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Double fertilization in Ephedra, a nonflowering seed plant: its bearing on the origin of angiosperms
Double fertilization and the associated formation of endosperm have long been considered unique and defining characters (autapomorphies) of the angiosperms. During normal fertilization in Ephedra nevadensis, a nonflowering seed plant, fusion of a second sperm nucleus with the ventral canal nucleus occurs regularly within the egg cytoplasm. The occurrence of double fertilization in Ephedra assumes added significance in light of its critical phylogenetic position as a basal member of the most closely related extant group of seed plants (Gnetales) to angiosperms. Thus, double fertilization in angiosperms and Ephedra may represent an evolutionary homology. Published in Science, volume 547, issue 4945, on pages 951 -...
This is a collaborative, two-part project to compile and analyze resource data to support WLCI efforts. Part 1 entails directing data synthesis and assessment activities to ensure that they will inform and support the WLCI LPDTs and Coordination Team in their conservation planning efforts, such as developing conservation priorities and strategies, identifying priority areas for conservation actions, evaluating and ranking conservation projects, and evaluating spatial and ecological relations between proposed habitat projects and WLCI priorities. In FY2014, we helped the Coordination Team complete the WLCI Conservation Action Plan and BLM’s annual report, and we provided maps and other materials to assist with ranking...
Categories: Data,
Project;
Types: Map Service,
OGC WFS Layer,
OGC WMS Layer,
OGC WMS Service,
ScienceBase Project;
Tags: Baseline Synthesis,
Science,
Science Project
We examined bird and bat mortality at a new 89-turbine windfarm constructed in an environmentally sensitive area in north-central Iowa. The windfarm became operational in November 2001. It is located in cropland between three Wildlife Management Areas (WMA's) with historically high bird use. In the past, migrant and resident waterfowl, shorebirds, raptors, and songbirds moved between the WMA's through the area now occupied by the windfarm. Studies of bird collision mortality in California and elsewhere raised concerns about the possibility of mortalities in this area. From April 15, 2003 and December 15, 2003 we searched for dead animals under 26 randomly selected turbines. Six 76.2 m by 3.0 m transects were maintained...
Lack of a 19th-century baseline temperature against which 20th-century warming can be referenced constitutes a deficiency in understanding recent climate change. Combination of borehole temperature profiles, which contain a memory of surface temperature changes in previous centuries, with the meteorological archive of surface air temperatures can provide a 19th-century baseline temperature tied to the current observational record. A test case in Utah, where boreholes are interspersed with meteorological stations belonging to the Historical Climatological Network, yields a noise reduction in estimates of 20th-century warming and a baseline temperature that is 0.6� +/- 6 0.1�C below the 1951 to 1970 mean temperature...
The Muddy Creek watershed, part of the Upper Colorado River watershed, is a semi-arid catchment in a sagebrush steppe ecosystem. A synoptic watershed assessment was conducted in 2010 to identify areas within the watershed that are more susceptible to mobilization of trace elements that occur in soils forming on marine shale. Samples of soil, stream sediment, and water were collected and assayed for major elements and a suite of trace elements. Formation waters discharged from two wells within the watershed were sampled in 2011 to evaluate their potential contribution of organic carbon, nitrogen (N) species, and trace elements to surface waters. In FY2012, analyses of the soil, rock, and water samples collected...
Limits on the time and financial resources available for monitoring efforts, coupled with the complexities of natural resources and stakeholders, are challenges in resource monitoring. To help address these and related challenges, the USGS Monitoring Team (MT) has linked conceptual monitoring specialists with habitat and wildlife biologists to inform and develop creative, scientifically defensible approaches for monitoring the status and trends of populations and habitats across the WLCI region. This collaboration has led to spatially balanced monitoring designs that will make it possible to interpret conditions across the WLCI region and a mechanism for integrating species’ distributions and population responses...
