Images

Left photo shows a loose piece of siliceous sinter that was precipitated around a photosynthetic microbial mat in the Lower Geyser Basin.  The microbial mat died when the outflow channel changed positions.

On the left is Castle Geyser during an eruption with a pool from nearby Tortoise Shell Spring showing photosynthetic pigments at the bottom. The middle image is of a small pool in the Geyser Hill Group in the Upper Geyser Basin with an outflow channel full of yellow, green, orange, red, and brown pigmented phototrophic microbial mats.

Logs and debris removed from Solitary Geyser, near Old Faithful, during remediation work in 2021.  Photo by Jeff Cross.

Simplified geologic maps showing the difference in mapped rock units from the current, large-scale geologic maps dividing Mount Everts and that join along the boundary between Montana and Wyoming.

Map of the Uhl Hill fault in eastern Grand Teton National Park. Base map is a 1-meter lidar hillshade. Black arrows mark the visible fault scarp, and red lines mark locations where scarp profiles were generated from lidar data or field surveying.

A 200-kilogram (440-pound) fragment of the Canyon Diablo meteorite that was found at Meteor Crater in Arizona.

Montana State University students taking samples from borehole B944 near West Thumb, Yellowstone National Park. Credit: Eric Boyd, Montana State University, 2021.

Screenshot of the December 8, 2021 Yellowstone volcano monitoring map. Seismometers, GPS, and earthquakes are the displayed icons, which can be filtered in the right menu.

Regional map of southeastern Idaho showing the relative location of Yellowstone National Park and the Stanley earthquake aftershocks. Yellowstone National Park (outlined in yellow) is at least 275 km away from the 2020 M_w6.5 Stanley earthquake. Several active faults (in red) are located between the Stanley earthquake and Yellowstone Caldera.

Cumulative number of aftershocks greater than magnitude 2.5 following the March 30, 2020, magnitude-6.5 Stanley earthquake in central Idaho. The black line shows the observed aftershocks, the red line shows the predicted number of aftershocks. Aftershocks are a normal and expected phenomenon following strong tectonic earthquakes.

Comparison of (a) 1904 Historical map with (b) 1988 USGS map. Colloidal Pool is a large, labeled pool roughly located on a straight line between Hurricane vent and Whirligig Geyser on the 1988 map (b); this same transect on the 1904 map (a) shows no feature at that location (white circle).

Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images of the Colloidal Pool colloids (images are a combination of backscatter and secondary electrons). The colloids are a mixture of clay particles, hydrated silica, alunite, and diatoms.

A branching root cast from grasses that grew on the ashy lahars deposited along the ancestral Missouri River system. Plant roots growing in calcareous soils made holes that were filled with calcite after the organics rotted away.  Photo by Rob Thomas, August 2021.

Microscope thin-section photo of Lava Creek Tuff “unit 2.” Photo by Ray Salazar (Montana State University) on October 28, 2021.

A view of White Mountain -- a deposit of the Heart Mountain detachment -- from the Sunlight Basin Road in Wyoming. Much of the evidence supporting the lamprophyre diatreme triggering mechanism theory for the landslide was gathered at White Mountain.

Example initial analyses on the water temperature data. (a, c) Graphs showing the calculated time between eruptions. (b, d) Histograms demonstrating the distribution of eruption intervals.

Research Vessel Annie and Remotely Operated Vehicle Yogi.  a) R/V Annie on Yellowstone Lake operated by the Global Foundation for Ocean Exploration.  Image Rob Harris, OSU.  b) ROV Yogi with GFOE President Dave Lovalvo.  Image Todd Gregory, GFOE.  C) ROV Yogi and 1-m heat flow probe.  This pr

Different views of an eruption from two predictable geysers. (a, c) Graphs showing water temperatures recorded by data loggers stationed near Beehive and Old Faithful Geysers, respectively. These data loggers were deployed by the Yellowstone Geology Program, configured to capture temperatures at one-minute intervals (indicated by blue dots).

Yellowstone Lake bathymetry showing the location of the Deep Hole vent field.  Inset shows locations of heat-flux measurements (red dots) in the Deep Hole vent field.

Screen shot of the USGS Earth Explorer web tool showing an example of the geographic area and date range search criteria for Yellowstone.

USGS Earth Explorer screen shot showing example of selecting the Data Sets to search.