Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology Commons^™

Droughtscape, Summer 2014, Kelly Smith

DroughtScape: Quarterly Newsletter of the National Drought Mitigation Center (2007–2023)

Contents

Director’s report

Outlook

Drought & climate summary

Drought impacts

International drought monitoring and planning

Visiting scholars

North American Drought Monitor Forum

New primary Dust Bowl source

New additions to online webinar archive

Community Capitals Framework Institute

Organic Copper Binding Ligands And Thiol Compounds Produced By Bacteria And In The Elizabeth River, Virginia, Christina Louise Dryden

OES Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation presents work focusing on copper and organic copper binding ligands in laboratory cultures and the Elizabeth River, Virginia. Laboratory cultures of the marine bacterium Vibrio parahaemolyticus were used to demonstrate the influence of elevated copper concentrations on copper-complexing ligand and thiol production. Copper-complexing ligands similar in binding strength to the strongest natural ligands were detected in V. parahaemolyticus cultures (log K′_CuL = 11.8–13.2). A strong correlation (r² = 0.973) was found between total thiol and copper-complexing ligand concentrations at all copper concentrations examined.

A yearlong seasonal study was undertaken in a heavily polluted estuary to ascertain …

A Comprehensive Evaluation Of C25 Highly Branched Isoprenoid Alkenes Of Marine Diatoms As Proxies For Sea Ice Extent In The Arctic Ocean, Tetiana Muniak

OES Theses and Dissertations

Sea Ice extent is one of the major factors regulating carbon cycling and ecosystem function in the modern Arctic Ocean. It is an essential component of climate models and is crucial for the evaluation of various oceanographic processes that influence a particular region. Yet it is also one of the most difficult attributes of the ocean with respect to our ability for its accurate reconstruction from paleo records. The lack of the detailed records prior to satellite information has encouraged the development of new proxy records for the reconstruction of past

sea ice conditions. In recent years, a new monounsaturated …

Implications Of Climate Change For Cyanobacteria Over The Western Florida Shelf In The Gulf Of Mexico, Ivy Mara Ozmon

OES Theses and Dissertations

Concentrations of atmospheric CO₂ are expected to double by year 2100 as a result of anthropogenic activities. Under elevated CO₂ conditions, cyanobacteria may reallocate energy from active accumulation and transport of dissolved inorganic carbon (C) required for photosynthesis to other growth processes. Stimulation of cyanobacterial production on the Western Florida Shelf in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) could lead to improved nutritional status for the toxic, mixotrophic dinoflagellate Karenia brevis that utilizes newly fixed N₂ from co-occurring diazotrophic cyanobacteria and consumes unicellular cyanobacteria via grazing for growth. Culture studies performed by other researchers on the climate induced …

A Multi-Proxy Approach To Understanding Abrupt Climate Change And Laurentide Ice Sheet Melting History Based On Gulf Of Mexico Sediments, Clare Carlisle Williams

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

During the last deglaciation (ca. 24-10 ka thousand years ago (ka)), the North American Laurentide Ice Sheet (LIS) was a major source of meltwater to the Arctic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, and the Gulf of Mexico (GOM), and it is hypothesized that meltwater routing played an important role in regulating Late Quaternary millennial-scale climate variability, via its influence on Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). For example, the meltwater routing hypothesis predicts that a rerouting of meltwater from the GOM to the North Atlantic and/or Arctic Oceans resulted in a decrease of North Atlantic Deep Water (NADW) formation and subsequent cooling …

Hydrostratigraphic Interpretation Of Test-Hole And Borehole Geophysical Data, Kimball, Cheyenne, And Deuel Counties, Nebraska, 2011-12, Christopher M. Hobza, Steven S. Sibray

United States Geological Survey: Water Reports and Publications

Recently (2004) adopted legislation in Nebraska requires a sustainable balance between long-term supplies and uses of surface-water and groundwater and requires Natural Resources Districts to understand the effect of groundwater use on surface-water systems when developing a groundwater-management plan. The South Platte Natural Resources District (SPNRD) is located in the southern Nebraska Panhandle and overlies the nationally important High Plains aquifer. Declines in water levels have been documented, and more stringent regulations have been enacted to ensure the supply of ground-water will be sufficient to meet the needs of future generations. Because an improved understanding of the hydrogeologic characteristics of …

