Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) routinely uses calorimetry and gamma isotopic analyses (Cal/Iso) for the accountability measurement of plutonium (Pu) bearing items. In the past 15 years, the vast majority of those items measured by Cal/Iso were contained in a thin-walled convenience can enclosed in another thin-walled outer container. However, LLNL has recently begun to use DOE-STD-3013-2000 containers as well. These DOE-STD-3013-2000 containers are comprised of a stainless steel convenience can enclosed in welded stainless steel primary and secondary containers. In addition to the fact that the wall thickness of the DOE-STD-3013-2000 containers is much greater than that of other containers in our experience, the DOE-STD-3013-2000 containers appear to have larger thermal insulation characteristics. To date, we have derived Pu-mass values from Cal/Iso measurements of 74 different DOE-STD-3013-2000 containers filled with Pu-bearing oxide or mixed uranium-plutonium (U-Pu) oxide material. Both water-bath and air-bath calorimeters were used for these measurements and both use software to predict when thermal equilibrium is attained. Our experience has shown that after apparent equilibrium has been attained, at least one more complete cycle, and sometimes two or three more complete cycles, is required to gain a measure of true thermal equilibrium. Otherwise, the derived Pu-mass values …

We present one-dimensional (1-D) lipid bilayer structures that integrate carbon nanotubes with a key biological environment-phospholipid membrane. Our structures consist of lipid bilayers wrapped around carbon nanotubes modified with a hydrophilic polymer cushion layer. Despite high bilayer curvature, the lipid membrane maintains its fluidity and can sustain repeated damage-recovery cycles. We also present the first evidence of spontaneous insertion of pore-forming proteins into 1-D lipid bilayers. These structures could lead to the development of new classes of biosensors and bioelectronic devices.

This paper presents a strategy that may be used to guide stabilizing control design for multiple oscillations, which are difficult to control using conventional control design procedures. A multiple oscillation phenomena is observed in an example power system. A local bifurcation and an interarea bifurcation develop in an example power system due to multiple bifurcation parameter variations. The dynamic behaviors of the bifurcating system are complex due to the overlapping of the two different bifurcation subsystems and are shown to be difficult to control. The double bifurcations are studied in this paper and in order to stabilize them, three kind of {mu}-synthesis robust controls are designed, (a) {mu}-synthesis power system stabilizer (MPSS); (b) {mu}-synthesis SVC control (MSVC); and (c) a mixed MPSS/MSVC control. Based on the bifurcation subsystem analysis, the measurement signals and locations of the controls are selected. The control performances of three kind of controls are evaluated and compared. The conclusions are given according to the analysis and time simulation results.

The presence of strong nonlinear absorption has been observed in laser modified fused silica. Intensity-dependent transmission measurements using 355-nm, 532-nm and 1,064-nm laser pulses were performed in pristine polished regions in fused silica substrates and in locations that were exposed to dielectric breakdown. The experimental results suggest that multi-photon absorption is considerably stronger in the modified regions compared to pristine sites and is strongly dependent on the excitation wavelength.

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Silica-filled polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) composite systems find a broad range of applications due to their chemical and environmental resilience and the ability to fine tune, through chemical and processing modifications, the chemical and mechanical properties resulting in a precise engineering property for the final component. Thus, requirements for, and life-performance predictions of, these materials require an understanding of the interaction between the silica filler and the polymer network. Because silica surfaces are well known to have a high affinity for water adsorption, and this water is a critical part of the interface between the silica particles and the polymer matrix, water at this interface has important consequences on the nature of the silica-polymer bonding and subsequently the mechanical behaviour. Previous studies have reported on the water speciation and long-term outgassing kinetics of common fumed and precipitated silicas used in silicone elastomers, and of one such copolymer system in particular. Several different water species were observed to be present with a range of desorption activation energies. The amount and type of species present were observed to be dependent on the thermal and chemical history of the filler and the composite. Solid state Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) methods based on quantification of residual …

We study topological as well as dynamical properties of BPS nonabelian magnetic monopoles of Goddard-Nuyts-Olive-Weinberg type in $ G=SU(N)$, $USp(2N)$ and SO(N) gauge theories, spontaneously broken to nonabelian subgroups $H$. We find that monopoles transform under the group dual to $H$ in a tensor representation of rank determined by the corresponding element in $\pi_1(H)$. When the system is embedded in a $\cal N=2$ supersymmetric theory with an appropriate set of flavors with appropriate bare masses, the BPS monopoles constructed semiclassically persist in the full quantum theory. This result supports the identification of"dual quarks'' found at $r$-vacua of $\cal N=2$ theories with the nonabelian magnetic monopoles. We present several consistency checks of our monopole spectra.

