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Publications

Scientific reports, journal articles, and information products produced by USGS Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center scientists.

Filter Total Items: 1420

Accurate bathymetric maps from underwater digital imagery without ground control Accurate bathymetric maps from underwater digital imagery without ground control

Structure-from-Motion (SfM) photogrammetry can be used with digital underwater photographs to generate high-resolution bathymetry and orthomosaics with millimeter-to-centimeter scale resolution at relatively low cost. Although these products are useful for assessing species diversity and health, they have additional utility for quantifying benthic community structure, such as coral...
Authors
Gerry A. Hatcher, Jonathan A. Warrick, Andrew C. Ritchie, Evan T. Dailey, David G. Zawada, Christine J. Kranenburg, Kimberly K. Yates

Changes in sediment source areas to the Amerasia Basin, Arctic Ocean, over the past 5.5 million years based on radiogenic isotopes (Sr, Nd, Pb) of detritus from ferromanganese crusts Changes in sediment source areas to the Amerasia Basin, Arctic Ocean, over the past 5.5 million years based on radiogenic isotopes (Sr, Nd, Pb) of detritus from ferromanganese crusts

Ferromanganese (FeMn) crusts provide a useful paleoenvironmental archive for studying the poorly understood climatic, oceanographic, and geologic evolution of the Arctic Ocean. This study is based on the identification and temporal reconstruction of sources and inferred transport pathways of terrigenous material in FeMn crusts collected from several sites across the Amerasia Basin...
Authors
Natalia Konstantinova, James R. Hein, Kira Mizell, Georgy Cherkashov, Brian Dreyer, Deborah Hutchinson

The predictive skills of elastic Coulomb rate-and-state aftershock forecasts during the 2019 Ridgecrest, California, earthquake sequence The predictive skills of elastic Coulomb rate-and-state aftershock forecasts during the 2019 Ridgecrest, California, earthquake sequence

Operational earthquake forecasting protocols commonly use statistical models for their recognized ease of implementation and robustness in describing the short-term spatiotemporal patterns of triggered seismicity. However, recent advances on physics-based aftershock forecasting reveal comparable performance to the standard statistical counterparts with significantly improved predictive...
Authors
Simone Mancini, Margarita Segou, Maximillian J Werner, Thomas E. Parsons

Submarine landslide kinematics derived from high-resolution imaging in Port Valdez, Alaska Submarine landslide kinematics derived from high-resolution imaging in Port Valdez, Alaska

Submarine landslides caused by strong ground shaking during the M9.2 1964 Great Alaska earthquake generated a tsunami that destroyed much of the old town of Valdez, Alaska, and was responsible for 32 deaths at that location. We explore structural details of the 1964 landslide deposit, as well as landslide deposits from earlier events, in order to characterize kinematics of the landslide...
Authors
Emily Roland, Peter J. Haeussler, Thomas E. Parsons, Patrick E. Hart

Impacts of hydrothermal plume processes on oceanic metal cycles and transport Impacts of hydrothermal plume processes on oceanic metal cycles and transport

Chemical, physical and biological processes in hydrothermal plumes control the flux of elements from hydrothermal vents to the global oceans. The timescales of these processes range from less than a second, as the hydrothermal fluid mixes with seawater at the seafloor, to decades, as the plume disperses over thousands of kilometers. Integrating hydrothermal geochemistry throughout the...
Authors
Amy Gartman, Alyssa J. Findlay

Sediment transport in a restored, river-influenced Pacific Northwest estuary Sediment transport in a restored, river-influenced Pacific Northwest estuary

Predicting the success of future investments in coastal and estuarine ecosystem restorations is limited by scarce data quantifying sediment budgets and transport processes of prior restorations. This study provides detailed analyses of the hydrodynamics and sediment fluxes of a recently restored U.S. Pacific Northwest estuary, a 61 ha former agricultural area near the mouth of the...
Authors
Daniel J. Nowacki, Eric E. Grossman

Observations of coastal change and numerical modeling of sediment-transport pathways at the mouth of the Columbia River and its adjacent littoral cell Observations of coastal change and numerical modeling of sediment-transport pathways at the mouth of the Columbia River and its adjacent littoral cell

Bathymetric and topographic surveys performed annually along the coastlines of northern Oregon and southwestern Washington documented changes in beach and nearshore morphology between 2014 and 2019. Volume change analysis revealed measurable localized erosion and deposition throughout the study area, but significant net erosion at the regional scale (several kilometers [km]) was limited...
Authors
Andrew W. Stevens, Edwin Elias, Stuart Pearson, George M. Kaminsky, Peter R Ruggiero, Heather M. Weiner, Guy R. Gelfenbaum

Impacts of sea-level rise on the tidal reach of California coastal rivers using the Coastal Storm Modeling System (CoSMoS) Impacts of sea-level rise on the tidal reach of California coastal rivers using the Coastal Storm Modeling System (CoSMoS)

In coastal rivers, the interactions between tides and fluvial discharge affect local ecology, sedimentation, river dynamics, river mouth configuration, and the flooding potential in adjacent wetlands and low-lying areas. With sea-level rise, the tidal reach within coastal rivers can expand upstream, impacting river dynamics and increasing flood risk across a much greater area. Rivers...
Authors
Andrea C. O'Neill, Li H. Erikson, Patrick L. Barnard

Sediments and the sea floor of the continental shelves and coastal waters of the United States—About the usSEABED integrated sea-floor-characterization database, built with the dbSEABED processing system Sediments and the sea floor of the continental shelves and coastal waters of the United States—About the usSEABED integrated sea-floor-characterization database, built with the dbSEABED processing system

Since the second half of the 20th century, there has been an increase in scientific interest, research effort, and information gathered on the geologic sedimentary character of the continental margins of the United States. Data and information from thousands of sources have increased our scientific understanding of the character of the margin surface, but rarely have those data been...
Authors
Brian J. Buczkowski, Jane A. Reid, Chris J. Jenkins

Hydro-morphological characterization of coral reefs for wave runup prediction Hydro-morphological characterization of coral reefs for wave runup prediction

Many coral reef-lined coasts are low-lying with elevations 30,000) dataset of measured coral reef topobathymetric cross-shore profiles, statistics, machine learning, and numerical modeling to develop a set of representative cluster profiles (RCPs) that can be used to accurately represent the shoreline hydrodynamics of a large variety of coral reef-lined coasts around the globe. In two...
Authors
Fred Scott, Jose A.A. Antolinez, Robert T. McCall, Curt D. Storlazzi, Ad Reiners, Stuart Pearson

Submarine canyons, slope failures and mass transport processes in southern Cascadia Submarine canyons, slope failures and mass transport processes in southern Cascadia

The marine turbidite record along the southern Cascadia Subduction Zone has been used to interpret paleoseismicity and suggest a shorter recurrence interval for large (>M7) earthquakes along this portion of the margin; however, the sources and pathways of these turbidity flows are poorly constrained. We examine the spatial distribution of sediment storage, downslope transport, and slope...
Authors
Jenna C. Hill, Janet Watt, Daniel S. Brothers, Jared W. Kluesner
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