I am pleased to speak at the Fortieth Gordon Conference on Nuclear Chemistry. I served as Chairman of the first Gordon Conference on Nuclear Chemistry held June 23--27, 1952, at New Hampton, New Hampshire. In my remarks, during which I shall quote from my journal, I shall describe some of the background leading up to the first Gordon Conference on Nuclear Chemistry and my attendance at the first seven Gordon Conferences during the period 1952 through 1958. I shall also quote my description of my appearance as the featured speaker at the Silver Anniversary of the Gordon Research Conferences on December 27, 1956 held at the Commodore Hotel in New York City. I shall begin with reference to my participation in the predecessor to the Gordon Conferences, the Gibson Island Research Conferences 45 years ago, on Thursday, June 20, 1946, as a speaker. This was 15 years after the start of these conferences in 1931. Neil Gordon played a leading role in these conferences, which were named (in 1948) in his honor -- the Gordon Research Conferences -- soon after they were moved to Colby Junior College, New London, New Hampshire in 1947. W. George Parks became Director in 1947, …

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) and Laser Mega Joule (LMJ) facilities are currently under construction in the United States and France. Ignited targets at these facilities are anticipated to produce up to 1019 deuterium-tritium fusion neutrons. This will provide unprecedented opportunities and challenges for the use of nuclear diagnostics in inertial confinement fusion experiments. The NIF and LMJ nuclear diagnostics will work in a harsh radiation environment that includes neutron, hard x-ray, and gamma backgrounds, neutron induced signals in coaxial cables, and electromagnetic pulse (EMP) generated signals. Recent results of different background measurements on OMEGA laser facility will be reported. Based on these results, specific design concepts have been identified to mitigate much of the radiation and EMP-induced backgrounds. An overview of the background mitigation techniques in the NIF nuclear diagnostics conceptual designs will be presented.

{sup 13}C-based metabolic flux analysis provides valuable information about bacterial physiology. Though many biological processes rely on the synergistic functions of microbial communities, study of individual organisms in a mixed culture using existing flux analysis methods is difficult. Isotopomer-based flux analysis typically relies on hydrolyzed amino acids from a homogeneous biomass. Thus metabolic flux analysis of a given organism in a mixed culture requires its separation from the mixed culture. Swift and efficient cell separation is difficult and a major hurdle for isotopomer-based flux analysis of mixed cultures. Here we demonstrate the use of a single highly-expressed protein to analyze the isotopomer distribution of amino acids from one organism. Using the model organism E. coli expressing a plasmid-borne, his-tagged Green Fluorescent Protein (GFP), we show that induction of GFP does not affect E. coli growth kinetics or the isotopomer distribution in nine key metabolites. Further, the isotopomer labeling patterns of amino acids derived from purified GFP and total cell protein are indistinguishable, indicating that amino acids from a purified protein can be used to infer metabolic fluxes of targeted organisms in a mixed culture. This study provides the foundation to extend isotopomer-based flux analysis to study metabolism of individual strains …

'Puff and pump' radiating divertor scenarios [1,2] were applied to upper SN and DN H-mode plasmas. Under similar operating conditions, argon (Ar) accumulated in the main plasma of single-null (SN) plasmas more rapidly and reached a higher steady-state concentration when the B x {del}B ion drift direction was toward the divertor than when the B x {del}B ion drift direction was out of the divertor. The initial rate that Ar accumulated inside double-null (DN) plasmas was more than twice that of comparably-prepared SNs with the same B x {del}B direction. One way to reduce power loading at the divertor targets is to 'seed' the divertor plasma with impurities that radiatively reduce the conducted power. Studies have shown that the concentration of impurities in the divertor are increased by raising the flow of deuterium ions (D{sup +}) into the divertor by a combination of upstream deuterium gas puffing and active particle exhaust at the divertor targets, i.e., puff-and-pump. An enhanced D{sup +} particle flow toward the divertor targets exerts a frictional drag on impurities, and inhibits their escape from the divertor. A puff-and-pump approach using Ar as the impurity was successfully applied in recent DIII-D experiments to SN plasmas [3] while …

In this paper, we estimate how quickly and how precisely a reactor's operational status and thermal power can be monitored over hour to month time scales, using the antineutrino rate as measured by a cubic meter scale detector. Our results are obtained from a detector we have deployed and operated at 25 meter standoff from a reactor core. This prototype can detect a prompt reactor shutdown within five hours, and monitor relative thermal power to 3.5% within 7 days. Monitoring of short-term power changes in this way may be useful in the context of International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) Reactor Safeguards Regime, or other cooperative monitoring regimes.

