary supply of mercury to the Delta and in Delta sediments (cinnabar, metacinnabar...
Sources of Disinfection Byproduct-forming Material in the State Water Project
Water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta contains high concentrations of disinfection byproduct-forming (DBP-forming) materials when treated for potable use. DBPs form when dissolved organic compounds (DOC) in water react with disinfectants such as chlorine and ozone during the water-treatment process. The amount of DBPs that form is a function of the amount and source of the DOC, both of which...
High-Speed Mapping of Nutrient Distributions and Water Quality Survey - Lower South San Francisco Bay
This project aims to characterize spatial heterogeneity for key water quality parameters, and pilot the use of underway-flowthrough mapping of biogeochemical properties as a cost-effective approach to monitoring.
Dynamics of zooplankton in the Cache Slough Complex
Our purpose is to investigate what controls the distribution and abundance of fish prey within the Cache Slough Complex (CSC).
Phytoplankton production and nutrient transformations in shallow water wetland habitats
The objectives of this study are to quantify and characterize (1) phytoplankton production on Liberty Island, (2) utilization and transformation of nutrients, and (3) attenuation/loss of phytoplankton as the material is transported from Liberty Iisland into Cache Slough.
Nitrogen Dynamics Along the Sacramento River and Links to Phytoplankton Dynamics: Resolving Spatial and Temporal Variability Using In-Situ, High-Frequency Measurements and Other Tools
The overall project objective is to further our understanding of the link between nitrogen and phytoplankton dynamics in the Sacramento River and to elucidate effects of wastewater treatment plant effluent on food web dynamics.