Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Authority of a home-rule city to permit a city council member to participate in the municipal group health insurance program (RQ-0071-GA)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether a juvenile court may detain a child under section 53.02 or 54.01, Family Code, before adjudicating and disposing of a charge of delinquent conduct, psych as contempt of a justice court order (RQ-0072-GA)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether the mayor of a home-rule city is prohibited by article XVI, section 40 of the Texas Constitution or the common-law doctrine of incompatibility from serving as a county purchasing agent under section 262.0115 of the Local Government Code (RQ-0076-GA)

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In the past two runs of RHIC, the first measurements with polarized proton beams have been performed. For many years to come, the RHIC spin program will offer exciting physics, exploring QCD and the nucleon in new ways. The aim of this small workshop was to attract several spin theorists to the center for about two weeks, in order to collaborate with both experimentalists and theorists at RBRC, and to initiate and/or complete studies of relevance to RHIC spin. A major focus of polarized-pp measurements at RHIC is on measuring the spin-dependent gluon density, {Delta}g. A channel for accessing {Delta}g is high-p{sub T} pion production. The unpolarized cross section for this reaction has been measured by PHENIX and was found in good agreement with a perturbative-QCD based (NLO) calculation. It was a remarkable and exciting coincidence that PHENIX presented also the first results for the spin asymmetry for {rvec p}{rvec p} {yields} {pi}{sup 0}X during this workshop. This sparked a lot of additional activity and discussion. First steps toward the interpretation of the data were taken. Marco Stratmann and Barbara Jager (Regensburg University) presented recent work on the NLO calculation of the polarized cross section and the spin asymmetry, setting …

This effort attempts to demonstrate that environmentally acceptable energetic sol-gel coated flash metal multilayer nanocomposites can be used to replace current impact initiated devices (IIDs) which have hazardous and toxic components. Successful completion of this project will result in IIDs that include innocuous compounds, have sufficient output energy for initiation, meet current military specifications, are small, cost competitive, and perform as well as or better than current devices. We expect flash metal multilayer and sol-gel to be generic technologies applicable to a wide range of devices, especially in small caliber ammunition and sub-munitions. We will replace the NOL-130 mixture with a nanocomposite that consists of a mechanically robust energetic multilayer foil that has been coated with a sol-gel energetic material. The exothermic reactions are activated in this nanocomposite are the transformation of the multilayer material to its respective intermetallic alloy and the thermite reaction, which is characterized by very high temperatures, a small pressure pulse, and hot particle ejection. The proposed materials and their reaction products consist of, but are not limited to aluminum, nickel, iron, aluminum oxide, titanium, iron oxide and boron. These materials have much more desirable environmental and health characteristics than the NOL-130 composition.

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This study assesses five steps for Tank 241-AN-105 waste retrieval and subsequent pipeline transfer: 1. Remove supernatant liquid waste from AN-105 and transfer it through a pipeline with inline dilution with water (1st liquid waste transfer). 2. Add water (as a diluent) to Tank AN-105. 3. Mix the saltcake waste and water with mixer pumps to dissolve soluble solids. 4. Let undissolved solids settle to the tank bottom. 5. Remove the resulting supernatant liquid waste from Tank AN-105 (2nd liquid waste transfer). To assess these five steps for waste retrieval and pipeline transfer, AN-105 waste rheology was measured and solids identified with bright field image, select area diffraction, and energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy. By combining available in situ and laboratory data, an AN-105 specific viscosity model was developed that can change from several centiPoise of viscosity to tens of millions of centiPoise as a function of strain rate and solid concentration. This viscosity mo del was implemented into the AN-105 computer model to simulate pump jet mixing. The report also evaluates AN-105 slurry waste transfer to AP-102 and AP-104 through a 3-inch (0.07-m) pipeline.

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Summaries of the activities and accomplishments during this second quarter reporting period for each of the consortium participants are given. Some of the highlights for this reporting period include: Even without the forcing speaker, the ''Mozart'' device on the GCM geometry provides over 20% reduction in drag at 0 degree yaw and above 25% reductions at higher yaw angles; Experiments and computations guide a conceptual design for reduction of drag due to tractor-trailer gap flow; RANS simulations for the GTS geometry are being finalized for development of clear modeling guidelines with RANS; Simulations on the GCM geometry have begun; and Vortex methods have improved techniques for the treatment of vorticity near surfaces.

