For Victor Hugo, the nineteenth century could be remembered by only its first two years, which established peace in Europe and France's supremacy on the continent. For General Lam Quang Thi, the twentieth century had only twenty-five years: from 1950 to 1975, during which the Republic of Vietnam and its Army grew up and collapsed with the fall of Saigon. This is the story of those twenty-five years. General Thi fought in the Indochina War as a battery commander on the side of the French. When Viet Minh aggression began after the Geneva Accords, he served in the nascent Vietnamese National Army, and his career covers this army's entire lifespan. He was deputy commander of the 7th Infantry Division, and in 1965 he assumed command of the 9th Infantry Division. In 1966, at the age of thirty-three, he became one of the youngest generals in the Vietnamese Army. He participated in the Tet Offensive before being removed from the front lines for political reasons. When North Vietnam launched the 1972 Great Offensive, he was brought back to the field and eventually promoted to commander of an Army Corps Task Force along the Demilitarized Zone. With the fall of Saigon, he …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) spends $7 billion annually to provide decent, safe, and sanitary housing for low-income households in about 14,000 rental properties nationwide. Yet, many public housing properties have been unsafe and unsanitary for several decades. To identify and correct these problems, HUD began a Public Housing Assessment System (PHAS) to evaluate the performance of public housing authorities. Although HUD is still testing and revising PHAS, it has begun to designate certain housing authorities as troubled and to assign them to recovery centers, where they receive technical and other assistance. HUD also created the Public and Indian Housing Information Center (PIC) database to collect information on funding, compliance, and other problems that fall outside the scope of PHAS. PHAS includes four performance indicators: (1) the physical condition of the properties, (2) the financial condition of the housing authority, (3) the authority's management operations, and (4) residents' satisfaction with their living conditions. HUD develops a score for each indicator and, starting in this fiscal year, plans to use the scores for all four indicators to determine whether housing authorities are troubled. So …

A chapter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Concerns have been raised that the economic models used by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the U.S. International Trade Commission do not account for all the factors that affect cattle prices and producer incomes. GAO reviewed USDA's livestock model to determine whether it incorporates imports, market concentration, marketing agreements, and forward contracts. In reviewing best modeling practices, GAO's expert panel concluded that domestic cattle demand and supply were the fundamental forces driving cattle prices and producer incomes. The panel identified issues necessary to develop a comprehensive modeling system that predicts cattle prices and producer incomes. The panel recommended the collection of better data to quantify several important factors omitted from the model. The panel also wanted to see a more complete characterization of the supply and demand relationships connecting the cattle producer to the final consumer. The panel's emphasis on a more complete characterization of the cattle and beef industry underscores the idea that the demand for cattle is ultimately driven by consumer demand for beef and other demand and supply forces linking cattle producers to feedlots, meatpackers, and retailers."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) relies extensively on information technology (IT) to carry out its logistics support mission. This report focuses on DLA's processes for making informed IT investment decisions. Because IT investment management has only recently become an area of management focus and commitment at DLA, the agency's ability to effectively manage IT investments is limited. The first step toward establishing effective investment management is putting in place foundational, project-level control and selection processes. The second step toward effective investment management is to continually assess proposed and ongoing projects as an integrated and competing set of investment options. Accomplishing these two steps requires effective development and implementation of a plan, supported by senior management, which defines and prioritizes investment process improvements. Without a well-defined process improvement plan and controls for implementing it, it is unlikely that the agency will establish a mature investment management capability. As a result, GAO continues to question DLA's ability to make informed and prudent investment decisions in IT."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "GAO contracted with Clifton Gunderson LLP to audit the financial statements of the Senate Restaurants Revolving Fund for fiscal years 2001 and 2000. Clifton Gunderson LLP found that (1) the financial statements were fairly presented in conformity with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles, (2) the fund maintained effective internal control over financial reporting and compliance with laws and regulations, and (3) there was no reportable noncompliance with selected provisions of the laws and regulations it tested."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The federal government awards $300 billion to state and local governments and nonprofit groups each year. The Single Audit Act promotes sound financial management, including effective internal controls, over these federal awards. Before the act, government relied on audits of individual grants to determine if the money was spent properly. The act replaced these grant audits with a single audit--one audit of an entity as a whole. GAO surveyed the 24 federal agencies subject to the Chief Financial Officers (CFO) Act and found that they have developed processes and assigned responsibilities to meet the requirements of the Single Audit Act. Agencies reported that they are using single audits to monitor compliance with administrative and programs requirements and to determine the adequacy of recipients' internal controls. One or more offices at 22 of the 24 agencies used single audits to monitor compliance with administrative and program requirements in the Circular A-133 Compliance Statement and to monitor recipients' compliance with internal controls. Eleven agencies reported that they routinely use the Federal Audit Clearinghouse database to identify recipients that incurred questionable costs or programs that have significant findings, to …

Guidance issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "GAO released an exposure draft on its Model of Strategic Human Capital Management, which is intended to help federal agency leaders better manage their organizations' most important asset--their people. The model is designed to help agency leaders effectively use their people, or human capital, and determine how well they integrate human capital considerations into daily decision-making and planning for the program results they seek to achieve. In so doing, the model highlights the importance of a sustained commitment by agency leaders to maximize the value of their agencies' human capital and manage related risks."

