Earth Sciences Commons^™

Teaching Big History, Richard B. Simon, Mojgan Behmand, Thomas Burke, Esther Quaedackers, Seohyung Kim, Kiowa Bower, Neal Wolfe, James B. Cunningham, Cynthia Taylor, Martin Anderson, J. Daniel May, Philip Novak, Debbie Daunt, Jaime Castner, Ethan Annis, Amy E. Gilbert, Anne Reid, Suzanne Roybal, Alan Schut, Cynthia Brown, Harlan Stelmach

Harlan Stelmach

Retrieval Of Aerosol Microphysical Properties From Aeronet Photopolarimetric Measurements: 1. Information Content Analysis, Xiaoguang Xu, Jun Wang

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Faculty Publications

This paper is the first part of a two-part study that aims to retrieve aerosol particle size distribution (PSD) and refractive index from the multispectral and multiangular polarimetric measurements taken by the new-generation Sun photometer as part of the Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET). It provides theoretical analysis and guidance to the companion study in which we have developed an inversion algorithm for retrieving 22 aerosol microphysical parameters associated with a bimodal PSD function from real AERONET measurements. Our theoretical analysis starts with generating the synthetic measurements at four spectral bands (440, 675, 870, and 1020 nm) with a Unified Linearized …

Ua1c11/55 Gordon Wilson Photo Collection, Wku Archives

WKU Archives Collection Inventories

Photographs taken by and of Gordon Wilson.

U.S. Drought Monitor, December 30, 2014, Brad Rippey

United States Agricultural Commodities in Drought Archive

Drought map of U.S. for December 30, 2014 (12/30/14) plus: U.S. crop areas experiencing drought (map), Approximate percentage of crop located in drought, by state (bar graph), Percent of crop area located in drought, past 52 weeks (line graph) for: Corn, Soybeans, Hay, Cattle, Winter wheat.

Force Chains As The Link Between Particle And Bulk Friction Angles In Granular Material, Adam M. Booth, Ryan Hurley, Michael P. Lamb, José E. Andrade

Geology Faculty Publications and Presentations

From sediment transport in rivers to landslides, predictions of granular motion rely on a Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion parameterized by a friction angle. Measured friction angles are generally large for single grains, smaller for large numbers of grains, and no theory exists for intermediate numbers of grains. We propose that a continuum of friction angles exists between single-grain and bulk friction angles due to grain-to-grain force chains. Physical experiments, probabilistic modeling, and discrete element modeling demonstrate that friction angles decrease by up to 15° as the number of potentially mobile grains increases from 1 to ~20. Decreased stability occurs as longer …

Discrete Energies Of A Weakly Outcoupled Atom Laser Beam Outside The Bose–Einstein Condensate Region, Teguh Budi Prayitno

Makara Journal of Science

We consider the possibility of a discrete set of energies of a weakly outcoupled atom laser beam to the homogeneous Schrödinger equation with anisotropic harmonic trap in Cartesian coordinates outside the Bose–Einstein condensate region. This treatment is used because working in the cylindrical coordinates is not really possible, even though we implement the cigar-shaped trap case. The Schrödinger equation appears to replace a set of two-coupled Gross– Pitaevskii equations by enabling the weak-coupling assumption. This atom laser can be produced in a simple way that only involves extracting the atoms in a condensate from by using the radio frequency field. …

Ontogenetic Scaling Patterns And Functional Anatomy Of The Pelvic Limb Musculature In Emus (Dromaius Novaehollandiae), Luis P. Lamas, Russell P. Main, John R. Hutchinson

Department of Basic Medical Sciences Faculty Publications

Emus (Dromaius novaehollandiae) are exclusively terrestrial, bipedal and cursorial ratites with some similar biomechanical characteristics to humans. Their growth rates are impressive, as their body mass increases eighty-fold from hatching to adulthood whilst maintaining the same mode of locomotion throughout life. These ontogenetic characteristics stimulate biomechanical questions about the strategies that allow emus to cope with their rapid growth and locomotion, which can be partly addressed via scaling (allometric) analysis of morphology. In this study we have collected pelvic limb anatomical data (muscle architecture, tendon length, tendon mass and bone lengths) and calculated muscle physiological cross sectional area …

Reply To Simon And Reed: Independent And Converging Results Rule Out Historic Disturbance And Confirm Age Constraints For Barrier Canyon Rock Art, Joel L. Pederson, Harriet Cornachione, Steven R. Simms, Reza Sohbati, Tammy M. Rittenour, Andrew S. Murray, Gary Cox