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We have developed a mixed Vector Finite Element Method (VFEM) for Maxwell's equations with a nonlinear polarization term. The method allows for discretization of complicated geometries with arbitrary order representations of the B and E fields. In this paper we will describe the method and a series of optimizations that significantly reduce the computational cost. Additionally, a series of test simulations will be presented to validate the method. Finally, a nonlinear waveguide mode mixing example is presented and discussed.

This paper presents a new parallel indexing data structure for answering queries. The index, called Bin-Hash, offers extremely high levels of concurrency, and is therefore well-suited for the emerging commodity of parallel processors, such as multi-cores, cell processors, and general purpose graphics processing units (GPU). The Bin-Hash approach first bins the base data, and then partitions and separately stores the values in each bin as a perfect spatial hash table. To answer a query, we first determine whether or not a record satisfies the query conditions based on the bin boundaries. For the bins with records that can not be resolved, we examine the spatial hash tables. The procedures for examining the bin numbers and the spatial hash tables offer the maximum possible level of concurrency; all records are able to be evaluated by our procedure independently in parallel. Additionally, our Bin-Hash procedures access much smaller amounts of data than similar parallel methods, such as the projection index. This smaller data footprint is critical for certain parallel processors, like GPUs, where memory resources are limited. To demonstrate the effectiveness of Bin-Hash, we implement it on a GPU using the data-parallel programming language CUDA. The concurrency offered by the Bin-Hash index …

The free energies of reaction and the activation energies are calculated, with DFT (B3PW91) and small RECP (relativistic core potential) for uranium, for the reaction of Cp2UNMe and Cp2UO with MeCCMe and H3Si-Cl that yields the corresponding addition products. CAS(2,7) and DFT calculations on Cp2UO and Cp2UNMe give similar results, which validates the use of DFT calculations in these cases. The calculated results mirror the experimental reaction of [1,2,4-(CMe3)3C5H2]2UNMe with dimethylacetylene and [1,2,4-(CMe3)3C5H2]2UO with Me3SiCl. The net reactions are controlled by the change in free energy between the products and reactants, not by the activation energies, and therefore by the nature of the UO and UNMe bonds in the initial and final states. A NBO analysis indicates that the U-O interaction in Cp2UO is composed of a single U-O bond with three lone pairs of electrons localized on oxygen, leading to a polarized U-O fragment. In contrast, the U-NMe interaction in Cp2UNMe is composed of a and component and a lone pairof electrons localized on the nitrogen, resulting in a less polarized UNMe fragment, in accord with the lower electronegativity of NMe relative to O. The strongly polarized U(+)-O(-) bond is calculated to be about 70 kcal mol-1 stronger than …

In the past two decades, one of the most important goals of the nuclear physics community has been the production and characterization of the new state of matter--Quark-Gluon Plasma (QGP). Understanding how properties of hadrons change in medium, particularly, the bound state of a very heavy quark and its antiquark, known as quarkonium, as well as determining the transport coefficients is crucial for identifying the properties of QGP and for the understanding of the experimental data from RHIC. On April 23rd, more than sixty physicists from twenty-seven institutions gathered for this three-day topical workshop held at BNL to discuss how to understand the properties of the new state of matter obtained in ultra-relativistic heavy ion collisions (particularly at RHIC-BNL) through spectral functions. In-medium properties of the different particle species and the transport properties of the medium are encoded in spectral functions. The former could yield important signatures of deconfinement and chiral symmetry restoration at high temperatures and densities, while the later are crucial for the understanding of the dynamics of ultra-relativistic heavy ion collisions. Participants at the workshop are experts in various areas of spectral function studies. The workshop encouraged direct exchange of scientific information among experts, as well as …

The Sayers and Kachanov (1991) crack-influence parametersare shown to be directly related to Thomsen (1986) weak-anisotropyseismic parameters for fractured reservoirs when the crack density issmall enough. These results are then applied to seismic wave propagationin reservoirs having HTI symmetry due to aligned vertical fractures. Theapproach suggests a method of inverting for fracture density from wavespeed data.