Macroinvertebrates And Excessive Fine Sediment Conditions In Oregon Coastal Streams, Patrick M. Edwards

Dissertations and Theses

The Pacific Coastal ecoregion contains large tracts of economically important forest lands that also serve as critical stream habitat for endangered Salmonids. Excessive fine sediment deposition in streams of this region is a major environmental concern in the region but difficult to measure directly. The use of stream invertebrates to monitor fine sediment conditions in streams requires careful consideration of several important factors that complicate their use as bioindicators including high spatial and temporal variability and covariance with other environmental variables.

To evaluate the use of stream invertebrates as bioindicators of excessive fine sediment, three hypotheses were tested. The first …

Dust And Pleistocene Ice Ages: Eolian Sediments And Climate Change At Ziegler Reservoir, Snowmass Village, Colorado, Jeffrey S. Honke

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The discovery of the Ziegler Reservoir fossil site near Snowmass Village, Colorado presents an opportunity to examine subalpine ecosystem response, during a relatively unknown period, in which climate conditions were similar to present. Finegrained sediments at Ziegler Reservoir represent continuous deposition between ~140–55 ka (thousand years before present), spanning the close of the Bull Lake glacial period [marine isotope stage (MIS) 6], the Sangamon interglacial (MIS 5) and the early stages of the Pinedale (early Wisconsin) glacial period (MIS 4). Ziegler Reservoir is positioned on top of a ridge, at an elevation of 2705 m, and has a small watershed …

Umphlett Qci June 2014, Natalie Umphlett

High Plains Regional Climate Center: Staff Publications

Highlights for the Basin

Temperature and Precipitation Anomalies

􏰞􏰥􏰬􏰨􏰤􏰮􏱨Streamflow

Drought Impacts to Livestock

Continued Cold Hampers Producers in North

3-Month Precipitation and Temperature Outlooks

U.S. Seasonal Drought Outlook

Sex-Biased Gene Flow Among Elk In The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, Brian K. Hand, Shanyuan Chen, Neil Anderson, Albano Beja-Pereira, Paul C. Cross, Michael Ebinger, Hank Edwards, Robert A. Garrott, Marty D. Kardos, Matt Kauffman, Erin L. Landguth, Arthur Middleton, Brandon Scurlock, P.J. White, Pete Zager, Michael K. Schwartz, Gordon Luikart

United States Geological Survey: Staff Publications

We quantified patterns of population genetic structure to help understand gene flow among elk populations across the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. We sequenced 596 base pairs of the mitochondrial control region of 380 elk from eight populations. Analysis revealed high mitochondrial DNA variation within populations, averaging 13.0 haplotypes with high mean gene diversity (0.85). The genetic differentiation among populations for mitochondrial DNA was relatively high (FST = 0.161; P = 0.001) compared to genetic differentiation for nuclear microsatellite data (FST = 0.002; P = 0.332), which suggested relatively low female gene flow among populations. The estimated ratio of male to female …

Water In The 21st Century, Grayson Michael Shor

Social Sciences

The aim of this research project is to provide a comprehensive and global analysis of water use in order to provide the reader with a comprehensive grasp of current and impending issues. The included five (5) chapters discuss water distribution, conservation, purification, law, international development, economic debates, ethical consideration, as well as educated estimations of the effects water related issues may cause in the next one-hundred years.

Late Holocene Dune Development And Shift In Dune-Building Winds Along Southern Lake Michigan, Zoran Kilibarda, Ryan Venturelli, Ronald J. Goble

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Faculty Publications

The youngest dune belt along Lake Michigan’s southern coast evolved through four stages. The first stage began during the Nipissing transgression, ~6.0 ka, and culminated at the Nipissing high, ~4.5 ka. Rising lake levels eroded the lake margins and generated sediment that was transported to southern Lake Michigan, creating the Tolleston barrier beach. The second stage, beginning ~4.5 ka with a rapid lake level fall and continuing to ~3.0 ka, represents a major episode of transgressive parabolic dune field development. Large, simple parabolic dunes, with easterly apices (85–105° azimuth) suggestive of westerly wind formation, developed in a sand belt ~1–2 …