A research effort was undertaken to determine the need for any changes to USNRC's seismic regulatory practice to reflect the move, in the earthquake engineering community, toward using expected displacement rather than force (or stress) as the basis for assessing design adequacy. The research explored the extent to which displacement based seismic design methods, such as given in FEMA 273, could be useful for reviewing nuclear power stations. Two structures common to nuclear power plants were chosen to compare the results of the analysis models used. The first structure is a four-story frame structure with shear walls providing the primary lateral load system, referred herein as the shear wall model. The second structure is the turbine building of the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant. The models were analyzed using both displacement based (pushover) analysis and nonlinear dynamic analysis. In addition, for the shear wall model an elastic analysis with ductility factors applied was also performed. The objectives of the work were to compare the results between the analyses, and to develop insights regarding the work that would be needed before the displacement based analysis methodology could be considered applicable to facilities licensed by the NRC. A summary of the research …

Superconducting combined function magnets will be utilized for the 50GeV-750kW proton beam line for the J-PARC neutrino experiment and an R and D program has been launched at KEK. The magnet is designed to provide a combined function with a dipole field of 2.59 T and a quadrupole field of 18.7 T/m in a coil aperture of 173.4 mm. A single layer coil is proposed to reduce the fabrication cost and the coil arrangement in the 2-D cross-section results in left-right asymmetry. This paper reports the design study of the magnet.

The radioactive wastes stored in tanks 241-C-201, 241-C-202, 241-C-203, and 241-C-204 (the C-200 series tanks) are to be retrieved with the C-200 vacuum retrieval system (VRS). The VRS will suck the waste up through an articulated mast system, separate it from the suspending air, collect and transfer it to a receiver batch tank, and return the air as exhaust to the waste tank being retrieved. An analysis of potential accidents has indicated that a break in the line used to return the exhaust to the waste tank could release unacceptable quantities of suspended radioactive material to the environment. To estimate the quantity of suspended material and determine accident risks, CH2M HILL and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) conducted tests with the VRS using nonradioactive waste simulants at the Hanford Cold Test Facility. This report describes the tests conducted and presents and discusses the results.

The new heavy ion synchrotron facility proposed by GSI will have two superconducting magnet rings in the same tunnel, with rigidities of 300T{center_dot}m and 10OT{center_dot}m. Fast ramp times are needed. These can cause problems of ac loss and field distortion in the magnets. For the high energy ring, a lm model dipole magnet has been built, based on the RHIC dipole design. This magnet was tested under boiling liquid helium in a vertical dewar. The quench current showed very little dependence on ramp rate. The ac losses, measured by an electrical method, were fitted to straight line plots of loss/cycle versus ramp rate, thereby separating the eddy current and hysteresis components. These results were compared with calculated values, using parameters which had previously been measured on short samples of cable. Reasonably good agreement between theory and experiment was found, although the measured hysteresis loss is higher than expected in ramps to the highest field levels.

Seismic imaging and tracking methods have intelligence and monitoring applications. Current systems, however, do not adequately calibrate or model the unknown geological heterogeneity. Current systems are also not designed for rapid data acquisition and analysis in the field. This project seeks to build the core technological capabilities coupled with innovative deployment, processing, and analysis methodologies to allow seismic methods to be effectively utilized in the applications of seismic imaging and vehicle tracking where rapid (minutes to hours) and real-time analysis is required. The goal of this project is to build capabilities in acquisition system design, utilization and in full 3D finite difference modeling as well as statistical characterization of geological heterogeneity. Such capabilities coupled with a rapid field analysis methodology based on matched field processing are applied to problems associated with surveillance, battlefield management, finding hard and deeply buried targets, and portal monitoring. This project benefits the U.S. military and intelligence community in support of LLNL's national-security mission. FY03 was the final year of this project. In the 2.5 years this project has been active, numerous and varied developments and milestones have been accomplished. A wireless communication module for seismic data was developed to facilitate rapid seismic data acquisition and …

The production of a Higgs boson in association with a pair of e quarks will play a very important role at both hadron and lepton colliders. We review the status of theoretical predictions and their relevance to Higgs boson studies, with particular emphasis on the recently calculated NLO QCD corrections to the inclusive cross section for p{bar p}, pp {yields} t{bar t}h. We conclude by briefly discussing the case of exclusive b{bar b}h production and the potential of this process in revealing signals of new physics beyond the Standard Model.

The US Department of Energy (DOE), in order to increase the diversity of rock types under consideration by the geologic disposal program, initiated the Sedimary ROck Program (SERP), whose immediate objectiv eis to evaluate five types of secimdnary rock - sandstone, chalk, carbonate rocks (limestone and dolostone), anhydrock, and shale - to determine the potential for siting a geologic repository. The evaluation of these five rock types, together with the ongoing salt studies, effectively results in the consideration of all types of relatively impermeable sedimentary rock for repository purposes. The results of this evaluation are expressed in terms of a ranking of the five rock types with respect to their potential to serve as a geologic repository host rock. This comparative evaluation was conducted on a non-site-specific basis, by use of generic information together with rock evaluation criteria (RECs) derived from the DOE siting guidelines for geologic repositories (CFR 1984). An information base relevant to rock evaluation using these RECs was developed in hydrology, geochemistry, rock characteristics (rock occurrences, thermal response, rock mechanics), natural resources, and rock dissolution. Evaluation against postclosure and preclosure RECs yielded a ranking of the five subject rocks with respect to their potential as repository host …

