A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Recent violations uncovered in the mutual fund industry raised questions about the ethical practices of the industry and the quality of its oversight. A widespread abuse involved mutual fund companies' investment advisers (firms that provide management and other services to funds) entering into undisclosed arrangements with favored customers to permit market timing (frequent trading to profit from short-term pricing discrepancies) in contravention of stated trading limits. These arrangements harmed long-term mutual fund shareholders by increasing transaction costs and lowering fund returns. Questions have also been raised as to why the New York State Attorney General's Office disclosed the trading abuses in September 2003 before the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which is the mutual fund industry's primary regulator. Accordingly, this report (1) identifies the reasons that SEC did not detect the abuses at an earlier stage and the lessons learned in not doing so, and (2) assesses the steps that SEC has taken to strengthen its mutual fund oversight program and improve mutual fund company operations."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The tax-exempt sector under section 501(c) of the Internal Revenue Code covers over a million-and-a-half entities of varying sizes and purposes. Its diversity allows it to address the needs of many citizens. To help it do so, Congress and some in the tax-exempt sector itself encourage good governance practices by exempt entities. Transparency over exempt entities' activities is aided by public access to their annual tax returns. As the nation's tax administrator, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has a key role in overseeing this sector. Oversight can help ensure adherence to exempt purposes, protect against abuses, and sustain public support for the sector. The Chairman of the House Committee on Ways and Means asked GAO to address (1) the growth of the section 501(c) tax-exempt sector; (2) the role of governance and transparency in ensuring that tax-exempt entities function effectively and with integrity; (3) IRS's capacity for overseeing the exempt sector, including its results and efforts to address critical compliance problems; and (4) states' oversight and their relationship with IRS in overseeing the tax-exempt sector."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "In the past, governments worldwide owned, operated, and regulated air navigation services, viewing air traffic control as a governmental function. But as nations faced increasing financial strains, many governments decided to shift the responsibility to an independent air navigation service provider (ANSP) that operates along commercial lines. As of March 2005, 38 nations worldwide had commercialized their air navigation services, fundamentally shifting the operational and financial responsibility for providing these services from the national government to an independent commercial authority. GAO selected five ANSPs--in Australia, Canada, Germany, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom--to examine characteristics and experiences of commercialized air navigation services. These ANSPs used different ownership structures and varied in terms of their size, amount of air traffic handled, and complexity of their airspace. This testimony, which is based on ongoing work, addresses the following questions: (1) What are common characteristics of commercialized ANSPs? (2) What do available data show about how the safety, cost, and efficiency of air navigation services have changed since commercialization? (3) What are some initial observations that can be made about the commercialization of air navigation services?"

Other written product issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "An international peer review team with representatives from the supreme audit institutions of Canada, Australia, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, South Africa, and Sweden reviewed the quality assurance system that the United States Government Accountability Office (GAO) has established for managing its performance audit practice. The GAO's quality assurance system encompasses its organizational structure and the policies and procedures established to provide it with reasonable assurance of complying with Government Auditing Standards. The GAO is responsible for the design of its quality assurance system and compliance with it, including the quality of its products. The responsibility of the peer review team is to express an opinion on whether the system is suitably designed and operating effectively to meet its objective. The criteria the peer review team used to assess the GAO's quality assurance system were drawn from GAO legislative authorities, Government Auditing Standards, and the GAO performance audit manual. The peer review team conducted the review in accordance with the peer review standards in Government Auditing Standards, and in a manner consistent with the Code of Ethics and auditing standards issued by the International Organization of Supreme …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) plays a key role in coordinating the nation's homeland security efforts with stakeholders in the federal, state, local, and private sectors. While GAO has conducted numerous reviews of specific DHS missions, such as border and transportation security and emergency preparedness, this testimony addresses overall DHS management issues. This testimony addresses (1) why GAO designated DHS's transformation as a high-risk area; and (2) the specific management challenges facing DHS."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "In 2002, the Coast Guard began a multiyear, $19 billion to $24 billion acquisition program to replace or modernize its fleet of deepwater aircraft and cutters, so called because they are capable of operating many miles off the coast. For several years now, the Coast Guard has been warning that the existing fleet--especially cutters--was failing at an unsustainable rate, and it began studying options for replacing or modernizing the fleet more rapidly. Faster replacement is designed to avoid some of the costs that might be involved in keeping aging assets running for longer periods. This testimony, which is based both on current and past GAO work, addresses several issues related to these considerations: (1) changes in the condition of deepwater legacy assets during fiscal years 2000 through 2004; (2) actions the Coast Guard has taken to maintain and upgrade deepwater legacy assets; and (3) management challenges the Coast Guard faces in acquiring new assets, especially if a more aggressive schedule is adopted."

indicates that 2|Vub / Vcb/ Vus| = (1-z) with z given by z = 0.19 +(-) 0.14. This fact implies that irrespective of the form of the quark Yukawa matrices, the measured value of the SM CP phase beta is approximately the maximum allowed by the measured absolute values of the CKM elements. This is beta = pi/6 - z/sqrt{3} for gamma = pi/3 + z/sqrt{3}, which implies alpha = pi/2. Alternatively, assuming that beta is exactly maximal and using the experimental measurement, sin(2beta) = 0.726+(-) 0.037, the phase gamma is predicted to be gamma = pi/2 - beta = 66.3 +(-) 1.7. The maximality of beta, if confirmed by the near-future experiments, may give us some clues as to the origin of CP violation.