This project supplemented our regular DOE grant from the Basic Energy Sciences organization with the goal of fostering industrial partnerships and student internships. During the project period, we have interacted with between 15 and 20 companies in the optical fiber telecommunications equipment industry, and our students have participated in a number of highly visible projects with companies such as Ciena, Science Applications International Corporation, KDD, ATT, Virtual Photonics, Inc., Phaethon Telecommunications, PhotonEx, and others. The project led to many successful interactions and numerous job offers for our students.

Semi-weekly newspaper from Clifton, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

This paper discusses the creep behavior of example Sn-rich solders that have become candidates for use in Pb-free solder joints. The specific solders discussed are Sn-3.5Ag, Sn-3Ag-0.5Cu, Sn-0.7Cu and Sn-10In-3.1Ag, used in thin joints between Cu and Ni-Au metallized pads.

A multiphase computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code is used to simulate the evaporation and combustion processes of a diesel spray blended with a highly volatile component. The CFD code uses an Eulerian approach to model the liquid phase of diesel fuel with components of different boiling temperatures. The approach divides the droplets into size groups and assigns different boiling temperatures for each group. The CFD code accounts for liquid droplet flow, turbulent mixing, interfacial drag and heat transfer, droplet evaporation and combustion, radiation heat transfer, and pollutant kinetics. Using the code, a parametric study was conducted to investigate the impacts of a volatile component on the spray evaporation and combustion characteristics. The results indicate that the blending of a highly volatile component can have an impact on droplet evaporation rate and that thermal radiation is significant in spray combustion due to the formation of soot.

The NARSTO-NE-OPS (NorthEast Oxidant and Particle Study) is an investigation of the coupling of the meteorological and chemical processes that control the evolution of air pollution events. The project includes three major field programs carried out at a field site in northeast Philadelphia during the summers of 1998, 1999 and 2001. The activity brings together the research groups from 13 universities, 5 government laboratories and representatives of the electric power industry to apply the most advanced measurement techniques to understanding the physical and chemical processes contributing to air quality issues. Results have been obtained from three ground sites, two instrumented aircraft, many different instrumented balloon platforms, and several remote sensing techniques including satellites. In addition, the database used includes the ground-based measurements conducted at several surrounding state and city operated sites in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, New York and Maryland. The results have shown the importance of developing the 3-dimensional regional scale picture of the atmosphere to understand and properly model air pollution events. It has been shown that only from such a perspective, which includes the vertical distribution and a regional context, can one hope to properly model and predict ozone and particulate pollution. A combination of photochemical and …

The Ernest Orlando Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab or LBNL) is a multi-program national research facility operated by the University of California for the Department of Energy (DOE). As an integral element of DOE's National Laboratory System, Berkeley Lab supports DOE's missions in fundamental science, energy resources, and environmental quality. Berkeley Lab programs advance four distinct goals for DOE and the nation: (1) To perform leading multidisciplinary research in the computing sciences, physical sciences, energy sciences, biosciences, and general sciences in a manner that ensures employee and public safety and protection of the environment. (2) To develop and operate unique national experimental facilities for qualified investigators. (3) To educate and train future generations of scientists and engineers to promote national science and education goals. (4) To transfer knowledge and technological innovations and to foster productive relationships among Berkeley Lab's research programs, universities, and industry in order to promote national economic competitiveness. This is the annual report on Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) program for FY01.

This report details results from work conducted under the grant entitled ''Scalable Dynamic Mesh Algorithms and Software'' for the period September 1, 1998 to November 30, 2001.

This paper reports on the first round of R&D roadmap activities of the Generation IV (Gen IV) Technical Working Group (TWG) 3, on liquid metal-cooled reactors. Liquid metal coolants give rise to fast spectrum systems, and thus the reactor systems considered in this TWG are all fast reactors. Gas-cooled fast reactors are considered in the context of TWG 2. As is noted in other Gen IV papers, this first round activity is termed ''screening for potential'', and includes collecting the most complete set of liquid metal reactor/fuel cycle system concepts possible and evaluating the concepts against the Gen IV principles and goals. Those concepts or concept groups that meet the Gen IV principles and which are deemed to have reasonable potential to meet the Gen IV goals will pass to the next round of evaluation. Although we sometimes use the terms ''reactor'' or ''reactor system'' by themselves, the scope of the investigation by TWG 3 includes not only the reactor systems, but very importantly the closed fuel recycle system inevitably required by fast reactors. The response to the DOE Request for Information (RFI) on liquid metal reactor/fuel cycle systems from principal investigators, laboratories, corporations, and other institutions, was robust and …