We present a simple superfield Lagrangian for massive supergravity. It comprises the minimal supergravity Lagrangian with interactions as well as mass terms for the metric superfield and the chiral compensator. This is the natural generalization of the Fierz-Pauli Lagrangian for massive gravity which comprises mass terms for the metric and its trace. We show that the on-shell bosonic and fermionic fields are degenerate and have the appropriate spins: 2, 3/2, 3/2 and 1. We then study this interacting Lagrangian using goldstone superfields. We find that achiral multiplet of goldstones gets a kinetic term through mixing, just as the scalar goldstone does in the non-supersymmetric case. This produces Planck scale (Mpl) interactions with matter and all the discontinuities and unitarity bounds associated with massive gravity. In particular, the scale of strong coupling is (Mpl m^4)^1/5, where m is the multiplet's mass. Next, we consider applications of massive supergravity to deconstruction. We estimate various quantum effects which generate non-local operators in theory space. As an example, we show that the single massive supergravity multiplet in a 2-site model can serve the function of an extra dimension in anomaly mediation.

The CPS Accel is a commercial PET camera based on a block detector with 64 LSO scintillator crystals (each 6.75 x 6.75 x 25 mm)read out with 4 photomultiplier tubes. The excellent timing resolution of LSO suggests that this camera might be used for time-of-flight (TOF) PET, thereby reducing the statistical noise significantly. Although the Accel achieves 3 ns coincidence resolution (a factor of two better than BGO-based PET cameras), its timing resolution is nearly an order of magnitude worse than that demonstrated with individual LSO crystals. This paper quantifies the effect on the timing of each component in the Accel timing chain to identify which components most limit the camera's timing resolution. The components in the timing chain are: the scintillator crystal, the photomultiplier tube (PMT), the constant fraction discriminator (CFD), and the time to digital converter (TDC). To measure the contribution of each component, we construct a single crystal test system with high-performance versions of these components. This system achieves 221 ps fwhm coincidence timing resolution, which is used as a baseline measurement. One of the high-performance components is replaced by a production component, the coincidence timing resolution is re-measured, and the difference between measurements is the contribution …

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GaN/InGaN light emitting diodes (LEDs) are commercialized for lighting applications because of the cost efficient way that they produce light of high brightness. Nevertheless, there is significant room for improving their external emission efficiency from typical values below 10 percent to more than 50 percent, which are obtainable by use of other materials systems that, however, do not cover the visible spectrum. In particular, green-light emitting diodes fall short in this respect, which is troublesome since the human eye is most sensitive in this spectral range. In this letter advanced electron microscopy is used to characterize indium segregation in InGaN quantum wells of high-brightness, green LEDs (with external quantum efficiency as high as 15 percent at 75 A/cm2). Our investigations reveal the presence of 1-3 nm wide indium rich clusters in these devices with indium concentrations as large as 0.30-0.40 that narrow the band gap locally to energies as small as 2.65 eV.

Coupled ocean-atmosphere general circulation models (coupled GCMs) with interactive sea ice are the primary tool for investigating possible future global warming and numerous other issues in climate science. A long-standing problem with such models is that when different components of the physical climate system are linked together, the simulated climate can drift away from observations unless constrained by ad hoc adjustments to interface fluxes. However, eleven modern coupled GCMs--including three that do not employ flux adjustments--behave much better in this respect than the older generation of models. Surface temperature trends in control run simulations (with external climate forcing such as solar brightness and atmospheric carbon dioxide held constant) are small compared with observed trends, which include 20th century climate change due to both anthropogenic and natural factors. Sea ice changes in the models are dominated by interannual variations. Deep ocean temperature and salinity trends are small enough for model control runs to extend over 1000 simulated years or more, but trends in some regions, most notably the Arctic, are inconsistent among the models and may be problematic.