Exploring The Link Between Otolith Growth And Function Along The Biological Continuum In The Context Of Ocean Acidification, Eric D. Wilcox Freeburg

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

Oceans are acidifying as atmospheric CO₂ is drawn down. This process, known as ocean acidification (OA), is well known and documented. Over the next 100 years, pH of the surface ocean is projected to decrease by up to 0.35 units. This CO₂ draw down has a direct effect on dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) balance in the ocean. OA is expected to impact calcifying organisms that rely on constituencies of the DIC system, specifically carbonate ion [CO₃2-]. It is clear that externally calcified structures, such as coral skeletons, bivalve shells, etc., will be significantly affected as pH, …

Water-Use Restriction Information: Information Sharing Between Public Water Systems And State Government Offices, Christopher Carparelli

National Drought Mitigation Center: Faculty Publications

In many states there is an absence of communication between the state and local levels about many aspects of water resource management. This research examines the interaction between the state and local levels regarding water-use restrictions for public water systems (PWSs). This information is useful for state-level drought planning and mitigation through the assessment of drought impacts on public water supplies. Officials from five state-level entities that collect and disseminate local water-use restriction information were interviewed over the phone for this research. Each official was asked eleven questions about how and why their state collects and disseminates PWS water-use restriction …

Modern To Late Pleistocene Stable Isotope Climatology Of Alaska, Alison Sloat

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Understanding modern controls on climate is necessary to interpret past climatic conditions. This project investigated the modern controls on δ18O and δD values in Alaskan surface waters to interpret the controls on Late Pleistocene climate variability. ArcGIS was used to develop an isoscape of modern δ18O and δD values of over 400 surface water samples collected across Alaska and the Yukon. It was found that winter temperature and precipitation have the greatest controls on δ18O and δD values in Alaska, resulting in high δ18O values along the coast of the Gulf of Alaska and low values inland toward Central Alaska. …

Body Size And Species Richness Changes In Glyptosaurinae (Squamata: Anguidae) Through Climatic Transitions Of The North American Cenozoic, Sara Elshafie

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

Poikilothermic vertebrates offer excellent climate proxies based on relationships between environment and measurable variables such as body size and species richness. Relationships of these variables in lizards to environmental transitions over long time scales are poorly understood. Here I show that patterns of body size and species richness in a lizard clade, Glyptosaurinae (Squamata: Anguidae), correspond to known histories of paleotemperatures through the Cenozoic of North America. Glyptosaurines have the richest fossil record among North American Cenozoic lizards and exhibit a wide range of skull sizes. In order to estimate body size for glyptosaurines and other fossil anguids, I collected …

The Surface Energy Balance And Its Drivers In A Boreal Peatland Fen Of Northwestern Russia, Benjamin R. K. Runkle, Christian Wille, Michal Gazovic, M. Wilmking, L. Kutzbach

Biological and Agricultural Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Boreal peatland energy balances using the eddy covariance technique have previously been made in Alaska, Canada, Scandinavia, and Western Siberia, but not in the European portion of the Russian Federation. European Russia contains approximately 200,000 km2 of peatlands and has a boreal (subarctic), continental climate influencing the region’s energy balance. To help fill this research gap, the surface energy balance was determined for a boreal peatland fen in the Komi Republic of Russia for an 11-month period in 2008–2009 using the eddy covariance method. The total measurement period’s cumulative energy balance closure rate was 86%, with higher closure during the …

Climate Change In Northern New Hampshire: Past, Present And Future, Cameron P. Wake, C. Keeley, Elizabeth A. Burakowski, Peter Wilkinson, Katharine Hayhoe, Anne Stoner, Julie Labrance

The Sustainability Institute Publications

EARTH’S CLIMATE CHANGES. It always has and always will. However, an extensive and growing body of scientific evidence indicates that human activities—including the burning of fossil fuel (coal, oil, and natural gas) for energy, clearing of forested lands for agriculture, and raising livestock—are now the primary force driving change in the Earth’s climate system. This report describes how the climate of northern New Hampshire has changed over the past century and how the future climate of the region will be affected by a warmer planet due to human activities.

