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The USGS provides unbiased, objective, and impartial scientific information upon which our audiences, including resource managers, planners, and other entities, rely.
Browse more than 65,000 articles authored by our scientists over the past 100+ year history of the USGS and refine search by topic, location, year, and advanced search.
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The generational gap: Children, adults, and protective actions in response to earthquakes The generational gap: Children, adults, and protective actions in response to earthquakes
In addition to academic curricula, schools offer regular drills to train young people and adult staff on what to do in an emergency or disaster. Earthquake drills in the United States currently recommend the protective action “drop, cover, and hold on” in the event of shaking. Yet, little is known about whether this guidance is followed in schools and homes by children and adults. To...
Authors
Rachel M. Adams, Jennifer Tobin, Lori Peek, Jolie Breeden, Sara K. McBride, Robert Michael deGroot
Linking evolutionary potential to extinction risk: Applications and future directions Linking evolutionary potential to extinction risk: Applications and future directions
Extinction-risk assessments play a major role in prioritizing conservation action at national and international levels. However, quantifying extinction risk is challenging, especially when including the full suite of adaptive responses to environmental change. In particular, evolutionary potential (EP), the capacity to evolve genetically based changes that increase fitness under changing
Authors
Brenna R. Forester, Erik A. Beever, Catherine Darst, Jennifer Szymanski, W. Chris Funk
New generation hyperspectral sensors DESIS and PRISMA provide improved agricultural crop classifications New generation hyperspectral sensors DESIS and PRISMA provide improved agricultural crop classifications
Using new remote sensing technology to study agricultural crops will support advances in food and water security. The recently launched, new generation spaceborne hyperspectral sensors, German DLR Earth Sensing Imaging Spectrometer (DESIS) and Italian PRecursore IperSpettrale della Missione Applicativa (PRISMA), provide unprecedented data in hundreds of narrow spectral bands for the...
Authors
Itiya P. Aneece, Prasad Thenkabail
Warming-driven erosion and sediment transport in cold regions Warming-driven erosion and sediment transport in cold regions
Rapid atmospheric warming since the mid-twentieth century has increased temperature-dependent erosion and sediment-transport processes in cold environments, affecting food, energy and water security. In this Review, we summarize landscape changes in cold environments and provide a global inventory of increases in erosion and sediment yield driven by cryosphere degradation. Anthropogenic...
Authors
Tinghu Zhang, Dongfeng Li, Amy E. East, Desmond E. Walling, Stuart N. Lane, Irina Overeem, Achim A. Beylich, Michele N Koppes, Xixi Lu
Perspectives on challenges and opportunities at the restoration-policy interface in the U.S.A. Perspectives on challenges and opportunities at the restoration-policy interface in the U.S.A.
As we advance into the United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, understanding the relationship between science, management, and policy is increasingly important given the paucity of research evaluating the ability of existing policy to address contemporary environmental challenges. Despite their inherent interdependence, restoration ecology as a scientific discipline, ecological...
Authors
Ella M. Samuel, Rachel M. Mitchell, Daniel E. Winkler
Identifying mechanisms underlying individual body size increases in a changing, highly seasonal environment: The growing trout of West Brook Identifying mechanisms underlying individual body size increases in a changing, highly seasonal environment: The growing trout of West Brook
As air temperature increases, it has been suggested that smaller individual body size may be a general response to climate warming. However, for ectotherms inhabiting cold, highly seasonal environments, warming temperatures may increase the scope for growth and result in larger body size.In a long-term study of individual brook trout Salvelinus fontinalis and brown trout Salmo trutta...