Geosciences Faculty Publications

We welcome this further discussion of our results on the age of the Great Gallery rock art in the Canyonlands of Utah. The comment by Simon and Reed (1) focuses on just one of the three components of our study (2), which is presented in greater technical detail in ref. 3 and is surely our best-constrained and least-surprising result: the dating of a rock-fall that removed some of the art and thus provides a minimum age. Simon and Reed (1) point out that the Great Gallery panel is not pristine and relate the sordid human history of visitation and possible …

Teaching Threshold 6: The Rise Of Homo Sapiens, Richard Simon, Mojgan Behmand, Thomas Burke, Esther Quaedackers, Seohyung Kim, Kiowa Bower, Neal Wolfe, James Cunningham, Cynthia Taylor, Martin Anderson, J. May, Philip Novak, Debbie Daunt, Jaime Castner, Ethan Annis, Amy Gilbert, Anne Reid, Suzanne Roybal, Alan Schut, Cynthia Brown, Harlan Stelmach

Cynthia Taylor

Teaching Big History, Richard B. Simon, Mojgan Behmand, Thomas Burke, Esther Quaedackers, Seohyung Kim, Kiowa Bower, Neal Wolfe, James B. Cunningham, Cynthia Taylor, Martin Anderson, J. Daniel May, Philip Novak, Debbie Daunt, Jaime Castner, Ethan Annis, Amy E. Gilbert, Anne Reid, Suzanne Roybal, Alan Schut, Cynthia Brown, Harlan Stelmach

Mojgan Behmand

Teaching Big History Or Teaching About Big History? Big History And Religion, Harlan Stelmach

Harlan Stelmach

Groundwater Lowering And Stream Incision Rates In The Central Appalachian Mountains Of West Virginia, Usa, Gregory S. Springer, Holly A. Poston, Ben Hardt, Harold D. Rowe

International Journal of Speleology

Surface channel incision rates are of broad geomorphological interest because they set the boundary conditions for landscape change by affecting changes in local relief and hillslope angles. We report groundwater table lowering rates associated with subsurface Buckeye Creek and the surface channel of Spring Creek in southeastern West Virginia, USA. The mountainous watersheds have drainage areas of 14 km² and 171 km², respectively. The lowering rates are derived from U/Th-dating of stalagmites and the paleomagnetostratigraphy of clastic sediments in Buckeye Creek Cave. The oldest stalagmites have a minimum age of 0.54 Ma and we use a minimum …

Registration Of ‘Newell’ Smooth Bromegrass, K P. Vogel, R B. Mitchell, B L. Waldron, M R. Haferkamp, J D. Berdahl, D D. Baltensperger, Galen Erickson, T J. Klopfenstein

Green Canyon Environmental Research Area, Logan Utah

No abstract provided.

Us Coast And Geodetic Survey Aerial Photos From 1927, 1928, 1932, 1935, 1952 And 1954 Covering South Florida, Peter Harlem

Sea Level Rise Collection

Summary of the Dr. Harold R. Wanless collection of film copies and scanning project.

The Garnet Line In Oxford County, Maine Pegmatites., Myles Mathew Felch, Myles M. Felch

University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The garnet line is a planar fabric occuring within the intermediate and core zone in many of the Oxford County, Maine pegmatites. This study focuses primarily on the textural and chemical characteristics of the garnet line within the Mt. Mica and western Mt. Apatite quarries. Smaller, but similarly textured garnet line analogs from the Bennett, Emmons, Havey and Tamminen quarries are also investigated. All of these textures represent specific fractionation events within their respective dikes. In some of these locations, multiple stages of crystallization occur and appear to be post-magmatic, related to late stage metasomatism. These late stage fluids are …

Soil Carbon And Nitrogen Mineralization And Crop Parameters In Typical Maize-Bean Intercropping In Western Kenya, Judith A. Odhiambo, Urszula Norton, Emmanuel C. Omondi, Dennis Ashilenje, Jay B. Norton

Agricultural and Environmental Sciences Faculty Research

Smallholder farmers in western Kenya who plant maize (Zea mays L.) intercropped with beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) face many challenges associated with nutrient-poor soils and weather-related crop failures. In regions where temperatures are favorable, crops are grown twice per year during long and short rainy seasons and in other regions, once per year during one long growing season. Growing crops two times per year necessitates frequent land preparation using inversion-type tillage. Little is known about the impact of current tillage-intensive crop management on annual soil organic matter (SOM) recovery. The aim of this study was to assess changes to soil …

U.S. Drought Monitor, December 16, 2014, David Miskus

United States Agricultural Commodities in Drought Archive

Drought map of U.S. for December 16, 2014 (12/16/14) plus: U.S. crop areas experiencing drought (map), Approximate percentage of crop located in drought, by state (bar graph), Percent of crop area located in drought, past 52 weeks (line graph) for: Corn, Soybeans, Hay, Cattle, Winter wheat.

