Publications

Seismograms recorded during iceberg calving contain information pertaining to source processes during calving events. However, locally variable material properties may cause signal distortions, known as site and path effects, which must be eliminated prior to commenting on source mechanics. We applied the technique of horizontal/vertical spectral ratios to passive seismic data collected...

Ice loss to the sea currently accounts for virtually all of the sea-level rise that is not attributable to ocean warming, and about 60% of the ice loss is from glaciers and ice caps rather than from the two ice sheets. The contribution of these smaller glaciers has accelerated over the past decade, in part due to marked thinning and retreat of marine-terminating glaciers associated with...

Although detrital zircon has proven to be a powerful tool for determining provenance, past work has focused primarily on delimiting regional source terranes. Here we explore the limits of spatial resolution and stratigraphic sensitivity of detrital zircon in ascertaining provenance, and we demonstrate its ability to detect source changes for terranes separated by only a few tens of...

Counting towers provide an accurate, low-cost, low-maintenance, low-technology, and easily mobilized escapement estimation program compared to other methods (e.g., weirs, hydroacoustics, mark-recapture, and aerial surveys) (Thompson 1962; Siebel 1967; Cousens et al. 1982; Symons and Waldichuk 1984; Anderson 2000; Alaska Department of Fish and Game 2003). Counting tower data has been...

The team creeps silently across a well-tended lawn, eyes drawn to a small wooden box perched several meters up a lone birch tree. The first biologist is armed with a broom in one hand and a bug net in the other. Her partner wields a lunchbox-sized plastic case and a tree-climbing ladder that looks like an oversized radio antenna. A neighbor peers out her window from across the street to...

Harvests of Yukon and Kuskokwim Chinook salmon declined significantly during 1998- 2002 in response to fewer returning salmon. Factors affecting the decline in Chinook salmon abundance are largely unknown. Growth of salmon in freshwater and the ocean is generally thought to influence salmon survival, therefore we examined historical Chinook salmon catch trends and developed growth...

A key requirement for implementing ecosystem-based management is to obtain timely information on significant fluctuations in the ecosystem (Botsford et al. 1997). However, obtaining all necessary information about physical and biological changes at appropriate temporal and spatial scales is a daunting task. Intuitively, one might assume that physical data are more important for the...

Transtensional deformation was concentrated in a zone adjacent to the Tintina strike-slip fault system in Alaska during the early Tertiary. The deformation occurred along the Victoria Creek fault, the trace of the Tintina system that connects it with the Kaltag fault; together the Tintina and Kaltag fault systems girdle Alaska from east to west. Over an area of ???25 by 70 km between the...

Along the central Beaufort Sea, Pacific Common Eiders (Somateria mollissima v-nigra) nest on unvegetated, barrier islands; often near nesting Glaucous Gulls (Larus hyperboreus). Nest-site choice likely reflects a strategy of predator avoidance: nesting on islands to avoid mammalian predators and near territorial gulls to avoid other avian predators. We observed a nesting colony of Common...

Oil stranded by the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill has persisted in subsurface sediments of exposed shores for 16 years. With annualized loss rates declining from ∼68% yr-1 prior to 1992 to ∼4% yr-1 after 2001, weathering processes are retarded in both sediments and residual emulsified oil (“oil mousse”), and retention of toxic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons is prolonged. The n-alkanes...

In wild birds implanted intracoelomically with radio transmitters, a synthetic fabric collar placed around the base of a percutaneous antenna is believed to function as a barrier to contamination of the coelom. We examined 13 fabric collars recovered from percutaneous antennas of radio transmitters implanted intracoelomically in harlequin ducks (Histrionicus histrionicus) 12 months...

Three-dimensional ground-penetrating radar (3D GPR) was used to investigate the subsurface structure of ice-wedge polygons and other features of the frozen active layer and near-surface permafrost near Barrow, Alaska. Surveys were conducted at three sites located on landscapes of different geomorphic age. At each site, sediment cores were collected and characterised to aid interpretation...