Climate Change In Southern New Hampshire: Past, Present And Future, Cameron P. Wake, Elizabeth A. Burakowski, Peter Wilkinson, Katharine Hayhoe, Anne Stoner, C. Keeley, Julie Labranche

The Sustainability Institute Publications

EARTH’S CLIMATE CHANGES. It always has and always will. However, an extensive and growing body of scientific evidence indicates that human activities—including the burning of fossil fuel (coal, oil, and natural gas) for energy, clearing of forested lands for agriculture, and raising livestock—are now the primary force driving change in the Earth’s climate system. This report describes how the climate of southern New Hampshire has changed over the past century and how the future climate of the region will be affected by a warmer planet due to human activities.

Issue Brief: Asset Management For Stormwater, New England Environmental Finance Center, Sustainable Communities Learning Network

Sustainable Communities Capacity Building

Asset management is a strategic approach to maintaining and sustaining infrastructure in order to meet the needs of the community at the lowest overall life cycle cost. This approach helps communities know how and where to prioritize limited funds in order to achieve the greatest benefit. Often applied to drinking water and wastewater infrastructure, this method is well suited to managing any assets, including stormwater systems.

This issue brief is intended to introduce local governments to the asset management process and to show how it can be applied in managing stormwater assets. It was adapted from an appendix written by …

Salinity Risk Mapping For Assessing Carbon Farming Initiative Proposals: Decision Support And Data Requirements, Paul Raper, Peter Gardiner

Resource management technical reports

The Clean Energy Legislation passed by the Australian Parliament on 8 November 2011 links the carbon price to the Carbon Farming Initiative (CFI). Under the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative) Act 2011 (the Act), proponents need to consider regional natural resource management (NRM) plans to ensure that tree plantings for carbon bio-sequestration maximise environmental benefits and avoid unintended adverse effects on biodiversity, water and agricultural production systems.

Droughtscape, Spring 2014, Kelly Smith

DroughtScape: Quarterly Newsletter of the National Drought Mitigation Center (2007–2023)

Contents

Director’s report

Outlook . 2

Drought climate recap 3

Drought impacts .

DroughtAtlas

Missouri River Basin pilot 9

NASA Horn of Africa project 10

U2U tools and social science . 12

Consulting for Turkey 14

Czech drought monitoring 14

Growth And Nitrogen Uptake Kinetics In Cultured Procentrum Donghaiense, Zhangxi Hu, Shunshan Duan, Margaret R. Mulholland

OES Faculty Publications

We compared growth kinetics of Prorocentrum donghaiense cultures on different nitrogen (N) compounds including nitrate, ammonium urea, glutamic acid, dialanine, and cynate. P. donghaiense exhibited standard Monod-type growth kinetics over a range of nitrogen concentrations for all N. Compounds tested. Cultures grown on glu and urea had the highest maximum growth rates. However, cultures grown on cyanate had lower half saturation constants. Nitrogen uptake kinetics were measured in nitrate-deplete and replete batch cultures of P. donghaiense. In nitrate-deplete batch cultures, P. donghaiense exhibited Michaelis-Menten type uptake kinetics for nitrate, ammonium, urea and algal amino acids; uptake was saturated at …

Cosmogenic Beryllium Cycling In A Natural Forest Setting, Grace Conyers

Open Access Theses

10 Bemet , or cosmogenic beryllium, has a long half-life of 1.4 million years and quick adsorption on soil particles, which may make it ideal for dating soil erosion in historical context. However, there are questions on about the fundamental assumptions of the retentivity of 10 Bemet . This manuscript explores these assumptions and the context of nutrient cycling in a natural forest setting.