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We review the recent proposal that neutrinos are light because their masses are proportional to a low scale, f, of lepton flavor symmetry breaking. This mechanism is testable because the resulting pseudo-Goldstone bosons, of mass m_G, couple strongly with the neutrinos, affecting the acoustic oscillations during the eV era of the early universe that generate the peaks in the CMB radiation. Characteristic signals result over a very wide range of (f, m_G) because of a change in the total relativistic energy density and because the neutrinos scatter rather than free-stream. Thermodynamics allows a precise calculation of the signal, so that observations would not only confirm the late-time neutrino mass mechanism, but could also determine whether the neutrino spectrum is degenerate, inverted or hierarchical and whether the neutrinos are Dirac or Majorana. The flavor symmetries could also give light sterile states. If the masses of the sterile neutrinos turn on after the MeV era, the LSND oscillations can be explained without upsetting big bang nucleosynthesis, and, since the sterile states decay to lighter neutrinos and pseudo-Goldstones, without giving too much hot dark matter.

Oxidative alkaline leaching has been proposed to pre-treat the high-level nuclear waste sludges to remove some of the problematic (e.g., Cr) and/or non-radioactive (e.g., Na, Al) constituents before vitrification. It is critical to understand the behavior of actinides, americium and plutonium in particular, in oxidative alkaline leaching. We have studied the leaching behavior of americium from four different sludge simulants (BiPO{sub 4}, BiPO{sub 4 modified}, Redox, PUREX) using potassium permanganate and potassium persulfate in alkaline solutions. Up to 60% of americium sorbed onto the simulants is leached from the sludges by alkaline persulfate and permanganate. The percentage of americium leached increases with [NaOH] (between 1.0 and 5.0 M). The initial rate of americium leaching by potassium persulfate increases in the order BiPO{sub 4} sludge < Redox sludge < PUREX sludge. The data are most consistent with oxidation of Am{sup 3+} in the sludge to either AmO{sub 2}{sup +} or AmO{sub 2}{sup 2+} in solution. Though neither of these species is expected to exhibit long-term stability in solution, the potential for mobilization of americium from sludge samples would have to be accommodated in the design of any oxidative leaching process for real sludge samples.

The potential energy surface corresponding the complex resonance energy of the 2B1 Feshbach resonance state of the water anion is constructed in its full dimensionality. Complex Kohn variational scattering calculations are used to compute the resonance width, while large-scale Configuration Interaction calculations are used to compute the resonance energy. Near the equilibrium geometry, an accompanying ground state potential surface is constructed from Configuration Interaction calculations that treat correlation at a level similar to that used in the calculations on the anion.

The ATLAS Collaboration at CERN is preparing for the data taking and analysis at the LHC that will start in 2007. Therefore, a series of Data Challenges was started in 2002 whose goals are the validation of the Computing Model, of the complete software suite, of the data model, and to ensure the correctness of the technical choices to be made. A major feature of the first Data Challenge was the preparation and the deployment of the software required for the production of large event samples as a worldwide-distributed activity. It should be noted that it was not an option to ''run everything at CERN'' even if we had wanted to; the resources were not available at CERN to carry out the production on a reasonable time-scale. The great challenge of organizing and then carrying out this large-scale production at a significant number of sites around the world had the refore to be faced. However, the benefits of this are manifold: apart from realizing the required computing resources, this exercise created worldwide momentum for ATLAS computing as a whole. This report describes in detail the main steps carried out in DC1 and what has been learned from them as a …

In the favored progenitor scenario, Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) arise from a white dwarf accreting material from a non-degenerate companion star. Soon after the white dwarf explodes, the ejected supernova material engulfs the companion star; two-dimensional hydrodynamical simulations by Marietta et al. (2001) show that, in the interaction, the companion star carves out a conical hole of opening angle 30-40 degrees in the supernova ejecta. In this paper we use multi-dimensional Monte Carlo radiative transfer calculations to explore the observable consequences of an ejecta-hole asymmetry. We calculate the variation of the spectrum, luminosity, and polarization with viewing angle for the aspherical supernova near maximum light. We find that the supernova looks normal from almost all viewing angles except when one looks almost directly down the hole. In the latter case, one sees into the deeper, hotter layers of ejecta. The supernova is relatively brighter and has a peculiar spectrum characterized by more highly ionized species, weaker absorption features, and lower absorption velocities. The spectrum viewed down the hole is comparable to the class of SN 1991T-like supernovae. We consider how the ejecta-hole asymmetry may explain the current spectropolarimetric observations of SNe Ia, and suggest a few observational signatures of …