Authors
Benjamin Letcher, Keith Nislow, Matthew J. O'Donnell, Andrew R. Whiteley, Jason Coombs, Todd L. Dubreuil, Daniel Turek
Occurrence of a reproducing wild population of Channa aurolineata (Pisces: Channidae) in the Manatee River drainage, Florida Occurrence of a reproducing wild population of Channa aurolineata (Pisces: Channidae) in the Manatee River drainage, Florida
We report on the discovery of a wild, reproducing population of Channa aurolineata (Pisces: Channidae) in west-central Florida (USA), and first documented occurrence of snakeheads in the Gulf Coast region. Channa aurolineata is a large, predatory fish of the bullseye snakehead “Marulius group” species complex from Asia. Adult and juvenile specimens were captured in June 2020 in a 1.8...
Authors
Leo Nico, Matthew Neilson, Robert H. Robins, John M. Pfeiffer, Matthew Kail, Zachary S. Randall, Eric A. Johnson
Gaining decision-maker confidence through community consensus: Developing environmental DNA standards for data display on the USGS Nonindigenous Aquatic Species database Gaining decision-maker confidence through community consensus: Developing environmental DNA standards for data display on the USGS Nonindigenous Aquatic Species database
To advance national efforts for the detection and biosurveillance of aquatic invasive species (AIS), we employed a community consensus process to enable the incorporation of environmental DNA (eDNA) detection data into the U.S. Geological Survey’s (USGS) Nonindigenous Aquatic Species (NAS) database (https://nas.er.usgs.gov/eDNA/). Our goal was to identify minimum standards and best...
Authors
Jason Ferrante, Wesley M. Daniel, Jonathan Adam Freedman, Katy E. Klymus, Matthew Neilson, Yale Passamaneck, Christopher B. Rees, Adam J. Sepulveda, Margaret Hunter
A statistical framework for modelling migration corridors A statistical framework for modelling migration corridors
1. Management of animal populations requires spatially explicit knowledge of movement corridors, such as those used during seasonal migrations. GPS tracking data allows for mapping of corridors from directly observed movements, providing important insights, but tracking data is absent for many populations. 2. We developed a novel statistical corridor modeling approach that predicts...
Authors
Tristan A. Nuñez, Mark A. Hurley, Tabitha A. Graves, Anna C. Ortega, Hall Sawyer, Julien Fattebert, Jerod A. Merkle, Matthew J. Kauffman
Seasonal movements and spatial overlap of juvenile and adult lake sturgeon in Lake Champlain Seasonal movements and spatial overlap of juvenile and adult lake sturgeon in Lake Champlain
The lake sturgeon Acipenser fulvescens is a large, long-lived, potamodromous species that is widely distributed throughout freshwater systems in the central part of North America. In this study, we used acoustic telemetry to examine seasonal distribution and movement patterns of endangered Lake Sturgeon in Lake Champlain, Vermont. Acoustic tags were implanted in 29 juvenile Lake Sturgeon...
Authors
Lisa K. Izzo, Gayle Barbin Zydlewski, J. Ellen Marsden, Donna L. Parrish
Viewing animal migration through a social lens Viewing animal migration through a social lens
Evidence of social learning is growing across the animal kingdom. Researchers have long hypothesized that social interactions play a key role in many animal migrations, but strong empirical support is scarce except in a few unique systems and species. Here, we aim to catalyze advances in the study of social migrations by synthesizing research across disciplines and providing a framework...
Authors
Ellen O. Aikens, Iris D. Bontekoe, Lara Blumenstiel, Anna Schlicksupp, Andrea Flack
Mismatch between temperature and discharge disrupts spawning cues in a fluvial specialist, blue sucker Cycleptus elongatus Mismatch between temperature and discharge disrupts spawning cues in a fluvial specialist, blue sucker Cycleptus elongatus
Seasonal movements cued by environmental variables are a critical component of riverine fish life history. Life-history events for species such as blue sucker Cycleptus elongatus are likely cued by discharge and temperature and may be disrupted if those life-history events and environmental regimes are mismatched. However, this effect may be dependent upon the habitat occupied when...
Authors
Matthew Ross Acre, Timothy B. Grabowski, Daniel J. Leavitt, Nathan G. Smith, Allison A. Pease, Preston T. Bean, Dakus Geeslin