Newsletter of the Texas Agricultural Extension Service discussing topics related to economic aspects of raising dairy cows, dairy production, and managing dairy operations. This issue has a feature article about: "Investments in Free Stall Dairy Housing: Estimated Costs, Returns and Risk"

Newsletter focusing on pecan disease and pest control in Texas, including prevention, identification, treatment, and educational opportunities.

Periodic newsletter discussing information related to student drop-out rates, relevant legislative issues, and prevention programs. This issue focuses on child care problems and how they can affect the workforce.

First part of an annual report of the Texas Railroad Commission's Oil and Gas Division providing background on the industry and the agency's activities, information related to the production of oil and gas, and data regarding production by field.

First part of an annual report of the Texas Railroad Commission's Oil and Gas Division providing background on the industry and the agency's activities, information related to the production of oil and gas, and data regarding production by field.

Periodic newsletter discussing information related to student drop-out rates, relevant legislative issues, and prevention programs. This issue focuses on barriers to participation in school reform.

Report over the twenty annual state-administered library development programs overseen by the Library Development Division, including budget statements for each for fiscal year 1994.

Annual report of the Texas Racing Commission describing goals, activities, and accomplishments during calendar year 1992.

During the fourth quarter of 1990, steady-state performance testing at the Nucla Circulating Fluidized Bed (CFB) resumed under sponsorship of the US Department of Energy. Co-sponsorship of the Demonstration Test Program by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) was completed on June 15, 1990. From October through December, 1990, Colorado-Ute Electric Association (CUEA) completed a total of 23 steady-state performance tests, 4 dynamic tests, and set operating records during November and December as the result of improved unit operating reliability. Highlight events and achievements during this period of operation are presented.

Considerable effort has been expended in recent years in finding improved spatial differencing schemes for the neutron and radiation transport equations. Standard criteria used to select a candidate scheme are its order of spatial convergence for small mesh size and its positivity in the sense that positive solutions emerge from positive input data. More recently, it has become clear that truly robust schemes must behave well in diffusing regions and must be compatible with an effective iteration acceleration method. Recently, Morel and Larsen reported their work on a promising new method called the multiple balance method that has virtually all the desirable characteristics. Here we study a different approach to the problem by considering discrete-ordinates approximations to the even-parity transport equations. We analyze three spatial difference approaches: diamond differencing, cell-edge differencing, and cell-center differencing. For the case of isotropic scattering and sources, the latter two approaches are shown to be strictly positive, to be second-order accurate, to be compatible with derived diffusion synthetic acceleration methods, and to possess the necessary diffusion limits. Unlike previous work with the even-parity equation, we do not use finite elements or variational principles. 5 refs., 1 tab.

The University of Chicago Solar Energy Group has had a continuing program and commitment to develop an advanced evacuated solar collector integrating nonimaging concentration into its design. During the period from 1985--1987, some of our efforts were directed toward designing and prototyping a manufacturable version of an Integrated Compound Parabolic Concentrator (ICPC) evacuated collector tube as part of an international cooperative effort involving six organizations in four different countries. This multilateral'' project made considerable progress towards a commercially practical collector. One of two basic designs considered employed a heat pipe and an internal metal reflector CPC. We fabricated and tested two large diameter (125mm) borosilicate glass collector tubes to explore this concept. The other design also used a large diameter (125mm) glass tube but with a specially configured internal shaped mirror CPC coupled to a U-tube absorber. Performance projections in a variety of systems applications using the computer design tools developed by the International Energy Agency (IEA) task on evacuated collectors were used to optimize the optical and thermal design. The long-term goal of this work continues to be the development of a high efficiency, low cost solar collector to supply solar thermal energy at temperatures up to 250{degree}C. Some …

Progress for the reporting period is summarized on the following: analyzing multiwell pressure data for a composite reservoir with a circular discontinuity, adsorption theory from the point of view of numerical simulation, effects adsorption/desorption on reinjection and tracer analysis, and estimation of adsorption parameters from experimental and field data. (MHR)

