Annual Illness and Injury Surveillance Program report for the Hanford site. The IISP monitors illnesses and health conditions that result in an absence of workdays, occupational injuries and illnesses, and disabilities and deaths among current workers. The prpogram is part of DOE's commitment to assuring the health and safety of its workers and includes the conduct of epidemiologic surveillance activities that provide an early warning system for health problems among workers.

Annual Illness and Injury Surveillance Program report for 2004 for the Hanford site. The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) commitment to assuring the health and safety of its workers includes the conduct of epidemiologic surveillance activities that provide an early warning system for health problems among workers. The IISP monitors illnesses and health conditions that result in an absence of workdays, occupational injuries and illnesses, and disabilities and deaths among current workers.

Annual Illness and Injury Surveillance Program for 2004 for the Hanford site. The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) commitment to assuring the health and safety of its workers includes the conduct of epidemiologic surveillance activities that provide an early warning system for health problems among workers. The Illness and Injury Surveillance Program monitors illnesses and health conditions that result in an absence of workdays, occupational injuries and illnesses, and disabilities and deaths among current workers.

Aqueous solutions (mixed waste) generated from various LLNL operations, such as debris washing, sample preparation and analysis, and equipment maintenance and cleanout, were combined for storage in the B695 tank farm. Prior to combination the individual waste streams had different codes depending on the particular generating process and waste characteristics. The largest streams were CWC 132, 791, 134, 792. Several smaller waste streams were also included. This combined waste stream was treated at LLNL's waste treatment facility using a vacuum filtration and cool vapor evaporation process in preparation for discharge to sanitary sewer. Prior to discharge, the treated waste stream was sampled and the results were reviewed by LLNL's water monitoring specialists. The treated solution was discharged following confirmation that it met the discharge criteria. A major source, accounting for 50% for this waste stream, is metal machining, cutting and grinding operations in the engineering machine shops in B321/B131. An additional 7% was from similar operations in B131 and B132S. This waste stream primarily contains metal cuttings from machined parts, machining coolant and water, with small amounts of tramp oil from the machining and grinding equipment. Several waste reduction measures for the B321 machine shop have been taken, including the …

The Department of Energy Environmental Management Program is faced with two major issues involving two-phase flow in fractured rock; specifically, transport of dissolved contaminants in the Vadose Zone, and the fate of Dense Nonaqueous Phase Liquids (DNAPLs) below the water table. Conceptual models currently used to address these problems do not correctly include the influence of the fractures, thus leading to erroneous predictions. Recent work has shown that it is crucial to understand the topology, or 'structure' of the fluid phases (air/water or water/DNAPL) within the subsurface.

U.S. efforts to promote the international expansion of nuclear energy through the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) will result in a dramatic expansion of nuclear fuel cycle facilities in the United States. New demonstration facilities, such as the Advanced Fuel Cycle Facility (AFCF), the Advanced Burner Reactor (ABR), and the Consolidated Fuel Treatment Center (CFTC) will use advanced nuclear and chemical process technologies that must incorporate increased proliferation resistance to enhance nuclear safeguards. The ASA-100 Project, “Advanced Safeguards Approaches for New Nuclear Fuel Cycle Facilities,” commissioned by the NA-243 Office of NNSA, has been tasked with reviewing and developing advanced safeguards approaches for these demonstration facilities. Because one goal of GNEP is developing and sharing proliferation-resistant nuclear technology and services with partner nations, the safeguards approaches considered are consistent with international safeguards as currently implemented by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). This first report reviews possible safeguards approaches for the new fuel reprocessing processes to be deployed at the AFCF and CFTC facilities. Similar analyses addressing the ABR and transuranic (TRU) fuel fabrication lines at AFCF and CFTC will be presented in subsequent reports.

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This Report contains the U.S. Wind Power Installation, Cost, performance trends in 2006.