In recent years, LLNL has developed methods for diagnosing significant quantities of special nuclear material (SNM). Homeland security problems have recently focused our attention on detection of shielded highly enriched uranium (HEU), which is a weak signal problem. Current and advanced safeguards applications will require working in the opposite extreme of strong but buried signals. We will review some of the technologies that have been developed at LLNL for homeland security applications and discuss how they might be used in support of international safeguards.

Ultrashort pulsed lasers can accurately ablate materials which are refractory, transparent, or are otherwise difficult to machine by other methods. The typical method of machining surfaces with ultrashort laser pulses is by raster scanning, or the machining of sequentially overlapping linear trenches. Experiments in which linear trenches were machined in alumina at various pulse overlaps and incident fluences are presented, and the dependence of groove depth on these parameters established. A model for the machining of trenches based on experimental data in alumina is presented, which predicts and matches observed trench geometry. This model is then used to predict optimal process parameters for the machining of trenches for maximal material removal rate for a given laser.

The extension to recursion over holes of the Gilleron and Pain method for calculating partition functions of a canonical ensemble of non-interacting bound electrons is presented as well as a generalization for the efficient computation of collisional line broadening.

High performance plasmas, including both hybrid and advanced tokamak (AT) bench-mark discharges, were shown to be highly repeatable in DIII-D over 6000 plasma-seconds of operation during the 2006 campaign with no intervening boron depositions or high temperature bakes. Hybrid and AT discharges with identical control targets were repeated after the initial boronization at the beginning of the 2006 campaign, and again just before and after a second boronization near the end of the 2006 campaign. After a long entry vent between the 2006 and 2007 campaigns, similar discharges were again repeated after the standard high temperature baking and plasma cleanup, but prior to a boronization. Performance metrics, such as {beta}, confinement quality, and density control, were extremely well repeated. A low performance daily reference shot (DRS) was also established as a routine monitor of impurity influx. Over the 2006 campaign, the DRS database indicated little to no secular increase in impurity content. Oxygen content and Ni line emission were higher after the intervening vent, but were still minor contributors to plasma contamination. This indicates that erosion of boron films used for wall conditioning will not be a limitation to establishing long pulse high performance discharges in the new generation of …

This work is motivated by the growing interest in injectingcarbon dioxide into deep geological formations as a means of avoidingatmospheric emissions of carbon dioxide and consequent global warming.One of the key questions regarding the feasibility of this technology isthe potential rate of leakage out of the primary storage formation. Weseek exact solutions in a model of gas flow driven by a combination ofbuoyancy, viscous and capillary forces. Different combinations of theseforces and characteristic length scales of the processes lead todifferent time scaling and different types of solutions. In the case of athin, tight seal, where the impact of gravity is negligible relative tocapillary and viscous forces, a Ryzhik-type solution implies square-rootof time scaling of plume propagation velocity. In the general case, a gasplume has two stable zones, which can be described by travelling-wavesolutions. The theoretical maximum of the velocity of plume migrationprovides a conservative estimate for the time of vertical migration.Although the top of the plume has low gas saturation, it propagates witha velocity close to the theoretical maximum. The bottom of the plumeflows significantly more slowly at a higher gas saturation. Due to localheterogeneities, the plume can break into parts. Individual plumes alsocan coalesce and from larger plumes. The …

We present a new computed tomography method, the low third derivative (LTD) method, that is particularly suited for reconstructing the spatial distribution of gas concentrations from path-integral data for a small number of optical paths. The method finds a spatial distribution of gas concentrations that (1) has path integrals that agree with measured path integrals, and (2) has a low third spatial derivative in each direction, at every point. The trade-off between (1) and (2) is controlled by an adjustable parameter, which can be set based on analysis of the path-integral data. The method produces a set of linear equations, which can be solved with a single matrix multiplication if the constraint that all concentrations must be positive is ignored; the method is therefore extremely rapid. Analysis of experimental data from thousands of concentration distributions shows that the method works nearly as well as Smooth Basis Function Minimization (the best method previously available), yet is 100 times faster.

