Geology Commons^™

Land Systems, Soils And Vegetation Of The Southern Goldfields And Great Western Woodlands Of Western Australia - Volume 2, Peter-Jon A. Waddell, Paul Galloway

Technical Bulletins

This technical bulletin defines and maps the land resources of the southern Goldfields region of Western Australia (WA). The southern Goldfields region, as featured in this bulletin, covers 151,753 km². The western and eastern borders are variable because they align with various cadastral boundaries. The western survey border, which in part follows the WA State Barrier Fence, demarcates cleared agricultural land from the intact, western extent of the Great Western Woodlands. The eastern border abuts the westernmost Nullarbor pastoral lease boundaries, except for the north-easternmost and south-easternmost edges which continue into Crown land. Major towns are Coolgardie, Kalgoorlie …

Hydrogeologic Field Trip Of Northeast Nebraska, Sue Olafsen Lackey, Kathleen Cameron, Matt Marxsen

Conservation and Survey Division: Faculty and Staff Publications

No abstract provided.

2023 Nebraska Water Leaders Academy, Mark E. Burbach, Robert Matthew Joeckel

Conservation and Survey Division: Faculty and Staff Publications

Eighteen participants completed the 2023 Water Leaders Academy bringing the total number of graduates to 186 since the inception of the program in 2011. Assessments of participants’ transformational leadership skills, champion of innovation skills, water knowledge, engagement with water issues, civic capacity, entrepreneurial leadership behaviors, boundary spanning skills, and curiosity increased significantly over the course of the year, according to both the participants and their raters. Feedback from the participants was highly positive and constructive. Academy planners are addressing participant concerns. Results of the program assessment indicate that the curriculum is meeting the Academy’s objectives. Therefore, only minor changes are …

Telescopic Megafans On The High Plains, Usa Were Signal Buffers In A Major Source-To-Sink System, Jesse T. Korus Dr., Robert Matthew Joeckel

Conservation and Survey Division: Faculty and Staff Publications

No abstract provided.

3d Hydrostratigraphic And Hydraulic Conductivity Modeling Using Supervised Machine Learning, T. A. Tilahun, Jesse T. Korus Dr.

Conservation and Survey Division: Faculty and Staff Publications

No abstract provided.

Nebraska's Water, Nawaraj Shrestha, Ann Briggs, Aaron R. Young, Robert Matthew Joeckel

Conservation and Survey Division: Faculty and Staff Publications

No abstract provided.

Conservation And Survey Division 2023 Annual Report, R. M. Joeckel, M. M. Waszgis

Conservation and Survey Division: Faculty and Staff Publications

No abstract provided.

Historical Channel Evolution And Human Modifications Of Blue River Near Kansas City Missouri, Katie Ann Grong

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

Channel form can respond to changes in flood regime and sediment load caused by land use and climate disturbances. In the eastern United States, widespread soil and vegetation disturbances in the 1800s during agricultural expansion increased runoff rates, flood magnitude and frequency, and sediment loads often causing major changes in channel activity and floodplain sedimentation in local streams. Investigating the historical evolution of a stream channel system including its floodplains can help to advance geomorphological theory and benefit environmental managers. This study documents human impacts on historical changes in channel and floodplain widths since the early to middle 1800s in …

The Uncertain Future Of Landscapes Subjected To Mountaintop Removal Mining, Samuel James Bower

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Increased erosion following human land disturbance is a global issue for ecosystem health and land management. Mountaintop removal (MTR) mining – a type of surface mining predominately found in the Central Appalachian Coalfields region – is one of the most significant examples of human perturbation to a natural landscape. A post-MTR landscape, when compared to its natural state, has significantly different erosive potential due to the rearrangement of topography from mining and reclamation practices. Removal of vegetation and alterations to soil further influence erosion by raising the effective erodibility of substrate subjected to MTR. We quantify the changes in erosion …

Bedrock Channel Geometry: Meter To Micron Scale Controls On Fluvial Incision, Nicholas J. Colaianne