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The authors introduce a class of damage models on regular lattices with isotropic interactions between the broken cells of the lattice. Quasistatic fiber bundles are an example. The interactions are assumed to be weak, in the sense that the stress perturbation from a broken cell is much smaller than the mean stress in the system. The system starts intact with a surface-energy threshold required to break any cell sampled from an uncorrelated quenched-disorder distribution. The evolution of this heterogeneous system is ruled by Griffith's principle which states that a cell breaks when the release in potential (elastic) energy in the system exceeds the surface-energy barrier necessary to break the cell. By direct integration over all possible realizations of the quenched disorder, they obtain the probability distribution of each damage configuration at any level of the imposed external deformation. They demonstrate an isomorphism between the distributions so obtained and standard generalized Ising models, in which the coupling constants and effective temperature in the Ising model are functions of the nature of the quenched-disorder distribution and the extent of accumulated damage. In particular, they show that damage models with global load sharing are isomorphic to standard percolation theory, that damage models with …

DOE Order 420.1A, Facility Safety , requires the installation of Criticality Accident Alarm System (CAAS) to detect the radiation from an unplanned and uncontrolled nuclear reaction and to notify building occupants of such an event if the expected dose exceeds 12 rads in free air. DOE Order 420.1A requires that the Nuclear Criticality Safety Program be based on the requirements in ANSI/ANS-8.3-1997 . This standard permits the use of portable criticality detection instruments ''in areas that are not normally occupied.'' This paper provides a basis for a working definition of the term ''not normally occupied'' for the application of APCDs at the Savannah River Site (SRS).

This paper discusses the use of a reference streak camera (SC) to diagnose laser performance and guide modifications to remove high frequency noise from Bechtel Nevada's long-pulse laser. The upgraded laser exhibits less than 0.1% high frequency noise in cumulative spectra, exceeding National Ignition Facility (NIF) calibration specifications. Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF) experiments require full characterization of streak cameras over a wide range of sweep speeds (10 ns to 480 ns). This paradigm of metrology poses stringent spectral requirements on the laser source for streak camera calibration. Recently, Bechtel Nevada worked with a laser vendor to develop a high performance, multi-wavelength Nd:YAG laser to meet NIF calibration requirements. For a typical NIF streak camera with a 4096 x 4096 pixel CCD, the flat field calibration at 30 ns requires a smooth laser spectrum over 33 MHz to 68 GHz. Streak cameras are the appropriate instrumentation for measuring laser amplitude noise at these very high frequencies since the upper end spectral content is beyond the frequency response of typical optoelectronic detectors for a single shot pulse. The SC was used to measure a similar laser at its second harmonic wavelength (532 nm), to establish baseline spectra for testing signal analysis algorithms. …

The chloride-mass-balance (CMB) method has been used extensively to estimate recharge in arid and semi-arid environments. Required data include estimates of annual precipitation, total chloride input (from dry fallout and precipitation), and pore-water chloride concentrations. Typically, CMB has been used to estimate ancient recharge but recharge from recent land-use change has also been documented. Recharge rates below a few mm/yr are reliably detected with CMB; however, estimates above a few mm/yr appear to be less reliable. We tested the CMB method against 26 years of drainage from a 7.6-m-deep lysimeter at a simulated waste-burial ground, located on the Department of Energy s Hanford Site in southeastern Washington State, USA where land-use change has increased recharge rates. Measured drainage from the lysimeter for the past 26 years averaged 62 mm/yr. Precipitation averaged 190 mm/yr with an estimated chloride input of 0.225 mg/L. Initial pore-water chloride concentration was 88 mg/L and decreased to about 6 mg/L after 26 years, while the drainage water decreased to less than 1 mg/L. A recharge estimate made using chloride concentrations in drain water was within 20 percent of the measured drainage rate. In contrast, recharge estimates using 1:1 (water: soil) extracts were lower than actual by …

The generalized Radon (or Hough) transform is a well-known tool for detecting parameterized shapes in an image. The Radon transform is a mapping between the image space and a parameter space. The coordinates of a point in the latter correspond to the parameters of a shape in the image. The amplitude at that point corresponds to the amount of evidence for that shape. In this paper we discuss three important aspects of the Radon transform. The first aspect is discretization. Using concepts from sampling theory we derive a set of sampling criteria for the generalized Radon transform. The second aspect is accuracy. For the specific case of the Radon transform for spheres, we examine how well the location of the maxima matches the true parameters. We derive a correction term to reduce the bias in the estimated radii. The third aspect concerns a projection-based algorithm to reduce memory requirements.