ATF2 is an accelerator test facility modeled after the final focus beamline envisioned for the ILC. By the end of 2008, KEK plans to commission the ATF2 [1]. SLAC and OCEM collaborated on the design of 38 power systems for beamline magnets. The systems range in output power from 1.5 kW to 6 kW. Since high availability is essential for the success of the ILC, Collaborators employed an N+1 modular approach, allowing for redundancy and the use of a single power module rating. This approach increases the availability of the power systems. Common power modules reduces inventory and eases maintenance. Current stability requirements are as tight as 10 ppm. A novel, SLAC designed 20-bit Ethernet Power Supply Controller provides the required precision current regulation. In this paper, Collaborators present the power system design, the expected reliability, fault immunity features, and the methods for satisfying the control and monitoring challenges. Presented are test results and the status of the power systems.

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Significant beam intensity-dependence of the vertical emittance growth was experimentally observed at the Accelerator Test Facility (ATF) at KEK extraction beamline. This paper presents the simulations of possible vertical emittance growth sources, particularly in the extraction channel, where the magnets are shared by both the ATF extraction beamline and its damping ring. The vertical emittance growth is observed in the simulations by changing the beam orbit in the extraction channel, even with all optics corrections. The possible reasons for the experimentally observed dependence of the vertical emittance growth on the beam intensity are also discussed. An experiment to measure the emittance versus beam orbit at the existing ATF extraction beamline is on-going led by the European colleagues.

Emulsions appear in many subsurface applications includingbioremediation, surfactant-enhanced remediation, and enhancedoil-recovery. Modeling emulsion transport in porous media is particularlychallenging because the rheological and physical properties of emulsionsare different from averages of the components. Current modelingapproaches are based on filtration theories, which are not suited toadequately address the pore-scale permeability fluctuations and reductionof absolute permeability that are often encountered during emulsiontransport. In this communication, we introduce a continuous time randomwalk based alternative approach that captures these unique features ofemulsion transport. Calculations based on the proposed approach resultedin excellent match with experimental observations of emulsionbreakthrough from the literature. Specifically, the new approach explainsthe slow late-time tailing behavior that could not be fitted using thestandard approach. The theory presented in this paper also provides animportant stepping stone toward a generalizedself-consistent modeling ofmultiphase flow.

Fast shutdown of discharges using massive gas injection (MGI) is a promising technique for reducing tokamak wall damage during disruptions [1]. An outstanding concern, however, is the generation of runaway electrons (RE) during the shutdown. Although RE formation observed during MGI in present-day experiments is quite small (typically <1% of the main plasma current I{sub p} in DIII-D), it is thought that even this small RE current could be amplified to significant levels in reactor-scale tokamaks such as ITER [2]. It is expected that complete collisional suppression of any potential RE amplification during the CQ can be achieved for suppression parameters {gamma}{sub crit} {triple_bond} E{sub crit}/E{sub {psi}} > 1, where E{sub crit} = [2{pi}e{sup 3}ln{Lambda}(2n{sub e} + n{sub B})]/mc{sup 2} is the critical electric field [2] and E{sub {psi}} {approx} -[({mu}{sub 0}l{sub i})/4{pi}][-({partial_derivative}I{sub p}/{partial_derivative}t)+ {alpha}{sub L}(I{sub W}/{tau}{sub W})] is the toroidal electric field resulting from the decay of the plasma current I{sub p}. n{sub e} is the free electron density, n{sub B} is the bound electron density, {alpha}{sub L} {approx} 2[ln(8R/r{sub w})-2]/l{sub i} is the ratio of external (outside conducting wall) to internal (inside conducting wall) self-inductance, I{sub w} is the wall current, and {tau}{sub w} is the wall time. …

In one plan for reprocessing LWR spent fuel, after separation from fission products and transplutonics, part of the U and all of the Pu in a nitrate solution will form a coprocessed stream which is then evaporated and sent to a hold tank for accounting. The remaining U fraction will be purified and sent to a separate storage tank. These two streams can be monitored using x-ray fluorescence analysis. This report discusses equipment, spectra, cell calibration, and dynamic concentration measurements. 7 figures. (DLC)

In the Laser Fusion Program at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, a single laser fusion experiment lasts only a billionth of a second but in this time high speed instrumentation collects data that when digitized will create a data bank of several megabytes. This first level of data must be processed in several stages to put it in a form useful for interpretation of the experiments. One stage involves unfolding the source characteristics from the data and response of the instrument. This involves calculating the response of the instrument from the characteristics of each of its components. It is in this calculation that the ORACLE DBMS has become an invaluable tool for manipulation and archiving of the component data.