During this period, conventional and fast-kinetics techniques of photochemistry, photophysics, radiation chemistry, and electrochemistry were used for the characterization of the intermediates that are involved in transition metal excited-state electron-transfer reactions. The intermediates of interest were the excited states of Ru(II) and Cr(III) photosensitizers, their reduced forms, and the species formed in the reactions of redox quenchers and electron-transfer agents. Of particular concern has been the back electron-transfer reaction between the geminate pair formed in the redox quenching of the photosensitizers, and the dependence of its rate on solution medium and temperature in competition with transformation and cage escape processes.

The development of a research agenda should be a direct way of portraying the scope of petroleum engineering, of identifying the critical technological issues faced by the profession,of elucidating the gaps between the existing research resources and the needs. and of outlining a program of research through which the petroleum engineering departments can be collectively of maximum service. Such an agenda would be of value to the profession of petroleum engineering, to industry and to government agencies, as well as to the faculty and students of the petroleum engineering departments. The purposes of the activity that led to this report, therefore, were to develop a statement to serve as a beginning research agenda for the petroleum engineering academic community; to bring together representatives of the petroleum engineering academic community to recognize the importance of developing a consensus posture with respect to research; and to provide a document that will assist in portraying to industry, government agencies and others the problems and needs of the petroleum engineering departments for conducting research. Contents of this report include; introduction; the background; the scope of petroleum engineering research; priority research topics and technological issues; non-technological research issues; and conclusions and recommendations.

A project has been initiated at the request of ER to study and remediate the groundwater contamination at the Mixed Waste Management Facility (MWMF). This water contains a wide variety of both inorganics (e.g., sodium) and organics (e.g., benzene, trichloroethylene). Most compounds are present in the ppB range, and certain components (e.g., trichloroethylene, silver) are present at concentrations that exceed the primary drinking water standards (PDWS). These compounds must be reduced to acceptable levels as per RCRA and CERCLA orders. This report gives a listing of the important constituents which are to be included in a simulant to model the MWMF aquifer. This simulant will be used to evaluate the feasibility of various state of the art separation/destruction processes for remediating the aquifer.

This study is the second phase of ongoing research into the mechanics and feasibility of using the Meta-Lax method of vibratory stress relief in place of thermal methods of stress relief. The first phase of this research revealed results that were similar to, and even superior to those achieved using thermal methods. The testing here was designed to eliminate the effects of interbead tempering by utilizing single pass bead-on-plate welds only. A metallurgical explanation for the success of the Meta-Lax method was not found. No significant structure or chemical changes were noted when used with ASTM A36 or AISI 4140 materials, and the phenomena noted in phase I was apparently due to interbead tempering. The theory of accelerated aging has been proposed and studies exist which observed dislocation motion as a result of vibratory treatment. It is evident that the vibratory stress relief system does not impart sufficient energy to bring about the magnitude of change seen with thermal methods. however the physical improvement is a reality, and vibratory methods should be evaluated further.

The effects of compositional and microstructural gradients on weld metal properties were investigated. The effects of compositional gradients were analyzed using thermodynamic and composite models. Brittle and ductile cracking behavior were investigated using both binary alloy single crystals and large grain castings. In both cases, the crack propagated along regions where the compositional gradients were the steepest. High temperature deformation of large wavelength compositonally modulated structures vas investigated to understand creep behavior in veld metal. At moderate temperatures, the creep behavior of cored materials was found to follow predictions based on the rule of mixtures composite analysis. At higher temperatures with the advent of dynamic mass transport the creep process is influenced by diffusion-promoted vacancy flow and time-dependent compositional gradient. The investigation found the critical gradient which will promote Kirkendall voids and has reported a creep rate behavior that suggests strong structural dependence, localized stress and vacancy transport influence. Weld metal, based on metal matrix composite, was also demonstrated.