Categories: Data,
Project;
Types: ScienceBase Project;
Tags: Science,
Targeted Monitoring and Research
Regional-scale studies, such as those being conducted for the WLCI, are well suited for the use of remote-sensing techniques. Derivative products from remote-sensing instruments, such as Landsat, have been used successfully for decades in studies of geology, vegetation, environmental change, and many other types of scientific research. The continuous coverage of Landsat data since 1972 makes it possible to establish baseline conditions in areas affected by renewable and nonrenewable energy development. In this study, various Landsat datasets are being used to map current and pre-development conditions in the WLCI study area for a selected set of scientific interests. Landsat scenes have been mosaicked to produce...
In the WLCI region, the quality and condition of sagebrush steppe is a concern given the extent of rangewide land-use change, habitat conversion, and rapid energy development in sagebrush systems. Three migratory songbird species are considered near-obligates of sagebrush shrublands: Brewer’s and sagebrush sparrows and sage thrasher, all of which are designated Species of Great Conservation Need in Wyoming (Wyoming Game and Fish Department, 2010) and nest in Green River Basin. In collaboration with the WGFD, we initiated this multiphase project to address the WLCI management need to identify the condition and distribution of sagebrush songbird habitats and key drivers of change in those habitats. In Phase I (2008...
Muddy Creek, a tributary to the Little Snake River, is a semi-arid catchment that drains about 1,200 mi2 in south-central Wyoming. The drainage basin is characterized as a sagebrush steppe ecosystem. The area is undergoing energy exploration and development, including conventional natural gas wells and coalbed natural gas wells. Geologic formations that underlie the drainage basin include soluble marine shales, which are a natural source of dissolved solids (for example, sodium, chloride, and sulfate) and Se. As a result, the water quality of Muddy Creek is naturally high in dissolved constituents, including Se. The WDEQ has listed chloride and Se as impairments to aquatic life for Muddy Creek. Dissolved solids...
The Forest and Rangeland Ecosystem Science Center 's mission is to provide scientific understanding and the technology needed to support sound management and conservation of our nation's natural resources, with emphasis on western ecosystems. The scientists from FRESC capitalize on their diverse expertise to answer critically important scientific questions shaped by the equally diverse environments of the western United States. FRESC scientists collaborate with each other and with partners to provide rigorous, objective, and timely information and guidance for the management and conservation of biological systems in the West and worldwide. Research activities are concentrated in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Nevada,...
This time-enabled map service depicts the infestation of the mountain pine beetle within Banff, Kootenay and Yoho National Parks between 1999 and 2007. It also contains reference boundaries for the parks, areas susceptible to the mountain pine beetle and areas of lodgepole pine.
Categories: Data;
Types: ArcGIS REST Map Service,
Map Service;
Tags: Alberta,
British Columbia,
Canada,
ESRI Canada,
Education,
Some analysts think that biomass offers great potential as a renewable fiel for electricity generation. Biomass’ emissions of greenhouse gases, over its whole fiel cycle, are relatively insignificant when compared to even the “cleanest” of the fossil energy technologies — natural gas. Yet, the external costs (and benefits) of biomass fuel cycles, which stem from impacts other than those associated with greenhouse gases, are not necessarily trivial. Some of these impacts are similar to those that result from the combustion of fossil fbels. Other impacts are unique to biomass fiel cycles. This report describes methods to estimate many of the more important external costs (and benefits) of biomass fiel cycles.
This paper's objective is to apply Intervention Mapping, a planning process for the systematic development of theory- and evidence-based health promotion interventions, to the development of interventions to promote energy conservation behavior. Intervention Mapping (IM) consists of six steps: needs assessment, program objectives, methods and applications, program development, planning for program implementation, and planning for program evaluation. Examples from the energy conservation field are provided to illustrate the activities associated with these steps. It is concluded that applying IM in the energy conservation field may help the development of effective behavior change interventions, and thus develop...
