Publications

Demand for food and water are increasing while the extent of arable land and accessible fresh water are decreasing. This poses global challenges as economies continue to develop and the population grows. With agriculture as the leading consumer of water, better understanding how water is used to produce food may help support the increase of Crop Water Productivity (CWP; kg/m3), the ratio...

Despite advances in toxicity testing and development of new approach methodologies (NAMs) for hazard assessment, the ecological risk assessment (ERA) framework for terrestrial wildlife (i.e., air-breathing amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals) has remained unchanged for decades. While survival, growth, and reproductive endpoints derived from whole animal toxicity tests are central to...

Context Engaging stakeholders in research is needed for many of the sustainability challenges that landscape ecologists address. Involving stakeholders’ perspectives through narratives in participatory modeling fosters better understanding of the problem and evaluation of the acceptability of tradeoffs and creates buy-in for management actions. However, stakeholder-driven inputs often...

A variety of geophysical hazards (e.g., volcanic activity, earthquakes, mass movements, marine storms, bolides) and anthropogenic sources (e.g., chemical and nuclear explosions, mining blasts, rocket launches) can release energy as mechanical waves in the ground, ocean, and atmosphere (Arrowsmith et al., 2010; Campus and Christie, 2009). Due to the mechanical coupling between a planetary...

The Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge (RFNWR) in Colorado is home to increasingly rare, xeric tallgrass prairie. The RFNWR is also located near many combustion and agricultural sources of inorganic reactive nitrogen (Nr), which emit Nr to the atmosphere. Wet atmospheric deposition of Nr was monitored at RFNWR during 2017–19 by the U.S. Geological Survey in cooperation with the U.S...

Using a geology-based assessment methodology, the U.S. Geological Survey estimated a mean of 5.2 trillion cubic feet of coalbed gas in the Vermejo Formation and Raton Formation of the Raton Basin-Sierra Grande Uplift Province.

Despite growing support for ecosystem-based approaches, conservation is mostly implemented at the species level. However, genetic differentiation exists within this taxonomic level, putting genetically distinct populations at risk of local extinction. In the diablotin black-capped petrel Pterodroma hasitata, an endangered gadfly petrel endemic to the Caribbean, 2 phenotypes have been...

Wildfire events are becoming more frequent and severe on a global scale. Rising temperatures, prolonged drought, and the presence of pyrophytic invasive grasses are contributing to the degradation of native vegetation communities. Within the Great Basin region of the western U.S., increasing wildfire frequency is transforming the ecosystem toward a higher degree of homogeneity, one...

Sea urchin population demographics can respond to changes in keystone species abundances, with the magnitude of these responses varying depending on environmental influences. In this study, sea urchin populations were surveyed across 15 Aleutian archipelago islands over a 30-year period to understand how patterns of sea urchin demography (density, biomass, and size structure) varied...

The 2020–2023 southwestern Puerto Rico seismic sequence, still ongoing in 2023, is remarkable for its multiple‐fault rupture complexity and elevated aftershock productivity. We applied an automatic workflow to continuous data from 43 seismic stations in Puerto Rico to build an enhanced earthquake catalog with ∼180,000 events for the 3+ yr sequence from 28 December 2019 to 1 January 2023...

Faults are important controls on hydrothermal circulation worldwide. More specifically, structural discontinuities, i.e. locations where faults interact and intersect, host many hydrothermal systems. In the Great Basin, western USA, an extensive characterization effort demonstrated that hydrothermal systems are controlled by one (or more) of eight types of structural discontinuities...

A primary focus of the Colorado Plateau Native Plant Program (CPNPP) is to identify and develop appropriate native plant materials (NPMs) for current and future restoration projects. Multiple efforts have characterized the myriad challenges inherent in providing appropriate seed resources to enable effective, widespread restoration and have identified a broad suite of research activities...