Experimental and theoretical research on the bulk and surface properties of conductive solid state materials has been performed based on the techniques of scanning tunneling microscopy and scanning tunneling spectroscopy, often at cryogenic temperatures. The research has focused on the electronic properties, particularly the superconductivity, of high temperature superconductors and other layered systems. The superconducting electronic density of states N(E)=dI/dV of the high T{sub c} superconductor Bi{sub 2}Sr{sub 2}CaCu{sub 2}O{sub 8+{delta}} was measured with spatial resolution of 5 A at 4.2K. An internal superconducting proximity effect was inferred to operate between Cu and Bi based layers of the crystal in those regions where the Bi layers are metallic in nature. This research project supported the thesis research of several young scientists, and led to a significant number of published papers, presentations and reports.

A weekly publication, the Texas Register serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas. Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents such as requests for proposals. After adoption, these rulemaking actions are codified into the Texas Administrative Code.

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "A growing backlog of cases and longer processing times have prompted concern about the management of the Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) Offer in Compromise (OIC) Program. OIC inventory and processing time have grown despite significant increases in program staff. Program changes increased the demand for offers, the number of processing steps, and the number of staff hours needed to process the case. Yet, the demand for offers exceeded staff's capacity to process them. The extent to which IRS' current initiatives would reduce the OIC Program inventory and processing time is uncertain. The current initiatives are intended to separate the processing of less complex and more complex offers, with lower-grade staff using standardized procedures to process less complex offers and higher-grade staff specializing in more complex offers. IRS projects that the initiatives will stabilize the inventory and keep up with the flow of new offers by the end of fiscal year 2002. IRS met the requirements of the IRS Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998 by independently reviewing all proposed offer rejections, considering the facts and circumstances of each taxpayer when determining allowances for monthly living expenses, …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) provides the military with computing, telecommunications, and acquisition services on a cost reimbursable basis. In fiscal year 2001, DISA's service reimbursements totaled $2.5 billion. DISA also runs joint warfighting and related mission support command, control, and communications systems funded by direct appropriations, which in fiscal year 2001 were $1 billion. In March 2001, DISA issued a 500 Day Action Plan for Supporting DoD Decision Superiority. The plan contains 140 ongoing or planned actions involving the investment of resources. In developing the plan, DISA appropriately focused on understanding and satisfying customer concerns and needs. DISA did not, however, adequately address other elements of effective plan development, such as ensuring that planned investments were cost-effective. Although the agency did not establish baseline commitments in developing its action plan, DISA has since established some, but not all, baselines and is beginning to monitor progress against these commitments. DISA's 500 Day Action Plan is part of management actions to improve mission performance. These actions address some, but not all, of the institutional management controls that can help an agency effectively adjust to shifts in …

Daily newspaper from Baytown, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

Semi-monthly newspaper from Oklahoma City, Oklahoma that includes local, state, and national news and advertising of interest to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) community.

This report consists of campaign finance reform with a legal analysis of issue and express advocacy.

High spatial resolution tomography benefits from a high brightness source (photons/(mr{sup 2} x source area)). A synchrotron radiation source provides extremely high continuous brightness with spectral characteristics suited to a wide variety of imaging needs. Therefore, during the initial testing of the new synchrotron radiation computed tomography (SRCT) system at Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory, it was suggested that we image a ruled target designed for NIF experiments. This is a detailed report of that imaging effort.

Migratory and resident fish in the Columbia River basin are exposed to stresses associated with hydroelectric power production, including pressure changes during turbine passage and dissolved gas supersaturation (resulting from the release of water from the spillway). The responses of fall Chinook salmon and bluegill sunfish to these two stresses, both singly and in combination, were investigated in the laboratory. A previous test series (Abernethy et al. 2001) evaluated the effects of passage through a Kaplan turbine under the ?worst case? pressure conditions. For this series of tests, pressure changes were modified to simulate passage through a Kaplan turbine under a more ?fish-friendly? mode of operation. The results were compared to results from Abernethy et al. (2001). Fish were exposed to total dissolved gas (TDG) levels of 100%, 120%, or 135% of saturation for 16-22 hours at either surface (101 kPa) or 30 ft (191 kPa) of pressure, then held at surface pressure at 100% saturation for a 48-hour observation period. Sensitivity of fall Chinook salmon to gas supersaturation was slightly higher than in the previous test series, with 15% mortality for surface-acclimated fish at 120% TDG, compared to 0% in the previous tests.