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 section 6.025(d) of the Tax Code violates article VIII, section 1(a), (b) and 18(c) of the Texas Constitution (RQ-0285-GA)

The Constitution sets forth the general principles which control the procedural aspects of impeachment, vesting the power to impeach in the House of Representatives, while imbuing the Senate with the power to try impeachments. Both the Senate and the House have designed procedures to implement these general principles in dealing with a wide range of impeachment issues. This report provides a brief overview of the impeachment process, reflecting the roles of both the House and the Senate during the course of an impeachment inquiry and trial.

None

None

None

Comparison of the metal reduction efforts between a sampled acidophile alphaprotebacteria (Acidiphilium cryptum JF-5) and a neutrophile deltaprotebacteria (Geobacter spp.), for the purposes of discovering if the two samples reduce metal with similar structured organelles.

The overall objective of this paper is to carry out field investigations to assess the potential for immobilizing and detoxifying chromium-contaminated groundwater using lactate-stimulated bioreduction of Cr(VI) to Cr(III) at the Hanford 100H site.

Stimulation of U(VI) bioreduction is becoming an attractive in-situ method for stabilizing U in contaminated sediments. After reduction of U(VI) is completed in sediments, how stable is bioreduced U(IV) upon exposure to oxidizing groundwaters?

Plutonium contamination in the environment is generally low-level and may be present and transported in a range of forms (IV, V, VI). Current remediation strategies are costly, financially and in terms of increased exposure risk to people and the environment. In situ bacterial biostabilization is a promising alternative.

Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) received funding from DOE EM-21, Office of Cleanup Technologies, to develop the rotary microfilter for high level radioactive service. One aspect of this project evaluated alternative filter media to select one for the 2nd generation rotary microfilter being procured as a prefilter to a small column ion exchange process. The authors conducted screening tests on a variety of filter media and pore sizes using a stirred cell followed by pilot-scale testing on a more limited number of filter media and pore sizes with a three disk rotary microfilter. These tests used 5.6 molar sodium supernate, and sludge plus monosodium titanate (MST) solids. The conclusions from this work are: (1) The 0.1 {micro} nominal TruMem{reg_sign} ceramic and the Pall PMM M050 (0.5 {micro} nominal) stainless steel filter media produced the highest flux in rotary filter testing. (2) The Pall PMM M050 media produced the highest flux of the stainless steel media tested in rotary filter testing. (3) The Pall PMM M050 media met filtrate quality requirements for the rotary filter. (4) The 0.1 {micro} TruMem{reg_sign} and 0.1 {micro} Pall PMM media met filtrate quality requirements as well. (5) The Pall PMM M050 media produced comparable flux …

None

None

None

Using a glancing synchrotron X-ray beam (Advanced Photon Source, Beamline 12BM, Argonne National Laboratory), Debye-Scherrer diffraction patterns from thermally grown oxides on NiAl samples were recorded during oxidation at 1000 or 1100 C in air. The diffraction patterns were analyzed to determine strain and phase changes in the oxide scale as it developed and evolved. Strain was obtained from measurements of the elliptical distortion of the Debye-Scherrer rings, where data from several rings of a single phase were used. Results were obtained from {alpha}-Al{sub 2}O{sub 3} as well as from the transition alumina, in this case {theta}-Al{sub 2}O{sub 3}, which formed during the early stage. Compressive stress was found in the first-formed transition alumina, but the initial stress in {alpha}-Al{sub 2}O{sub 3} was tensile, with a magnitude high enough to cause Al{sub 2}O{sub 3} fracture. New {alpha}-Al{sub 2}O{sub 3} patches nucleated at the scale/alloy interface and spread laterally and upward. This transformation not only puts the alpha alumina in tension, but can also cause the transition alumina to be in tension. After a complete {alpha}-Al{sub 2}O{sub 3} layer formed at the interface, the strain level in {alpha}-Al{sub 2}O{sub 3} became compressive, reaching a steady state level around -75 MPa at …

The objectives of this meeting are: (1) Understand fundamental biogeochemical processes influencing the use of bioremediation approaches for cleaning up, managing, or understanding fate and transport of metals and radionuclides at DOE's contaminated legacy waste sites; and (2) Promote coordination and efficient use of resources, and facilitate comparison and integration of data.

Image collection of composition, reactivity, and regulation of extracellular metal-reducing structures (nanowires) produced by dissimilatory metal reducing bacteria.

Chromium, one of the problematic elements in tank sludges, is considered the most important constituent in defining the total volume of high-level radioactive waste (HLW) glass. Current sludge washing processes (e.g. caustic leaching, 3 M NaOH) are not effective in removing Cr. This inefficient removal would result in production of an unacceptably large volume of HLW glass and thus a tremendous increase in the cost of waste disposal. This proposed research seeks to develop fundamental data for chromium (Cr) reactions that are not currently available but are essential for developing effective methodologies for removing Cr form high-level waste (HLW). Our objectives are to study (1) the dissolution of several solid phases (e.g., CrOOH, Cr2O3(c), Cr(OH)3, and Fe and Cr, binary hydroxides, identified to be important from sludge leaching studies) in highly alkaline solutions and in the presence of other electrolytes (e.g., carbonate, phosphate, sulfate, nitrite), and (2) the effect of the nature of Cr solid phases and aqueous species on their redox reactivity with a variety of potential oxidants (e.g., H2o2, persulfate, O2, and ferrate). This information will provide critical support for developing enhanced pretreatment strategies for removing Cr from HLW and will achieve a major cost reduction HLW disposal.