We present a novel Morse Theory approach for the analysis of the complex topology of the Rayleigh-Taylor mixing layer. We automatically extract bubble structures at multiple scales and identify the resolution of interest. Quantitative analysis of bubble counts over time highlights distinct mixing trends for a high-resolution Direct Numerical Simulation (DNS) [1].

In my five years as the Director of the Advanced Photon Source (APS), I have been fortunate to see major growth in the scientific impact from the APS. This year I am particularly enthusiastic about prospects for our longer-term future. Every scientific instrument must remain at the cutting edge to flourish. Our plans for the next generation of APS--an APS upgrade--got seriously in gear this year with strong encouragement from our users and sponsors. The most promising avenue that has emerged is the energy-recovery linac (ERL) (see article on page xx), for which we are beginning serious R&D. The ERL{at}APS would offer revolutionary performance, especially for x-ray imaging and ultrafast science, while not seriously disrupting the existing user base. I am very proud of our accelerator physics and engineering staff, who not only keep the current APS at the forefront, but were able to greatly impress our international Machine Advisory Committee with the quality of their work on the possible upgrade option (see page xx). As we prepare for long-term major upgrades, our plans to develop and optimize all the sectors at APS in the near future are advancing. Several new beamlines saw first light this year, including a dedicated …

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Residual fallout contamination from the nuclear test program in the Marshall Islands is a concern to Marshall Islanders because of the potential health risks associated with exposure to residual fallout contamination in the environment. Scientists from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) have been monitoring the amount of fallout radiation delivered to Utrok Atoll residents over the past 4 years. This briefing document gives an outline of our findings from the whole body counting and plutonium bioassay monitoring programs. Additional information can be found on the Marshall Islands web site (http://eed.lnl.gov/mi/). Cesium-137 is an important radioactive isotope produced in nuclear detonations and can be taken up from coral soils into locally grown food crop products that form an important part of the Marshallese diet. The Marshall Islands whole body counting program has clearly demonstrated that the majority of Utrok Atoll residents acquire a very small but measurable quantity of cesium-137 in their bodies (Hamilton et al., 2006; Hamilton et. al., 2007a; 2007b;). During 2006, a typical resident of Utrok Atoll received about 3 mrem of radiation from internally deposited cesium-137 (Hamilton et al., 2007a). The population-average dose contribution from cesium-137 is around 2% of the total radiation dose that people normally …

Tests were performed to evaluate the location of the air-sampling probe in the proposed design for the Waste Treatment Plant’s HV-C2 air exhaust stack. The evaluation criteria come from ANSI/HPS N13.1-1999, “Sampling and Monitoring Releases of Airborne Radioactive Substances from the Stacks and Ducts of Nuclear Facilities.” Pacific Northwest National Laboratory conducted the tests on a 3.67:1 scale model of the stack. Limited confirmatory tests on the actual stack will need to be conducted during cold startup of the High Level Waste Treatment Facility. The tests documented here assessed the capability of the air-monitoring probe to extract a sample representative of the effluent stream in accordance with criteria in ANSI/HPS N13.1. The test parameters covered the expected range of system flowrates with both one and two operating fans. The current stack design calls for the sampling probe to be located about 10 diameters downstream of the junction of the duct from Fan A with the stack. In accordance with the statement of work and the test plan, the test measurements were made at that location and also at one point upstream and another downstream. An adjustment was made for the distance between a typical sampling probe inlet and the centerline …

This report documents the baseline environmental conditions of the U. S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) K-1251 Barge Facility, which is located at the East Tennessee Technology Park (ETTP). DOE is proposing to lease the facility to the Community Reuse Organization of East Tennessee (CROET). This report provides supporting information for the use, by a potential lessee, of government-owned facilities at ETTP. This report is based upon the requirements of Sect. 120(h) of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 (CERCLA). The lease footprint is slightly over 1 acre. The majority of the lease footprint is defined by a perimeter fence that surrounds a gravel-covered area with a small concrete pad within it. Also included is a gravel drive with locked gates at each end that extends on the east side to South First Avenue, providing access to the facility. The facility is located along the Clinch River and an inlet of the river that forms its southern boundary. To the east, west, and north, the lease footprint is surrounded by DOE property. Preparation of this report included the review of government records, title documents, historic aerial photos, visual and physical inspections of the property and adjacent properties, …

