Publications

Iron (Fe) is a growth-limiting micronutrient for phytoplankton in major areas of oceans and deposited wind-blown desert dust is a primary Fe source to these regions. Simulated atmospheric processing of four mineral dust proxies and two natural dust samples followed by subsequent growth studies of the marine planktic diatom Cyclotella meneghiniana in artificial sea-water (ASW)...

Introduction Lack of consistent spatial and temporal fire information with relevant spatial resolution hinders land management and broad-scale assessments of fire activity, especially in the eastern United States and the Great Plains where fi re is important ecologically and culturally. Remote sensing can be used to monitor fi re activity, augment existing fi re data, and fill...

Outbursts from impounded water bodies produce large, hazardous, and geomorphically significant floods affecting the Earth as well as other planetary surfaces. Two broad classes of impoundments are: (1) valleys blocked by ice, landslides, constructed dams, and volcanic materials; and (2) closed basins such as tectonic depressions, calderas, meteor craters, and those rimmed by glaciers and...

Accurate maps of the wildland–urban interface (WUI) are critical for the development of effective land management policies, conducting risk assessments, and the mitigation of wildfire risk. Most WUI maps identify areas at risk from wildfire by overlaying coarse-scale housing data with land cover or vegetation data. However, it is unclear how well the current WUI mapping methods capture...

Over the past 2 decades, several global burned area products have been produced and released to the public. However, the accuracy assessment of such products largely depends on the availability of reliable reference data that currently do not exist on a global scale or whose production require a high level of dedication of project resources. The important lack of reference data for the...

The 72‐km‐long Teton fault in northwestern Wyoming is an ideal candidate for reconstructing the lateral extent of surface‐rupturing earthquakes and testing models of normal‐fault segmentation. To explore the history of earthquakes on the northern Teton fault, we hand‐excavated two trenches at the Steamboat Mountain site, where the east‐dipping Teton fault has vertically displaced west...

Soils are naturally occurring bodies that form in the interface between the geosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere, and atmosphere. They are the medium for much of the Earth's plant and animal growth. Soil morphology and how it evolves are functions of the soil-forming factors of climate, organisms, relief, parent material, and time. The expression of soil morphology takes the form of layers...

The origin and nature of eolian (wind-blown) sediments are reviewed, with an emphasis on the occurrence of these features in the Quaternary. Eolian sediments consist of windblown sand, loess, and long-range-transported (LRT) dust, in order of decreasing particle size. Eolian sand forms some of the most dramatic landscapes in the world, particularly when these sediments are deposited as...

Islands come in all shapes, sizes and types, from tiny rocky outcrops, to enormous continental landmasses. The true number of islands distributed in the planet’s seas and oceans is still elusive. Recent efforts bolstered by an abundance of detailed satellite imagery and the sophistication of geographic information systems (GIS) are bringing real answers to those questions closer than...

The effects of anthropogenic climate change are apparent in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE), USA, with forest die-off, insect outbreaks, and wildfires impacting forest ecosystems. A long-term perspective would enable assessment of the historical range of variability in forest ecosystems and better determination of recent forest dynamics and historical thresholds. The objectives...

1. The effects of changing climate and disturbance on mountain forest carbon stocks vary with tree species distributions and over elevational gradients. Warming can increase carbon uptake by stimulating productivity at high elevations but also enhance carbon release by increasing respiration and the frequency, intensity, and size of wildfires. 2. To understand the consequences of climate...

Recently obtained radiocarbon ages from the southern Puget Lowland and reevaluation of limiting ages from the Olympic Peninsula in the light of new light detection and ranging (LiDAR) data suggest that the Juan de Fuca and Puget lobes of the Cordilleran ice sheet reached their maximum extents after 16,000 calibrated yr B.P. Source areas for both lobes fed through a common conduit, likely...