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The relative resistance of various rock types to incisional processes vary widely and the properties governing bedrock erodibility are poorly understood. Lithologic properties influencing erodibility are the culmination of a rock’s depositional, diagenetic, and exhumation processes. Difficulty identifying a convenient physical proxy for erodibility suggests examining evidence of these processes holistically may offer insight into the role of each in setting a rock’s resistance to incisional forces. In this study we use measured channel geometries along a short stretch of the Dry Fork, WV hosting three distinct lithologic settings to infer relative erodibility against measured and observed fluvial, lithologic, and …

Cenozoic Extension Of The Lake Tanganyika Rift, East Africa: Structures, Tectonostratigraphy And Paleoenvironmental Reconstruction, Shaidu Shaban

Dissertations - ALL

Active continental rifts are ideal sites for understanding the break-up of continents, and long-lived rift lake environments are known as important reservoirs for endemic communities and biodiversity. The sedimentary fill of extensional continental rifts within the East Africa Rift System (EARS) records a long history of continental extension and variable tropical climate that is unparalleled in its duration and fidelity. Continental extensional basins are sensitive to variations caused by the interplay between tectonics, sedimentary processes, and climate change. However, to discern the sedimentary fill history and its related tectonostratigraphy, as well as for reconstructing past climate changes, high-fidelity data such …

Geology, Soils And Climate Of Western Australia's Wine Regions, Peter J. Tille, Angela Stuart-Street, Peter S. Gardiner

Bulletins 4000 -

This bulletin details what is special and unique about the geology, soil and climate of the south-west of Western Australia (WA), an area that encompasses the state’s 9 wine regions.

We have arranged the information into 2 parts:

• In Part 1, we broadly describe the special geological, soil and climate features of the south-west of WA to provide context for the wine regions.

• In Part 2, we describe the geology, soil and climate of the regions and subregions of the Geographical Indications (GI) scheme (administered by Wine Australia) for WA.

Through this work we have found that the wine regions …

Inverting Passive Margin Stratigraphy For Marine Sediment Transport Dynamics Over Geologic Time, Charles Shobe, Jean Braun, Xiaoping Yuan, Benjamin Campforts, Boris Gailleton, Guillaume Baby, François Guillocheau, Cécile Robin

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

Passive margin stratigraphy contains time-integrated records of landscapes that have long since vanished. Quantitatively reading the stratigraphic record using coupled landscape evolution and stratigraphic forward models (SFMs) is a promising approach to extracting information about landscape history. However, there is no consensus about the optimal form of simple SFMs because there has been a lack of direct tests against observed stratigraphy in well-constrained test cases. Specifically, the extent to which SFM behaviour over geologic space and timescales should be governed by local (downslope sediment flux depends only on local slope) versus nonlocal (sediment flux depends on factors other than local …

Preliminary Geochemical And Mineralogical Assessment Of The Beach Sand, Vieques, Puerto Rico, Nazrul I. Khandaker

Publications and Research

PRELIMINARY GEOCHEMICAL AND MINERALOGICAL ASSESSMENT OF THE BEACH SAND, VIEQUES, PUERTO RICO

ROBBINS, Kathy H., KHANDAKER, Nazrul, SINGH, Andrew, and MUNRO, Toralv, Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs, Vol 54, No. 5, https://doi.org/10.1130/abs/2022AM-379886

ROBBINS, Kathy H., Bronx Early College Academy for Teaching and Learning, 250E 164 STREET, Bronx, NY 10456, KHANDAKER, Nazrul, Geology Discipline, York College of CUNY, 9420 Guy R Brewer Blvd, AC-2F09, Jamaica, NY 11451-0001, SINGH, Andrew, Earth and Physical Sciences, York College of CUNY, 9420 Guy R Brewer Blvd, AC-2F09, Jamaica, NY 11451-0001 and MUNRO, Toralv, 10911 164th St Apt 1, Jamaica, NY 11433-2921 …

Geochemical Analysis Of Recent Volcanic Ash Blanketing Barbados And Constraints On Magma Composition (V32e-0112), Nazrul I. Khandaker, Krishna Mahabir, Surendranauth Mahabir, Lloyd Kiefer, Juan C. Campo, Andrew M. Singh

Publications and Research

Preliminary field and geochemical investigations were conducted on ash samples from Barbados to chemically characterize and decipher magma chemistry associated with a recent volcanic event. A thick plume of volcanic ash from the La Soufriere Volcano in St Vincent, which erupted on April 9, 2021, caused lower visibility due to ash clouds which engulfed the region for some time. Three authors from the research team visited Barbados during the summer subsequent and completed a reconnaissance investigation on recent ashfall. St Vincent is a small volcanic island in the Eastern Caribbean and lies in the southern part of the Lesser Antilles …