Categories: Publication;
Types: Citation;
Tags: Changing,
attitudes,
public,
quality of life,
science
Offshore exploration and production of oil and gas have increased significantly in the last decade. Computer models are used in emergency response, contingency planning, and impact assessment to simulate the behavior of oil and gas if accidentally released from a well, pipeline, or ship. There are two types of models used for this purpose-models that have both plume dynamics stage and the advection diffusion stage and models that are of simplified nature that has only the advection diffusion stage. This paper compares both types of models and shows what information are similar and what are different and under what conditions. The paper also examines in detail about different criteria that can be used as the transition...
Categories: Publication;
Types: Citation;
Tags: balancing,
historical,
perspective,
protected,
role,
It is increasingly clear that a wide range of stakeholders should be included in the problem formulation phase of research aimed at solving environmental problems; indeed the inclusion of stakeholders at this stage has been formalized as an integral part of ecological risk assessment. In this paper, we advocate the additional inclusion of stakeholders in the refinement of research methods and protocols and in the execution of the research, rather than just at the final communication and reporting phase. We use a large study of potential radionuclide levels in marine biota around Amchitka Island as a case study. Amchitka Island, in the Aleutian Island Chain of Alaska, was the site of three underground nuclear tests...
Models project that land ecosystems may be able take up a considerable proportion of the carbon dioxide released by human activities, thereby counteracting the anthropogenic emissions. In their Perspective, Hungate et al. argue that these carbon uptake estimates are too high because the models do not take other nutrients such as nitrogen into account appropriately. The authors estimate that there will not be enough nitrogen available to sustain the high carbon uptake scenarios. Nutrients other than nitrogen may also affect carbon uptake in ways not captured by most models. Published in Science, volume 302, issue 5650, on pages 1512 - 3, in 2003.
Project involves analyzing datasets using two measures: Spatial similarity of the distributed precipitation and temperature fields of the study datasets Implications on hydrologic modeling We will then provide guidance on the choice of datasets for statistical downscaling of GCM outputs used in different types of scale-dependent planning assessments. We will evaluate these differences from a hydrological standpoint at specific Reclamation basins: Animas at Durango, Colorado; Snake at Heise, Idaho; Sacramento at Redding, California; Salt at Chrysotile, Arizona; Yellowstone River at Billings, Montana; and Colorado River at Lees Ferry Utah and Arizona. The analysis will indicate whether the choice of forcing a...
Categories: Project;
Types: Map Service,
OGC WFS Layer,
OGC WMS Layer,
OGC WMS Service,
ScienceBase Project;
Tags: Global Climate Model (GCM),
Science,
climate change,
dataset,
downscaling,
Southwestern Fishes and the Enigma of "Endangered Species": Man's invasion of deserts creates problems for native animals, especially for freshwater fishes, credited to Deacon, James E, published in 1968. Published in Science, volume 159, issue 3822, on pages 1424 - 1432, in 1968.
Migratory ungulates are susceptible to effects of development along their migration corridors. For example, impermeable barriers such as tall fences preclude movements of migratory populations. Most forms of development in the West, however, represent semipermeable barriers, and their influences on migration remain unclear. This study entails using fine-scale mule deer movement data to evaluate the influence of anthropogenic barriers on the animals’ migratory behaviors. Our efforts include evaluating the rate of travel, duration of stopovers, and route fidelity of deer migrating across a gradient of development in Southwest Wyoming. In FY2014, we analyzed mule deer movement metrics and use of migration stopover...
A program as large and complex as the WLCI requires significant coordination and management, as well as the integration of what is learned from science with the decision-making and program-evaluation processes. For the WLCI, coordination and integration are accomplished through the WLCI Coordination Team, which is composed of one member each from the USGS, BLM, FWS, Wyoming Game and Fish Department, and Wyoming Department of Agriculture. There is also a USGS member on the Science and Technical Advisory Committee. Under the direction of the WLCI Executive Committee, the Coordination Team manages the fiscal and logistical operations necessary to meet the goals and objectives of the WLCI. The Coordination Team also...
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