Mapping Thunder Sources By Inverting Acoustic And Electromagnetic Observations, J. F. Anderson, J. B. Johnson, R. O. Arechiga, R. J. Thomas

Geosciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

We present a new method of locating current flow in lightning strikes by inversion of thunder recordings constrained by Lightning Mapping Array observations. First, radio frequency (RF) pulses are connected to reconstruct conductive channels created by leaders. Then, acoustic signals that would be produced by current flow through each channel are forward modeled. The recorded thunder is considered to consist of a weighted superposition of these acoustic signals. We calculate the posterior distribution of acoustic source energy for each channel with a Markov Chain Monte Carlo inversion that fits power envelopes of modeled and recorded thunder; these results show which …

Modeling Mussel Mortality: Investigating The Importance Of Swash And The Potential Implications Of Changing Wave Environments, Shadow Leigh Gulledge

Theses and Dissertations

Rising sea level and increases in temperature are causing biogeographic shifts in intertidal zones and can also lead to shifts in the local vertical zonation of organisms due to changes in body temperature during aerial exposure during low tide. Swash is an important determinant of aerial body temperatures, and vulnerability of intertidal zones to changes in climate could potentially depend on how much and how often animals are cooled by waves. While wave heights (and thus swash) are generally expected to increase with climate change, anthropogenic physical structures, such as breakwaters and wave energy converters, can decrease wave height and …

Remote Sensing Satellite Image Acquisition Planning: Framework, Methods And Application, Shufan Liu

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation explores the theories and methods of satellite remote sensing image acquisition planning within a spatial temporal context. For many time sensitive applications, such as disaster emergency response, timely acquisition of critical information is the key to intelligent and effective decision making. Remote sensing plays an important role in information collection for these time sensitive applications. Imagery collected from hundreds of remote sensing satellite sensors offer accurate, frequent and almost instantaneous data covering the Earth in a relatively short time. However, determining which satellite sensors can provide an appropriated kind of imageries during a restricted collection window for the …

The Geologic Implications Of The Factors That Affected Relative Sea-Level Positions In South Carolina During The Pleistocene And The Associated Preserved High-Stand Deposits, William Richardson Doar Iii

Theses and Dissertations

This work utilizes the current understanding of South Carolina geology to provide a stratigraphic review of the late-Pliocene and Pleistocene marine deposits. Almost two centuries of recorded geological study includes geomorphic and stratigraphic units that were described, proposed, revised, abandoned, and revived. Along with the history of the age assignments, changes in geological time scales, and the changes in the understanding of geological concepts, this review is necessary because two concurrent and conflicting stratigraphies exist for late-Pliocene and Pleistocene marine sediments that record multiple sea-level transgressions that were more often destructive than constructive. The result, when tested against existing geological …

Climate-Induced Changes In The Germination Phenology Of Boechera Stricta, Samuel Johnson

Theses and Dissertations

Climate change is having demonstrable, worldwide impacts on ecological systems in ways that have modified aspects of organism behavior. Plant phenologies have responded to warmer temperatures in a variety of ways that may have implications for long-term species survival. How germination phenology changes in response to warmer climate is a largely unexplored question yet the ability of a plant to advance or delay germination in unfavorable conditions is critical for survival. Knowing the relative success and timing of germination under different climate regimes is important in understanding whether species can keep pace with the rate of climate change via migration …

Temporal Constraints On Holocene Initiation And Termination Of Mound Development At An Episodic Gas Hydrate And Cold Seep System, Woolsey Mound, Northern Gulf Of Mexico, Nathan Robinson

Theses and Dissertations

Woolsey Mound is a thermogenic gas hydrate and cold seep system in the deepwater (900m) Gulf of Mexico. A set of sub-bottom seismic profiles acquired at MC-118 Woolsey Mound provide decimeter-scale vertical resolution of the upper ~50m of the subsurface throughout the lease block. Integration of these data with radiocarbon, lithostratigraphic, and biostratigraphic data from shallow gravity cores provides the basis for detailed interpretation of the mound evolution within the last 12,000 years. Uniform sedimentation during the Last Glacial Maximum and following changes in sediment distribution over MC-118 suggests modern mound activity did not begin until at least ~12ka. Development …

Zinc And Copper Isotopic Fractionation During Planetary Differentiation, Heng Chen