Integrating Remote Digital Tools Into Post-Pandemic Geologic Fieldwork To Effectively Disseminate Content Delivery And Assist In Overall Understanding Of Various Geologic Phenomena: Summer 2022 Field Mapping Exercises, Nazrul I. Khandaker

Publications and Research

INTEGRATING REMOTE DIGITAL TOOLS INTO POST-PANDEMIC GEOLOGIC FIELDWORK TO EFFECTIVELY DISSEMINATE CONTENT DELIVERY AND ASSIST IN OVERALL UNDERSTANDING OF VARIOUS GEOLOGIC PHENOMENA: SUMMER 2022 FIELD MAPPING EXERCISES

SHAMI, Malek, BETHEL, Cherise, NUNEZ, Eddy, RAYHAN, Salam, KHANDAKER, Nazrul and CABAROY, Charren C.

Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs. Vol 54, No. 5, https://doi.org/10.1130/abs/2022AM-379779

SHAMI, Malek¹, BETHEL, Cherise², NUNEZ, Eddy³, RAYHAN, Salam³, KHANDAKER, Nazrul² and CABAROY, Charren C.¹, (1)Geology Discipline, AC-2F09, York College of CUNY, 9420 Guy R. Brewer Blvd., Jamaica, NY 11451, (2)Geology Discipline, York College of CUNY, …

Assessing Student Performance And Interest From The Start Of The Covid-19 Pandemic To Present Using Engagement, Attendance, And Grades As Indicators, Nazrul I. Khandaker

Publications and Research

ASSESSING STUDENT PERFORMANCE AND INTEREST FROM THE START OF THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC TO PRESENT USING ENGAGEMENT, ATTENDANCE, AND GRADES AS INDICATORS

SINGH, Andrew, KHANDAKER, Nazrul, ZARINE, Ali, ROBBINS, Kathy H., JACKSON, Shirley and AHMED, Masud,

Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs. Vol 54, No. 5, https://doi.org/10.1130/abs/2022AM-379409

SINGH, Andrew¹, KHANDAKER, Nazrul², ZARINE, Ali³, ROBBINS, Kathy H.⁴, JACKSON, Shirley³ and AHMED, Masud⁵, (1)Earth and Physical Sciences, York College of CUNY, 9420 Guy R Brewer Blvd, AC-2F09, Jamaica, NY 11451-0001, (2)Geology Discipline, York College of CUNY, 9420 Guy R Brewer …

Soils Of The Central Nebraska Loess Hills And Central Loess Plains, Judith Turk, Rebecca Young, Nicolas A. Jelinsky, Amber D. Anderson, Ashlee Dere, Colby J. Moorberg, Rachel K. Owen

Conservation and Survey Division: Faculty and Staff Publications

Understanding soil systems that characterize a region is critical to natural resource management. However, the knowledge gained through intensive study of local soil systems, which takes place annually as part of collegiate soil judging contests, is often poorly preserved for future use. In this study, field descriptions and laboratory data for 16 soil profiles described for the 2019 Region 5 Soil Judging Contest were used to characterize the soil system of the Central Nebraska Loess Hills and Central Loess Plains. Three landscape components of this soil system were analyzed: the loess uplands and rainwater basins, the transitional zone, and bottomlands. …

The Art Of Landslides: How Stochastic Mass Wasting Shapes Topography And Influences Landscape Dynamics, Benjamin Campforts, Charles Shobe, Irina Overeem, Gregory Tucker

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

Bedrock landslides shape topography and mobilize large volumes of sediment. Yet, interactions between landslide-produced sediment and fluvial systems that together govern large-scale landscape evolution are not well understood. To explain morphological patterns observed in steep, landslide-prone terrain, we explicitly model stochastic landsliding and associated sediment dynamics. The model accounts for several common landscape features such as slope frequency distributions, which include values in excess of regional stability limits, quasi-planar hillslopes decorated with straight, closely spaced channel-like features, and accumulation of sediment in valley networks rather than on hillslopes. Stochastic landsliding strongly affects the magnitude and timing of sediment supply to …

Coastal Geomorphic Response To Sea-Level Rise, Storms, And Antecedent Geology: Examples From The Northern Gulf Of Mexico, Clayton Dike

Dissertations

Sea-level rise and tropical cyclone activity are threatening coastlines around the world. Past geologic coastal responses can be used to inform future scenarios. This three-part study examines the response of coastal systems to sea-level rise, storms, sediment supply, and antecedent geology over the past ~ 140 ka.

