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Full-Text Articles in Environmental Sciences

Human And Hydrologic Influences On Nebraska's Endangered Rainwater Basin Wetlands, Sarah Thompson Dec 2022

Human And Hydrologic Influences On Nebraska's Endangered Rainwater Basin Wetlands, Sarah Thompson

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Over half of wetlands in North America have been lost or degraded. Rainwater Basin (RWB) wetlands, located in south-central Nebraska, are a primary example of such loss; an estimated 90% have been destroyed by land conversion for agriculture. Remaining RWB wetlands are often embedded in row-crop fields, where they are threatened by altered surface water runoff flow, drainage features, and excess sediment inputs. Efforts at the state and federal level have been made to preserve this wetland complex due to the critical stopover habitat these wetlands provide for migratory birds. Land managers work to maintain sufficient water levels during migratory …


Comparing Past And Future Drought And Surplus Periods In The Colorado River Basin, Rama Bedri Nov 2022

Comparing Past And Future Drought And Surplus Periods In The Colorado River Basin, Rama Bedri

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

The Colorado River Basin is crucial to the Western United States, providing water for seven states and Mexico. Historical and future periods of drought and surplus are analyzed in 17 Colorado River stations. Unimpaired streamflow data are evaluated from the U.S. Geological Survey, Bureau of Reclamation, and Coupled Modeled Intercomparison Projection 5 from 1950-2099. Future projections are based on eight climate scenarios. Four climate models (HadGEM2-ES, CNRM-CM5, CanESM2, MI-ROC5) are observed at Representative Concentration Pathways (RCP) 4.5 and 8.5 emission scenarios. Furthermore, the ensemble water year means of the four models are analyzed. The durations of drought or surplus, magnitudes, …


Using Sentinel-2 Imagery And Machine Learning Algorithms To Assess The Inundation Status Of Nebraska Conservation Easements During 2018–2021, Ligang Zhang, University Of Nebraska-Lincoln, Zhenghong Tang Sep 2022

Using Sentinel-2 Imagery And Machine Learning Algorithms To Assess The Inundation Status Of Nebraska Conservation Easements During 2018–2021, Ligang Zhang, University Of Nebraska-Lincoln, Zhenghong Tang

School of Natural Resources: Faculty Publications

Conservation easements (CEs) play an important role in the provision of ecological services. This paper aims to use the open-access Sentinel-2 satellites to advance existing conservation management capacity to a new level of near-real-time monitoring and assessment for the conservation easements in Nebraska. This research uses machine learning and Google Earth Engine to classify inundation status using Sentinel-2 imagery during 2018–2021 for all CE sites in Nebraska, USA. The proposed machine learning approach helps monitor the CE sites at the landscape scale in an efficient and low-cost manner. The results confirmed effective inundation performance in these floodplain or wetland-related CE …


Water Sourcing Strategies Of Desert Vegetation In Varying Soil Textures With Vegetation Competition: A Stable Isotope Analysis, Martha Elizabeth Gardea Aug 2022

Water Sourcing Strategies Of Desert Vegetation In Varying Soil Textures With Vegetation Competition: A Stable Isotope Analysis, Martha Elizabeth Gardea

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Recent studies have suggested an ecohydrological separation of water exists in the northern Chihuahuan Desert, where vegetation types, rainfall regimes, and location in the terrain seem to determine the type of water (e.g. isotopically depleted or enriched in 18O and 2H) plants are able to source and use throughout their growing cycle. That work found evidence of creosote (Larrea tridentata) and mesquite (Prosopis glandulosa) using tightly bound soil water at both a site on an ephemeral channel and a site in higher elevated flat area because the isotopic signature of plant water at the beginning of the study did not …


Sewer System Infrastructure And Stressors On Water Quality In Streams Within The Alplaus Watershed In Upstate Ny, Camryn Ragland Jun 2022

Sewer System Infrastructure And Stressors On Water Quality In Streams Within The Alplaus Watershed In Upstate Ny, Camryn Ragland

Honors Theses

Healthy aquatic ecosystems require clean water, but many creeks and streams may be impaired by human activity. This study is focused on surface water quality of the Alplaus, and Indian Kill streams located within the Alplaus Watershed in Schenectady and Saratoga Counties (NY). The primary goal of this study is to understand the extent of water quality impairment within the Alplaus and Indian Kill using a range of indicators to understand the impacts of failing infrastructure and stressors to surface water. Sixty-five water samples were collected in the fall of 2021 from six locations in the Alplaus and Indian Kill …


Safe Water For All: A Multi-Modal Approach To North Alabama's Water Resources, Elijah Walker Apr 2022

Safe Water For All: A Multi-Modal Approach To North Alabama's Water Resources, Elijah Walker

Theses

Environmental degradation is a destructive force produced by the human disturbance of pollution. It is a phenomenon that gradually evolves landscapes over time resulting in irreversible outcomes. Environmental degradation physically affects spaces’ resources, objects, and inhabiting humans. This study observes the impacts of pollution beyond physical boundaries and how it affects human identity/sense of place through the utilization of geographic information systems. Specifically, it examines cultural identity developed through human experiences and connections to landscapes containing water resources. Following, pollution contaminates water resources disrupting experiences and connections thus causing the cultural identity to disappear. The case study applied to this …


A Citizen-Science Approach For Urban Flood Risk Analysis Using Data Science And Machine Learning, Candace Agonafir Jan 2022

A Citizen-Science Approach For Urban Flood Risk Analysis Using Data Science And Machine Learning, Candace Agonafir

Dissertations and Theses

Street flooding is problematic in urban areas, where impervious surfaces, such as concrete, brick, and asphalt prevail, impeding the infiltration of water into the ground. During rain events, water ponds and rise to levels that cause considerable economic damage and physical harm. The main goal of this dissertation is to develop novel approaches toward the comprehension of urban flood risk using data science techniques on crowd-sourced data. This is accomplished by developing a series of data-driven models to identify flood factors of significance and localized areas of flood vulnerability in New York City (NYC). First, the infrastructural (catch basin clogs, …


Has Winter Weather In Southwest Ohio Been Affected By The El Niño Southern Oscillation, The North Atlantic Oscillation, The Pacific Decadal Oscillation, And The Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation?, John A. Blue Jan 2022

Has Winter Weather In Southwest Ohio Been Affected By The El Niño Southern Oscillation, The North Atlantic Oscillation, The Pacific Decadal Oscillation, And The Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation?, John A. Blue

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Winter temperature and precipitation in Southwest Ohio over the last century were examined for anomalies attributable to teleconnections with large-scale atmospheric perturbations caused by the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO), the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), and the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). The record of temperature gives evidence of a teleconnection with the NAO, ENSO, and PDO, with the strongest link being for phases of the NAO. Most winters during positive NAO phases had mean monthly temperature warmer than the century long mean, and the majority of negative NAO phase winters had colder temperatures. The difference …