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Zinc and copper are two important transition metal elements that are widely involved in every stage of planetary formation and differentiation. Their isotopic ratios are robust tracers used to understand the origin of the Solar System, planetary formation and differentiation processes. In this thesis, I focus on their isotopic behaviors during magmatic processes. I report the Zn isotopic compositions of representative igneous rocks to determine potential isotopic fractionations associated with magmatic processes, and to estimate the bulk silicate Earth value. I report isotopic compositions of various groups of iron meteorites (samples of which represent the core of asteroids) and discuss …

The Late Ordovician Biogeochemical Carbon Cycle, John Garrecht Metzger

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The isotopic composition of the carbonate carbon (δ13Ccarb) is one of the best tools for understanding the biogeochemical carbon cycle through Earth history. δ13Ccarb is also used to chemostratigraphically correlate coeval strata. This dissertation has three main foci that all utilize δ13Ccarb as the common data type. The geologic interval investigated was the Late Ordovician (458-444 Ma) with emphasis on the Guttenberg δ13C excursion, a globally correlated, positive ~3 / event that is ~400 kyr in duration. In the first topic we evaluate post-depositional alteration (i.e., diagenesis) of δ13Ccarb signals. In the second topic, we make reconstructions of sea level …

Kirkland D.W., 2014 - Role Of Hydrogen Sulfide In The Formation Of Cave And Karst Phenomena In The Guadalupe Mountains And Western Delaware Basin, New Mexico And Texas, Leslie A. Melim

International Journal of Speleology

No abstract provided.

The Geology And Petrology Of Enigmatic Rhyolites At Graveyard And Gordon Buttes, Mount Hood Quadrangle, Oregon, Elizabeth G. Westby

Dissertations and Theses

Rhyolite lava flows are found at two dome complexes at Graveyard Butte and Gordon Butte, Mount Hood Quadrangle, Oregon. At Graveyard Butte, the White River has cut a winding canyon 150 m deep, exposing at its base, a 40-meter-thick outcrop of flow-banded rhyolite (73 wt.% SiO₂, 3.67±0.01 Ma) that laterally extends along the canyon wall for about 1 km. Stratigraphically above the flow-banded rhyolite is locally-erupted iron-rich andesites (lava flows, agglutinate and other pyroclastic rocks as well as clastic debris), a rhyolitic ash-flow tuff (74 wt.% SiO₂), and the 2.77±0.36 Ma tholeiitic basalt lava flows of …

Applications Of Remote Sensing To The Study Of Estuarine Physics: Suspended Sediment Dynamics In The Columbia River Estuary, Austin Scott Hudson

Dissertations and Theses

Estuarine circulation and its associated transport processes drive the environmental integrity of many near-shore habitats (the coastal ocean, rivers, estuaries and emergent wetlands). A thorough understanding and consideration of this circulation is, therefore, vital in the proper management of these habitats. The aim of this study is to bring together theory and new satellite observations in the Columbia River Estuary to increase our understanding of estuarine circulation and transport. Surface reflectance measurements gathered by the Moderate Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) are first compared to in situ observations to develop an empirical model for remotely derived surface turbidity. Results indicate that MODIS …

Analyst A: Alternatives In Analysis Of The Utexas1 Surface Wave Dataset, Paul Michaels

Paul Michaels

In February of 2011 an earthquake event caused significant damage and loss of life in Christchurch, New Zealand. Such an event serves as motivation for improved foundation design and characterization of the shallow subsurface. In January of 2013, University of Texas engineers acquired surface wave data which has been made available to the ASCE GeoInstitute Geophysical Engineering Committee for a benchmark project. Participants were invited to process and interpret the common data set. This paper reports the results designated as those of "Analyst A". The active vibroseis and sledgehammer data were combined to produce a composite Rayleigh wave dispersion curve. …

The Effects Of Dissolution On The Silicon And Oxygen Isotope Compositions Of Silica Phytoliths, Andrea Prentice

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The δ³⁰Si and δ¹⁸O values of silica phytoliths have applications for reconstructing paleoenvironmental conditions. This study examines the effect of partial dissolution and burning of phytoliths on their isotopic compositions, dissolution behaviour, and physical characteristics (specific surface area, mean particle size, and visual appearance) and discusses problems with the use of phytolith δ¹⁸O and δ³⁰Si values that have been modified in soils in paleoclimate reconstruction. Dissolution experiments were conducted in batch reactors under a range of pH (4-10) and temperature (4-44˚C) conditions. The δ¹⁸O and δ³⁰Si values of …