Porous and permeable strata of the Deep-Basin Brine aquifer underlie bedded evaporites that are being considered as repositories for high-level nuclear waste isolation in the Palo Duro Basin, Texas Panhandle. Formation-water samples collected from four U.S.

Permian strata in the Palo Duro Basin consist of multicyclic sequences of carbonate, nodular and laminated anhydrite, bedded halite, chaotic mudstone-halite, and terrigenous clastic sediments. These evaporite lithofacies record deposition in a shallow-water marine evaporate shelf depositional system. Clastic sediment derived from surrounding highlands contributed aluminous detritus to the basin, including aluminum-rich smectite, illite, and mixed-layer illite/smectite clays.

Lineament analysis was used to study the relationship between subsurface structure and surficial features in East Texas, southeastern Oklahoma, southwestern Arkansas, and northwestern Louisiana-areas of low topographic relief, moderate vegetation cover, and diverse land use. More than 2,200 lineaments were mapped from four standard 1:250,000-scale Landsat Thematic Mapper images. Operator error and data-base variation were evaluated in areas of sidelap between adjacent images.

Since 1978, six climate- and erosion-monitoring stations on slopes in draws and large playa lake basins in the interior of the Southern High Plains and slopes along the Caprock Escarpment in the Rolling Plains of the Texas Panhandle have recorded precipitation amount and intensity, air and soil temperature, soil electrical resistance (soil moisture), slope erosion and deposition, and slope and stream headcut retreat. Stations are located in areas of active erosion.