The majority of the world’s Muslim population follows the Sunni branch of Islam, and approximately 10-15% of all Muslims follow the Shiite (Shi‘ite, Shi‘a, Shia) branch. This report includes a historical background of the Sunni-Shiite split and the differences in religious beliefs and practices between and within each Islamic sect as well as their similarities.

This report includes background and analysis of energy policy. Points of discussion include the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, nuclear energy, and renewable energy and fuels.

Legislation establishing a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) (P.L. 107-296) included provisions for an information analysis element within the new department. It did not transfer to DHS existing government intelligence and law enforcement agencies but envisioned an analytical office utilizing the products of other agencies — both unevaluated information and finished reports — to provide warning of terrorist attacks, assessments of vulnerability, and recommendations for remedial actions at federal, state, and local levels, and by the private sector. In January 2003, the Administration announced its intention to establish a new Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC) to undertake many of the tasks envisioned for the DHS informational analysis element, known as Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection (IAIP), but some Members of Congress argue that TTIC cannot be a substitute for a DHS analytical effort. This report examines different approaches to improving the information analysis function and the sharing of information among federal agencies.

This document presents the underlying theory for an unsteady computational model of the transient aerothermodynamics of a deformable vehicle entering an atmosphere at hypersonic speeds. Many unique features of the problem require unusual computational capabilities. The large accelerations associated with the vehicle's flight dynamics results in the body-fixed reference frame being non-inertial, and the governing equations must be modified to include this effect. The vehicle's structural deformations and ablation requires the inclusion of the effects of a moving solid boundary, with a nonuniform mass flux across that boundary. A computational chemistry capability must be included to treat the thermochemical nonequilibrium of the high-temperature gas dynamics, and the reactions between the ablation products and the dissociated air. The theory required to treat these phenomena are described in this report.

Vehicles moving at hypersonic speeds have great importance to the National Security. Ballistic missile re-entry vehicles (RV's) travel at hypersonic speeds, as do missile defense intercept vehicles. Despite the importance of the problem, no computational analysis method is available to predict the aerodynamic environment of maneuvering hypersonic vehicles, and no analysis is available to predict the transient effects of their shape changes. The present state-of-the-art for hypersonic flow calculations typically still considers steady flow about fixed shapes. Additionally, with present computational methods, it is not possible to compute the entire transient structural and thermal loads for a re-entry vehicle. The objective of this research is to provide the required theoretical development and a computational analysis tool for calculating the hypersonic flow about maneuvering, deforming RV's. This key enabling technology will allow the development of a complete multi-mechanics simulation of the entire RV flight sequence, including important transient effects such as complex flight dynamics. This will allow the computation of the as-delivered state of the payload in both normal and unusual operational environments. This new analysis capability could also provide the ability to predict the nonlinear, transient behavior of endo-atmospheric missile interceptor vehicles to the input of advanced control systems. Due …

A technique was developed to extrude thin glass tubes from a glass-polyethersulfone-solvent (NMP) paste with a glass to polymer weight ratio of about 8. The extrudates were gelled in water and heat treated at 800-950 C to remove the polymer and sinter the particles to a dense glass structure. Subsequently, the tubes were leached in hot water to remove the soluble phase formed by phase separation during cooling. The tubes were characterized by XRD, SEM, and permeation measurements. SEM examination indicated that during leaching the glass developed pores of about 100 nm size. Permeation measurements showed lack of separation selectivity consistent with the pore size observed in SEM.

An external gelation process was developed to produce spherical granules that contain metal hydride particles in a sol-gel matrix. Dimensionally stable granules containing metal hydrides are needed for applications such as hydrogen separation and hydrogen purification that require columns containing metal hydrides. Gases must readily flow through the metal hydride beds in the columns. Metal hydrides reversibly absorb and desorb hydrogen and hydrogen isotopes. This is accompanied by significant volume changes that cause the metal hydride to break apart or decrepitate. Repeated cycling results in very fine metal hydride particles that are difficult to handle and contain. Fine particles tend to settle and pack making it more difficult to flow gases through a metal hydride bed. Furthermore, the metal hydrides can exert a significant force on the containment vessel as they expand. These problems associated with metal hydrides can be eliminated with the granulation process described in this report. Small agglomerates of metal hydride particles and abietic acid (a pore former) were produced and dispersed in a colloidal silica/water suspension to form the feed slurry. Fumed silica was added to increase the viscosity of the feed slurry which helped to keep the agglomerates in suspension. Drops of the feed slurry …

