As a result of nuclear weapons testing and accidents, plutonium has been distributed into the environment. The areas close to the sites of these tests and accidental dispersions contain plutonium deposition of such a magnitude that health authorities and responsible officials have mandated that the contaminated areas be protected, generally through isolation or removal of the contaminated areas. In recent years remedial actions have taken place at all these sites. For reasons not entirely clear, the public perceives radiation exposure risk to be much greater than the evidence would suggest [1]. This perception seems to be particularly true for plutonium, which has often been ''demonized'' in various publications as the ''most hazardous substance known to man'' [2]. As the position statement adapted by the Health Physics Society explains, ''Plutonium's demonization is an example of how the public has been misled about radiation's environmental and health threats generally, and in cases like plutonium, how it has developed a warped ''risk perception'' that does not reflect reality'' [3]. As a result of this risk perception and ongoing debate surrounding environmental plutonium contamination, remedial action criteria are difficult to establish. By examining the data available before and after remedial actions taken at the …

A review of data on the nucleon electromagnetic form factors in the space-like region is presented. Recent results from experiments using polarized beams and polarized targets or nucleon recoil polarimeters have yielded a significant improvement on the precision of the data obtained with the traditional Rosenbluth separation. Future plans for extended measurements are outlined.

The 1999 Oil & Gas Conference was cosponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Office of Fossil Energy, Federal Energy Technology Center (FETC) and National Petroleum Technology Office (NPTO) on June 28 to 30 in Dallas, Texas. The Oil & Gas Conference theme, Technology Options for Producer Survival, reflects the need for development and implementation of new technologies to ensure an affordable, reliable energy future. The conference was attended by nearly 250 representatives from industry, academia, national laboratories, DOE, and other Government agencies. Three preconference workshops (Downhole Separation Technologies: Is it Applicable for Your Operations, Exploring and developing Naturally Fractured Low-Permeability Gas Reservoirs from the Rocky Mountains to the Austin Chalk, and Software Program Applications) were held. The conference agenda included an opening plenary session, three platform sessions (Sessions 2 and 3 were split into 2 concurrent topics), and a poster presentation reception. The platform session topics were Converting Your Resources Into Reserves (Sessions 1 and 2A), Clarifying Your Subsurface Vision (Session 2B), and High Performance, Cost Effective Drilling, Completion, Stimulation Technologies (Session 3B). In total, there were 5 opening speakers, 30 presenters, and 16 poster presentations.