This endeavor was comprised of three companion projects. They are interdependent components which together provide a significant enhancement to the existing programs in the School of Education at Norfolk state University.The primary focus of the project was in instructing regular and special education undergraduate students and teachers. As a result of this endeavor, instruction in science and engineering majors was enhanced.

This project is concerned with studies of biological activity-structure relationships in which the mechanisms of interaction of ionizing radiation and benzopyrene (PB) compounds with DNA are being investigated and compared. Emphasis is focused on effects of DNA conformation on its mechanisms of interaction with ionizing radiation, on the influence of structure and stereochemistry of BP metabolites on mechanisms of DNA damage, and on influence of DNA conformation on interactions between BP metabolites and DNA molecules, and the structures of the complexes and adducts which are formed. One basic theme of this project is the use of photoexcited states of BP and nucleic acids as probes of these interactions. In part I of this report, recent progress on elucidating the structures of selected BP-oligonucleotide model adducts by high resolution NMR and gel electrophoresis techniques is summarized. It is shown that the stereochemical properties of benzo(a)pyrene diol epoxide-DNA adducts play a crucial role in determining their interactions with certain exonucleases. These results provide useful models for deriving a better understanding of differences biological activities of BP compounds and the relationships between mutagenicities and the structure properties of BP-DNA adducts. In Part II of this report, a new time-resolved method based on picosecond …

NMR reagents for the speciation and quantitation of labile-hydrogen functional groups and sulfur groups in coal ligands have been synthesized and evaluated. These reagents, which contain the NMR-active nuclei {sup 31}p, {sup 119}Sn or {sup 195}pt, were designed to possess improved chemical shift resolution over reagents reported in the literature. Our efforts were successful in the case of the new {sup 31}p and {sup 119}Sn reagents we developed, but the {sup 195}pt work on sulfur groups was only partially successful in as much as the grant came to a close and was not renewed. Our success with {sup 31}P and {sup 119}Sn NMR reagents came to the attention of Amoco and they have recently expressed interest in further supporting that work. A further measure of the success of our efforts can be seen in the nine publications supported by this grant which are cited in the reference list.

Newsletter of the Texas Department of Health discussing the news, activities, and events of the organization and other information related to health in Texas.

This Standard applies to the receipt, processing, storage, and shipment of fissionable material in the 300 Area and in any other facility under the control of the Reactor Materials Project Management Team (PMT). The objective is to establish practices and process conditions for the storage and handling of fissionable material that prevent the accidental assembly of a critical mass and that comply with DOE Orders as well as accepted industry practice.

Thermal radiation plays a key role in the operation and efficiency of combustion systems, accounting for over 90% of the heat transfer. The analysis of radiative heat transfer in coal-fired boilers, combustion chambers and other energy systems requires accounting for the effects of inorganic deposits on bounding surfaces and of entrained particulates, such as pulverized coal, char, and fly-ash. These effects can be predicted; however, the accuracy in predicting the radiative properties of entrained pyrolysis (ash) and deposit layers (slag) is limited by inaccurate knowledge of the physical/chemical properties of the materials over a range of material temperatures and radiative wavelengths that is representative of conditions in practical combustion systems. The objective of this project is to make laboratory measurements of the radiative properties of extracted ash and slag deposit samples and compare to model predictions.

A mobile robot system called Stored Waste Autonomous Mobile Inspector (SWAMI) is under development by the Savannah River Technology Center (SRTC) Robotics Group of Westinghouse Savannah River Company (WSRC) to perform mandated inspections of waste drums stored in warehouse facilities. The system will reduce personnel exposure to potential hazards and create accurate, high-quality documentation to ensure regulatory compliance and enhance waste management operations. Development work is coordinated among several Department of Energy (DOE), academic, and commercial entities in accordance wit DOE`s technology transfer initiative. The prototype system, SWAMI I, was demonstrated at Savannah River Site (SRS) in November, 1993. SWAMI II is now under development for field trails at the Fernald site.