The first study is of the Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, coastal system along the northern Gulf of Mexico incorporating sediment supply, subsidence, and antecedent topography paired with an examination of geologic response to sea-level fall and rise. I used core and geophysical data that resolve incised valleys and other subsurface deposits from ~ …

Sulfuric Acid Speleogenesis And Surface Landform Evolution Along The Vienna Basin Transfer Fault: Plavecký Karst, Slovakia, Pavel Bella, Helena Hercman, Šimon Kdýr, Petr Mikysek, Petr Pruner, Juraj Littva, Jozef Minár, Michal Gradzinski, Wojciech Wróblewski, Marek Velšmid, Pavel Bosak

International Journal of Speleology

Hypogene caves in the Plavecký hradný vrch Hill (Western Slovakia, Central Europe) were formed by waters ascending along faults in fractured Triassic carbonates related to the horst-graben structure at the contact of the Malé Karpaty Mountains and the NE part of the Vienna Basin. The Plavecká jaskyňa and Pec caves mostly contain horizontal passages and chambers with flat corrosion bedrock floors, fissure discharge feeders, wall water-table notches, replacement pockets, as well as a few other speleogens associated with sulfuric acid speleogenesis. The low-temperature sulfuric acid development phases of the Plavecká Jaskyňa are also indicated by the presence of sulfate minerals …

Sedimentary Characteristics And Associated Carbon And Nutrients Of Overbank Sediments Deposited During The 2018, 2019, And 2020 Floods In Embanked Floodplains Along The Lower Mississippi River Near Natchez, Mississippi, Rachel Kelk

Master's Theses

The Lower Mississippi River (LMR) experienced major floods in 2018, 2019, and 2020. Sediment deposition in the embanked floodplains during floods represent important storage and sequestration opportunities for carbon and nutrients from ~40% of the continental USA. This research aims to compare depositional thicknesses, organic matter (OM), carbon (C), nitrogen (N), phosphorous (P) concentrations, and grain sizes in floodplain sediments deposited by the combined 2018-19 floods to the 2020 flood along the LMR near Natchez, Mississippi. Greater depositional thicknesses in 2018-19 are best explained by their combined flood durations; the 2019 flood was the longest in recorded history. Slightly higher …

Fossils On The Floor Mosaics In The Rotunda Of The Nebraska State Capitol Second Edition, Robert F. Diffendal Jr.

Robert F. Diffendal, Jr., Publications

The idea for this project arose during a field trip to the Nebraska State Capitol led by my long-time friend and colleague, Joe Hannibal, of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, during the Geological Society of America’s North-Central Section Meeting in Lincoln, Nebraska, on Saturday, April 26, 2014. One of Joe’s interests is historical buildings and their building stones. He put together a very useful guidebook to the building and its decorative stones (Hannibal, 2014) that we used on our tour.

One of the many places that we visited was the State Capitol Archives, located in the basement, where the …

Echoed Sites And The Unknowable Object, Joseph Canizales

MFA in Visual Art

This thesis will discuss the expanded field of sculpture, simulacra, digital technology, and two terms I’ve devised: the unknowable object, and echoed sites. Within these two terms, I’m concerned with the complicated relationship between humans and geology and how we extract material from the ground without reflecting on the geologic history of the site. In echoed sites I create sculptures with and without a geologic site or object, by way of digital technology. These forms display two states paradoxically in balance, where what’s presented leaves more questions than answers. Thus, as part of echoed sites, exists the unknowable object. …

Quantitative Analysis Of The Maximum Rate And Minimum Duration For A 200 Km Stepwise Retreat Of The Bindschadler Ice Stream At ~11.5 Cal Kyr Bp, Matthew E Kratochvil

