USGS Leads a National Study on Hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico

The USGS was the lead agency for a recently released national study on the Flux and Sources of Nutrients in the Mississippi-Atchafalaya River Basin. This report is part of a multi-agency assessment of the causes and consequences of hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico. Nutrients from the Mississippi River Basin are believed to be responsible, at least in part, for the large hypoxic zone that develops on the Louisiana-Texas shelf in the Gulf of Mexico each summer.

This map shows the locations of the 9 large subbasins studied in the Committee on Environment and Natural Resources (CENR) hypoxia assessment.

References

CENR, 2000,

Integrated assessment of hypoxia in the northern Gulf of Mexico: National Science and Technology Council Committee on Environment and Natural Resources, Washington, D.C. , 58 p.

Goolsby, D.A., 2000,

Mississippi basin nitrogen flux believed to cause Gulf hypoxia: EOS Transactions, American Geophysical Union, v. 81, no. 29, p. 321, 326-327.

Goolsby, D.A., Battaglin, W.A., Lawrence, G.B., Artz, R.S., Aulenbach, B.T., Hooper, R.P., Keeney, D.R., and Stensland, G.J., 1999,

Flux and sources of nutrients in the Mississippi-Atchafalaya River Basin--Topic 3, Report for the integrated assessment on hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration NOAA Coastal Ocean Program Decision Analysis Series No. 17, 129 p. (This link is to a pdf file.)

More Information

• News Release - Nutrients aren't always good: USGS Scientists Determine Sources of Nutrients in Mississippi River Basin
• News Release - Scientists Debate Causes of Hypoxia
• Agricultural Chemicals in the Upper Midwest (Corn Belt) Investigation

Related Headlines

• Streamflow and Nutrient Delivery from the Mississippi River Basin to the Gulf of Mexico
• New Report on Science for Hypoxia in Gulf of Mexico
• Nitrogen Isotope Study Answers Questions about the Transport of Nutrients in Streams
• USGS Info Guides Gulf of Mexico Hypoxic Zone Action Plan
• USGS Leads a National Study on Hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico