Publications

Caulks Creek is a small stream that flows through the city of Wildwood in western St. Louis County, Missouri. The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the city of Wildwood, has documented historical and recent geomorphic change along Caulks Creek, simulated the hydrologic and hydraulic response of Caulks Creek to a variety of design storm scenarios, and simulated bank retreat...

Lead Belt, an area of major lead mining from the 1860s until 1972 where more than 8.5 million tons of lead were mined. After active mining ceased, the effects of mining activities persisted in the Big River system because of large mine waste pile erosion, and floodplain sediment and streambank contamination along several tributaries and the main stem of the Big River. Lead-contaminated...

The environmental ubiquity of tire and road wear particles (TRWP) underscores the need to understand the occurrence, persistence, and environmental effects of tire-related chemicals in aquatic ecosystems. One such chemical is 6PPD-quinone (6PPD-Q), a transformation product of the tire antioxidant 6PPD. In urban stormwater runoff 6PPD-Q can exceed acute toxicity thresholds for several...

Des Moines Water Works (DMWW) is a regional municipal water utility that provides residential and commercial water resources to about 600,000 customers in Des Moines, Iowa, and surrounding municipalities in central Iowa. DMWW has identified a need for increased water supply and is exploring the potential for expanding groundwater production capabilities in the Des Moines River alluvial...

Forecasts of flows entering and leaving the Chain of Lakes on the Fox River in northeastern Illinois are critical information to water-resource managers operating the Stratton Dam at McHenry, Illinois. These managers determine the optimal operation of the Stratton Dam at McHenry, Ill., to manage Chain of Lakes pool levels and to help mitigate flooding in the Chain of Lakes system. In...

This report characterizes changes in peak streamflow in Illinois and the relation of these changes to climatic variability, and provides a foundation for future studies that can address nonstationarity in peak-flow frequency analysis in Illinois. Records of annual peak and daily streamflow at streamgages and gridded monthly climatic data (observed and modeled) were examined across four...

Invasive grass carp (Ctenopharyngodon idella) are currently reproducing in several tributaries to Lake Erie and threatening the Great Lakes ecosystem and fisheries. Grass carp are pelagic river spawners whose fertilized eggs drift downstream from the spawning site, developing as they drift. Variability in spawning time and location together with nonuniform velocities in natural rivers...

The concentration of chlorophyll a in phytoplankton and periphyton represents the amount of algal biomass. We compiled an 18-year record (2005–2022) of pigment data from water bodies across the United States (US) to support efforts to develop process-based, machine learning, and remote sensing models for prediction of harmful algal blooms (HABs). To our knowledge, this dataset of nearly...

In machine learning or scientific computing, model performance is measured with an objective function. But why choose one objective over another? According to the information-theoretic paradigm, the “best” objective function is whichever minimizes information loss. To evaluate different objectives, transform them into likelihoods. The ratios of these likelihoods represent how strongly we...

The Space to Grow program helps transform aging and neglected schoolyards of Chicago Public Schools into outdoor community spaces with the goal of promoting health and learning while addressing neighborhood flooding issues. Virgil I. Grissom Elementary School and Donald L. Morrill Math and Science School were selected in 2014 for schoolyard upgrades and the installation of various green

This report describes the development of a CE-QUAL-W2 river hydrodynamics and temperature model of a 21-mile reach of the Illinois River including a 3-mile reach of a major tributary, the Fox River. Model outputs consist of streamflow, water velocity, water-surface elevation, and water-temperature time series that can be used to simulate summer conditions in years with and without...

The Special Contributing Area Loading Program (SCALP) is a hydrologic routing program that simulates reservoir routing through a linear-reservoir-in-series method. The Java version of SCALP was developed to replicate and replace the functionality of an older version of the program written in Fortran. SCALP models flow through three reservoirs in series using an input runoff depth time...