The Picosecond Laser-Electron Inter-Action for the Dynamic Evaluation of Structures (PLEIADES) facility, is a unique, novel, tunable (10-200 keV), ultrafast (ps-fs), hard x-ray source that greatly extends the parameter range reached by existing 3rd generation sources, both in terms of x-ray energy range, pulse duration, and peak brightness at high energies. First light was observed at 70 keV early in 2003, and the experimental data agrees with 3D codes developed at LLNL. The x-rays are generated by the interaction of a 50 fs Fourier-transform-limited laser pulse produced by the TW-class FALCON CPA laser and a highly focused, relativistic (20-100 MeV), high brightness (1 nC, 0.3-5 ps, 5 mm.mrad, 0.2% energy spread) photo-electron bunch. The resulting x-ray brightness is expected to exceed 10{sup 20} ph/mm{sup 2}/s/mrad{sup 2}/0.1% BW. The beam is well-collimated (10 mrad divergence over the full spectrum, 1 mrad for a single color), and the source is a unique tool for time-resolved dynamic measurements in matter, including high-Z materials.

Improved models of contaminant migration in heterogeneous, variably saturated porous media are required to better define the long-term stewardship requirements for U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) lands and to assist in the design of effective vadose-zone barriers to contaminant migrations. The objective of our three-year project is to meet the DOE need by developing new experimental approaches to describe adsorption and transport of contaminants in heterogeneous, variably saturated media (i.e., the vadose zone). The research specifically addresses the behavior of strontium, a high priority DOE contaminant. However, the key benefit of this research is improved conceptual models of how all contaminants migrate through heterogeneous, variably-saturated, porous media. Research activities are driven by the hypothesis that the reactivity of variably saturated porous media is dependent on the moisture content of the medium and can be represented by a relatively simple function applicable over a range of scales, contaminants, and media. A key and novel aspect of our research is the use of the 2-meter radius geocentrifuge capabilities at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) to conduct unsaturated reactive transport experiments (Figure 1). The experimental approach using the geocentrifuge provides data in a much shorter time period than conventional methods allowing us to …

Accelerator control system applications at Berkeley Lab's Advanced Light Source (ALS) are typically deployed on operator consoles running Microsoft Windows 2000 and utilize EPICS[2]channel access for data access. In an effort to accommodate the wide variety of Windows based development tools and developers with little experience in network programming, ActiveX controls have been deployed on the operator stations. Use of ActiveX controls for use in the accelerator control environment has been presented previously[1]. Here we report on some of our experiences with the use and development of these controls.

Experiments were performed on horizontal air-water bubbly two-phase flow, axial flow, stratified wavy flow, and annular flow. Theoretical studies were also undertaken on interfacial parameters for a horizontal two-phase flow.

Non-invasive, high resolution geophysical mapping of the shallow subsurface is necessary for delineation of buried hazardous wastes, detecting unexploded ordinance, verifying and monitoring of containment or moisture contents, and other environmental applications. Electromagnetic (EM) techniques can be used for this purpose since electrical conductivity and dielectric permittivity are representative of the subsurface media. Measurements in the EM frequency band between 1 and 100 MHz are very important for such applications, because the induction number of many targets is small and the ability to determine the subsurface distribution of both electrical properties is required. Earlier workers were successful in developing systems for detecting anomalous areas, but quantitative interpretation of the data was difficult. Accurate measurements are necessary, but difficult to achieve for high-resolution imaging of the subsurface. We are developing a broadband non-invasive method for accurately mapping the electrical conductivity and dielectric permittivity of the shallow subsurface using an EM impedance approach similar to the MT exploration technique. Electric and magnetic sensors were tested to ensure that stray EM scattering is minimized and the quality of the data collected with the high-frequency impedance (HFI) system is good enough to allow high-resolution, multi-dimensional imaging of hidden targets. Additional efforts are being made …

Superconducting insertion devices, which produce periodic magnetic fields, have been built and installed in a number of synchrotron-light source storage-rings. For the most part, these devices have been wigglers, which have relatively long period lengths. This report concerns itself with the special cryogenic issues associated with short period undulators. The motivation for considering the incorporation of superconducting technology in insertion device designs is to achieve higher magnetic fields than can be achieved with more conventional permanent magnet technology. Since the peak field decreases sharply with increased magnet gap to period ratio, the cryogenic design of the magnet system is crucial. In particular, the insulation required for a warm vacuum bore device is impractical for short period undulators. This report describes the issues that are related to a cold bore ({approx}4 K) and an intermediate temperature bore (30 to 70 K) designs. The criteria for the use of small cryocoolers for cooling a short period undulator are presented. The problems associated with connecting small coolers to an undulator at 4.2 K are discussed.

We found that exposure of an intact pine forest (Duke FACTS1 experiment) to an increase in atmospheric CO2 of 200 ul(sup -1) operating through a sustained increase of photosynthesis, caused a 27% increase in net primary production and a 41% stimulation in net ecosystem production. A stimulation of this magnitude would store ~10% of the fossil fuel CO2 in the atmosphere by the year 2050. This series of physiological measurements provided new insights into processes regulating the forest carbon cycle under elevated CO2. Combined with ongoing measurements of tree growth data from this research contributes to a dynamic forest carbon budget that provides a benchmark for other modeling and empirical studies.