LSU Master's Theses

Small-scale morainal ridges on the middle continental shelf of the Whales Deep Basin partly record the rapid opening of a 200-km grounding line embayment slightly after ~11.5 cal kyr BP. The overlapping pattern of backstepped moraines indicates that the grounding line oscillated back and forth during the retreat. Published sediment fluxes were combined with new sediment volume mapping of the moraines to infer the rates at which the grounding line retreated. The analyses indicate that the rates of grounding line retreat on the eastern flank of the embayment ranged from ~490 m a^-1 to 1,300 m a^-1. …

Thickness Of Fluvial Deposits Records Climate Oscillations, Xiaoping Yuan, Laure Guerit, Jean Braun, Delphine Rouby, Charles Shobe

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

Fluvial deposits offer Earth’s best-preserved geomorphic record of past climate change over geological timescales. However, quantitatively extracting this information remains challenging in part due to the complexity of erosion, sediment transport and deposition processes and how each of them responds to climate. Furthermore, sedimentary basins have the potential to temporarily store sediments, and rivers subsequently rework those sediments. This may introduce time lags into sedimentary signals and obscure any direct correlation with climate forcing. Here, using a numerical model that combines all three processes—and a new analytical solution—we show that the thickness of fluvial deposits at the outlet of a …

A Tectonic Geomorphic Study Of Neotectonics And Seismic Hazard Of The Fold And Thrust Belt Complex Of Bengal Basin, Eastern Himalayan Range, Niroj Shrestha

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Tectonic activity continues to shape and create challenges for human populations in tectonically active areas. The Bengal Basin is one of the most important sedimentary basins of the Eastern Himalayan Range, aiding in one of the densely populated regions of the world. The basin is part of the tectonically active Himalayan Orogen that is undergoing oblique subduction between the Eurasian Plate and the Indian Plate. As a result of this subduction-related convergence, the eastern part of the Basin, particularly the Chittagong-Tripura Fold Belt (CTFB) and western part of the Indo-Burman Range (IBR) has structurally deformed into a series of mostly …

Improving Asteroid Remote Sensing By Examining Past Martian Methods, James Dean King

Theses

Deep Space Remote Sensing is an ever-evolving field. The very first missions into deep space were explorations that utilized trial and error, as humanity faced a new frontier of unknowns. Over these 70 years of deep space exploration, much attention has been given to our three nearest celestial neighbors: the Moon, Venus, and Mars. Mars, in particular, has been the target of much observation and study due to it being a target for future colonization. Meanwhile, the areas beyond Mars have had comparatively less focus. Asteroids and objects beyond Mars offer many new horizons for humanity to study. By using …

New Hampshire Continental Shelf Geospatial Database: Surficial Geology Maps And Sediment Grain Size Data, Larry G. Ward, Zachary S. Mcavoy, Rachel C. Morrison

Data Catalog

The “New Hampshire Continental Shelf Geospatial Database: Surficial Geology Maps and Sediment Grain Size Data” consists of high-resolution surficial geology maps of the continental shelf off New Hampshire to Jeffreys Ledge in the Western Guff of Maine (WGOM) and supporting sediment grain size information. The surficial geology maps cover ~3,250 km² (Figure 1). The maps depict three different classifications based on the Coastal and Marine Ecological Classification Standards (CMECS; FGDC, 2012): Geoforms (major morphologic or physiographic features; Figure 2; Table 1), Geologic Substrate Subclass (Figure 3; Table 2), and Geologic Substrate Group (Figure 4; Table 2). The maps are …

Nebraska Statewide Groundwater-Level Monitoring Report 2021, Aaron R. Young, Mark E. Burbach, Leslie M. Howard, Sue Olafsen Lackey, Robert Matthew Joeckel

Conservation and Survey Division: Faculty and Staff Publications

This report is a synthesis of groundwater-level monitoring programs in Nebraska. It is a continuation of the series of annual reports and maps produced by the Conservation and Survey Division (CSD) of the University of Nebraska in cooperation with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) since the 1950s. Groundwater-level monitoring began in Nebraska in 1930 in an effort to survey the state’s groundwater resources and to observe changes in its availability on a continuing basis. The CSD and USGS cooperatively developed, maintained, and operated an observation-well network throughout the state. These two agencies were responsible for collecting and archiving this information, …