To see if 10 Bemet was being cycled through the trees, and at what rate, we looked at the[10 Bemet ] in the soil, 4 species of trees, and their leaves. The isotopic ratio 10 Be/9 …

Uncertainties In Life Cycle Greenhouse Gas Emissions From U.S. Beef Cattle, Quentin M. Dudley, Adam Liska, Andrea K. Watson, Galen E. Erickson

Adam Liska Papers

Beef cattle feedlots are estimated to contribute 26% of U.S. agricultural greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and future climate change policy could target reducing these emissions. Life cycle assessment (LCA) of GHG emissions from U.S. grain-fed beef cattle was conducted based on industry statistics and previous studies to identify the main sources of uncertainty in these estimations. Uncertainty associated with GHG emissions from indirect land use change, pasture soil emissions (e.g. soil carbon sequestration), enteric fermentation from cattle on pasture, and methane emissions from feedlot manure, respectively, contributed the most variability to life cycle GHG emissions from beef production. Feeding of …

Influence Of Diet On Element Incorporation In The Shells Of Two Bivalve Molluscs: Argopecten Irradians Concentricus And Mercenaria Mercenaria, William Noland Elsaesser

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Recently, biogenic carbonates have received much attention as potential proxies of environmental change; however, a major pathway of elemental incorporation is often overlooked when making interpretations or designing experiments. This research experimentally examines the influence of diet on elemental composition in juvenile shells of the bay scallop, Argopecten irradians concentricus, and the northern quahog, Mercenaria mercenaria.

Exploratory trials were conducted using Argopecten irradians concentricus juveniles fed different algal diets: Isochrysis, Chaetoceros, Pavlova, Tetraselmis, or a mix of all four in a 2:1:2:2 ratio. No differences between the left and right valves were revealed, thus, subsequent analysis of the dietary influence …

Economic Growth Assumptions In Climate And Energy Policy, Nir Y. Krakauer

Publications and Research

The assumption that the economic growth seen in recent decades will continue has dominated the discussion of future greenhouse gas emissions and the mitigation of and adaptation to climate change. Given that long-term economic growth is uncertain, the impacts of a wide range of growth trajectories should be considered. In particular, slower economic growth would imply that future generations will be relatively less able to invest in emissions controls or adapt to the detrimental impacts of climate change. Taking into consideration the possibility of economic slowdown therefore heightens the urgency of reducing greenhouse gas emissions now by moving to renewable …

Similar Resilience Attributes In Lakes With Different Management Practices, Didier L. Baho, Stina Drakare, Richard K. Johnson, Craig R. Allen, David G. Angeler

Nebraska Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit: Staff Publications

Liming has been used extensively in Scandinavia and elsewhere since the 1970s to counteract the negative effects of acidification. Communities in limed lakes usually return to acidified conditions once liming is discontinued, suggesting that liming is unlikely to shift acidified lakes to a state equivalent to pre-acidification conditions that requires no further management intervention. While this suggests a low resilience of limed lakes, attributes that confer resilience have not been assessed, limiting our understanding of the efficiency of costly management programs. In this study, we assessed community metrics (diversity, richness, evenness, biovolume), multivariate community structure and the relative resilience of …

Umphlett Qci March 2014, Natalie Umphlett

High Plains Regional Climate Center: Staff Publications

Highlights for the Basin

Temperature and Precipitation Anomalies

Mountain Snowpack

Agriculture

Tourism and Recreation

Missouri Basin Flood Outlook

U.S. Seasonal Drought Outlook

Nongeocentric Axial Dipole Field Behavior During The Mono Lake Excursion, Robert M. Negrini, Daniel T. Mccuan, Robert A. Horton, James D. Lopez, William S. Cassata, James E.T. Channell, Kenneth L. Verosub, Jeffrey R. Knott, Robert S. Coe, Joseph C. Liddicoat, Steven P. Lund, Larry V. Benson, Andrei M. Sarna-Wojcicki

United States Geological Survey: Staff Publications

A new record of the Mono Lake excursion (MLE) is reported from the Summer Lake basin of Oregon, USA. Sediment magnetic properties indicate magnetite as the magnetization carrier and imply suitability of the sediments as accurate recorders of the magnetic field including relative paleointensity (RPI) variations. The magnitudes and phases of the declination, inclination, and RPI components of the new record correlate well with other coeval but lower resolution records from western North America including records from the Wilson Creek Formation exposed around Mono Lake. The virtual geomagnetic pole (VGP) path of the new record is similar to that from …