This CRADA was developed to enable ORNL to assist American Electronics, Inc. test a new technology--BioSAR. BioSAR is a an airborne, low frequency (80-120 MHz {approx} FM radio frequencies) synthetic aperture radar (SAR) technology which was designed and built for NASA by ZAI-Amelex under Patrick Johnson's direction. At these frequencies, leaves and small branches are nearly transparent and the majority of the energy reflected from the forest and returned to the radar is from the tree trunks. By measuring the magnitude of the back scatter, the volume of the tree trunk and therefore the biomass of the trunks can be inferred. The instrument was successfully tested on tropical rain forests in Panama. Patrick Johnson, with American Electronics, Inc received a Phase II SBIR grant from DOE Office of Climate Change to further test and refine the instrument. Mr Johnson sought ORNL expertise in measuring forest biomass in order for him to further validate his instrument. ORNL provided ground truth measurements of forest biomass at three locations--the Oak Ridge Reservation, Weyerhaeuser Co. commercial pine plantations in North Carolina, and American Energy and Power (AEP) Co. hardwood forests in southern Ohio, and facilitated flights over these forests. After Mr. Johnson processed the …

We describe the use of image analysis to count bubbles in 3-D, large-scale, LES [1] and DNS [2] of the Rayleigh-Taylor instability. We analyze these massive datasets by first converting the 3-D data to 2-D, then counting the bubbles in the 2-D data. Our plots for the bubble count indicate there are four distinct regimes in the process of the mixing of the two fluids. We also show that our results are relatively insensitive to the choice of parameters in our analysis algorithms.

We describe a camera to record coherent scattering patterns with a soft-X-ray free-electron laser. The camera consists of a laterally-graded multilayer mirror which reflects the diffraction pattern onto a CCD detector. The mirror acts as a bandpass filter both for wavelength and angle, which isolates the desired scattering pattern from non-sample scattering or incoherent emission from the sample. The mirror also solves the particular problem of the extreme intensity of the FEL pulses, which are focused to greater than 10{sup 14} W/cm{sup 2}. The strong undiffracted pulse passes through a hole in the mirror and propagates on to a beam dump at a distance behind the instrument rather than interacting with a beamstop placed near the CCD. The camera concept is extendable for the full range of the fundamental wavelength of the FLASH FEL (i.e. between 6 nm and 60 nm) and into the water window. We have fabricated and tested various multilayer mirrors for wavelengths of 32 nm, 16 nm, 13.5 nm, and 4.5 nm. At the shorter wavelengths mirror roughness must be minimized to reduce scattering from the mirror. We have recorded over 30,000 diffraction patterns at the FLASH free-electron laser with no observable mirror damage or degradation …

Epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) is a cellular transdifferentiation program that facilitates organ morphogenesis and tissue remodeling in physiological processes such as embryonic development and wound healing. However, a similar phenotypic conversion is also detected in fibrotic diseases and neoplasia, in which it is associated with disease progression. EMT in cancer epithelial cells often appears to be an incomplete and bi-directional process. Here we discuss the phenomenon of EMT as it pertains to tumor development, focusing on exceptions to the commonly held rule that EMT promotes invasion and metastasis. We also highlight the role of the Ras-controlled signaling mediators, ERK1, ERK2 and PI3-kinase, as microenvironmental responsive regulators of EMT.