In this report we summarize findings from a study of the predicted performance of a suite of application codes taken from the research environment and analyzed against a modeling framework for the HTMT architecture. We find that the inward bandwidth of the data vortex may be a limiting factor for some applications. We also find that available memory in the cryogenic layer is a constraining factor in the partitioning of applications into parcels. The architecture in several examples may be inadequately exploited; in particular, applications typically did not capitalize well on the available computational power or data organizational capability in the PIM layers. The application suite provided significant examples of wide excursions from the accepted (if simplified) program execution model--in particular, by required complex in-SPELL synchronization between parcels. The availability of the HTMT-C emulation environment did not contribute significantly to the ability to analyze applications, because of the large gap between the available hardware descriptions and parameters in the modeling framework and the types of data that could be collected via HTMT-C emulation runs. Detailed analysis of application performance, and indeed further credible development of the HTMT-inspired program execution model and system architecture, requires development of much better tools. Chief …

Operation Iraqi Freedom accomplished a long-standing objective, the overthrow and capture of Saddam Hussein, but replacing that regime with a stable, moderate, democratic political structure has run into difficulty. Past U.S. efforts to change the regime failed because of limited U.S. commitment, disorganization of the Iraqi opposition, and the efficiency and ruthlessness of Iraq’s several overlapping security services. Previous U.S. Administrations had ruled out major U.S. military action to change Iraq’s regime, believing such action would be risky and not necessarily justified by the level of Iraq’s lack of compliance on WMD disarmament.

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We validated COG, a 3D Monte Carlo radiation transport code, against experimental data and MNCP4C simulations from the Shielding Integral Benchmark Archive Database (SINBAD) compiled by RSICC. We modeled three experiments: the Osaka Nickel and Aluminum sphere experiments conducted at the OKTAVIAN facility, and the liquid oxygen experiment conducted at the FNS facility. COG results are in good agreement with experimental data and generally within a few % of MCNP results. There are several possible sources of discrepancy between MCNP and COG results: (1) the cross-section database versions are different, MCNP uses ENDFB VI 1.1 while COG uses ENDFB VIR7, (2) the code implementations are different, and (3) the models may differ slightly. We also limited the use of variance reduction methods when running the COG version of the problems.

The preparation of Cu, Co, Fe, Cu/Co, Cu/Fe and Co/Fe nano-particle metal loaded mesoporous 1 mm spherical granular {gamma}-Al{sub 2}O{sub 3} catalysts, by combined sol-gel/oil-drop methods followed by calcination and hydrogenation steps, is accomplished. Parameters for calcination process were optimized using DTA. The properties of metal loaded {gamma}-Al{sub 2}O{sub 3} granules were compared for the preparations starting with two precursors: aluminum tri-sec-butoxide (ALTSB) and aluminum tri-iso-propoxide (ALTIP). Three sol-gel/oil-drop catalyst preparation methods; (1) Metal nitrate solutions co-entrapped-sol-gel (2) nano-particle metal oxide co-entrapped-sol-gel, and (3) Metal impregnation on preformed alumina granules, were used. Structure and composition of metal-loaded-granules were investigated using XRD, SEM, EDX, and surface area measurements (BET method). The nano-particle nature of catalysts was confirmed using SEM and X-ray diffraction. The reduction efficiency of hydrogenation of catalysts was examined by magnetic studies using a vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM). Catalysts could be effectively calcined at 450 C and the surface area values obtained were between 200-350 m{sup 2}/g, indicating the mesoporous nature of catalyst support. Parameters affecting the metal loading process were also studied, and the optimum conditions were identified and reported for reproducible synthesis of the metal loaded {gamma}-alumina granular particles. The catalyst activities of Fe, Co, and Co/Fe …

This report provides information about the Country Applicability of the U.S. Normal Trade Relations (Most-Favored-Nation) Status. The united states extends unlimitedand permanent nondiscriminatory treatment to all of its trading partners.

The United States accords permanent normal-trade-relations (NTR) (formerly called most-favored-nation (MFN)) treatment to all its trading partners except six countries to which it is denied by law and 11 countries whose NTR status is temporary and subject to the conditions of Title IV of the Trade Act of 1974.

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Workforce Investment Act (WIA) has been in effect for several years and is currently undergoing reauthorization. In order to provide the Congress with information on the implementation and effectiveness of the WIA youth program, GAO was asked to explore how services have been delivered at the local level, whether the Department of Labor's guidance has addressed challenges faced by local areas, and how effective the program has been."

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