Available methods for developing and screening small drug-like molecules able to knockout toxins or pathogenic microorganisms have some limitations. In order to be useful, these new methods must provide high-throughput analysis and identify specific binders in a short period of time. To meet this need, we are developing an approach that uses living cells to generate libraries of small biomolecules, which are then screened inside the cell for activity. Our group is using this new, combined approach to find highly specific ligands capable of disabling anthrax Lethal Factor (LF) as proof of principle. Key to our approach is the development of a method for the biosynthesis of libraries of cyclic peptides, and an efficient screening process that can be carried out inside the cell.

The response to climate change and the stabilization of atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations has major implications for the global energy system. Stabilization of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations requires a peak and an indefinite decline of global CO2 emissions. Nuclear energy, along with other technologies, has the potential to contribute to the growing demand for energy without emitting CO2. Nuclear energy is of particular interest because of its global prevalence and its current significant contribution, nearly 20%, to the world’s electricity supply. We have investigated the value of nuclear energy in addressing climate change, and have explored the potential challenges for the rapid and large-scale expansion of nuclear energy as a response to climate change. The scope of this study is long-term and the modeling time frame extends out a century because the nature of nuclear energy and climate change dictate that perspective. Our results indicate that the value of the nuclear technology option for addressing climate change is denominated in trillions of dollars. Several-fold increases to the value of the nuclear option can be expected if there is limited availability of competing carbon-free technologies, particularly fossil-fuel based technologies that can capture and sequester carbon. Challenges for the expanded global …

Long-term sequestration of uranium at sites within the DOE complex is a significant problem that requires molecular-level information on the speciation, phase association, and spatial distribution of uranium

Characterizing and classifying molecular variation within biological samples is critical for determining fundamental mechanisms of biological processes that will lead to new insights including improved disease understanding. Towards these ends, time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) was used to examine increasingly complex samples of biological relevance, including monosaccharide isomers, pure proteins, complex protein mixtures, and mouse embryo tissues. The complex mass spectral data sets produced were analyzed using five common statistical and chemometric multivariate analysis techniques: principal component analysis (PCA), linear discriminant analysis (LDA), partial least squares discriminant analysis (PLSDA), soft independent modeling of class analogy (SIMCA), and decision tree analysis by recursive partitioning. PCA was found to be a valuable first step in multivariate analysis, providing insight both into the relative groupings of samples and into the molecular basis for those groupings. For the monosaccharides, pure proteins and protein mixture samples, all of LDA, PLSDA, and SIMCA were found to produce excellent classification given a sufficient number of compound variables calculated. For the mouse embryo tissues, however, SIMCA did not produce as accurate a classification. The decision tree analysis was found to be the least successful for all the data sets, providing neither as accurate a classification nor chemical …

Presentation by Dr. Dan Arvizu of NREL given at the Colorado New Energy Summit held March 24, 2007 in Denver, Colorado.

Given that fossil fuel fired power plants are among the largest and most concentrated producers of CO{sub 2} emissions, recovery and sequestration of CO{sub 2} from the flue gas of such plants has been identified as one of the primary means for reducing anthropogenic (i.e., man-made) CO{sub 2} emissions. In 2001, ALSTOM Power Inc. (ALSTOM) began a two-phase program to investigate the feasibility of various carbon capture technologies. This program was sponsored under a Cooperative Agreement from the US Department of Energy's National Energy Technology Laboratory (DOE). The first phase entailed a comprehensive study evaluating the technical feasibility and economics of alternate CO{sub 2} capture technologies applied to Greenfield US coal-fired electric generation power plants. Thirteen cases, representing various levels of technology development, were evaluated. Seven cases represented coal combustion in CFB type equipment. Four cases represented Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) systems. Two cases represented advanced Chemical Looping Combined Cycle systems. Marion, et al. reported the details of this work in 2003. One of the thirteen cases studied utilized an oxygen-fired circulating fluidized bed (CFB) boiler. In this concept, the fuel is fired with a mixture of oxygen and recirculated flue gas (mainly CO{sub 2}). This combustion process yields …