This report is a compilation of work done over the past ten years in support of phase stability studies of Alloy 22 for the Yucca Mountain Project and contains information previously published, reported, and referenced. Most sections are paraphrased here for the convenience of readers. Evaluation of the fabrication processes involved in the manufacture of waste containers is important as these processes can have an effect on the metallurgical structure of an alloy. Because material properties such as strength, toughness, aging kinetics and corrosion resistance are all dependent on the microstructure, it is important that prototypes be built and evaluated for processing effects on the performance of the material. Of particular importance are welds, which have an as-cast microstructure with chemical segregation and precipitation of complex phases resulting from the welding process. The work summarized in this report contains information on the effects of fabrication processes such as solution annealing, stress mitigation, heat-to-heat variability, and welding on the kinetics of precipitation, mechanical, and corrosion properties. For a waste package lifetime of thousands of years, it is impossible to test directly in the laboratory the behavior of Alloy 22 under expected repository conditions. The changes that may occur in these materials …

This report discusses Selected Issues in Patent Policy and the Commercialization of Technology regarding the Bayh-Dole Act.Congressional interest in facilitating U.S. technological innovation led to the passage of P.L. 96-517, Amendments to the Patent and Trademark Act(commonly reffered to ad the Bayh-Dole Act after its two main sponsor).This report discusses the rationale behind the passage of P.L. 96-517, its provsions, and Implementation of the law.

Ti-6Al-4V alloys are being considered as a positron producing target in the Next Linear Collider, with an incident photon beam and operating temperatures between room temperature and 300 C. Calculations of displacement damage in Ti-6Al-4V alloys have been performed by combining high-energy particle FLUKA simulations with SPECTER calculations of the displacement cross section from the resulting energy-dependent neutron flux plus the displacements calculated from the Lindhard model from the resulting energy-dependent ion flux. The radiation damage calculations have investigated two cases, namely the damage produced in a Ti-6Al-4V SLAC positron target where the irradiation source is a photon beam with energies between 5 and 11 MeV. As well, the radiation damage dose in displacements per atom, dpa, has been calculated for a mono-energetic 196 MeV proton irradiation experiment performed at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BLIP experiment). The calculated damage rate is 0.8 dpa/year for the Ti-6Al-4V SLAC photon irradiation target, and a total damage exposure of 0.06 dpa in the BLIP irradiation experiment. In both cases, the displacements are predominantly ({approx}80%) produced by recoiling ions (atomic nuclei) from photo-nuclear collisions or proton-nuclear collisions, respectively. Approximately 25% of the displacement damage results from the neutrons in both cases. Irradiation effects studies in …

This report provides information about the Data Mining and Homeland Security. Data mining has become one of the key features of the homeland security initiatives. Data mining can be a potential means to identify terrorist activities such as money transfer etc.

Projection optical systems built for Extreme Ultraviolet Lithography (EUVL) demonstrated the ability to produce, support and position reflective optical surfaces for achieving transmitted wavefront errors of 1 nm or less. Principal challenges included optical interferometry, optical manufacturing processes, multi-layer coating technology and opto mechanics. Our group was responsible for designing, building and aligning two different projection optical systems: a full-field, 0.1 NA, four-mirror system for 70 nm features and a small-field, 0.3 NA, two-mirror system for 30 nm features. Other than physical size and configuration, the two systems were very similar in the way they were designed, built and aligned. A key difference exists in the optic mounts, driven primarily by constraints from the metrology equipment used by different optics manufacturers. As mechanical stability and deterministic position control of optics will continue to play an essential role in future systems, we focus our discussion on opto-mechanics and primarily the optic mounts.

This report describes information security and data breach notification requirements included in the Privacy Act, the Federal Information Security Management Act.

Eight different polymer binders were formulated with bimodal distributions of 2,6-diamino-3,5-dinitropyrazine-1-oxide (LLM-105) in 5/95 weight ratio of polymer to explosive at the 25 gram level. The polymers evaluated included: Kel-F 800, Viton A, Oxy 461, Cytop A, Hyflon AD 60, Hytemp 5545, Technoflon PFR 91 and Technoflon P 459. LLM-105 had an average particle size of 35.6 {+-} 0.6 {micro}m. This material was ground in a ball mill for 24 h to achieve a particle size of 0.72 {+-} 0.02 {micro}m. Small angle light scattering measurements were used to obtain particle size distributions on both ground and unground LLM-105. Optical microscopy was used to characterize the morphology of the crystals. Bimodal mixes of approximately 75/25% coarse to fine LLM-105 were used in all formulations. Cylinders 1.27 cm diameter by 2.54 cm long were compression molded using 3 three-minute cycles at 105 C, except in the case of Cytop and Hyflon formulations which were molded at {approx}130 C. Densities varied between 94-98% of theoretical maximum. Stress strain measurements were made in compression at -30, ambient and 74 C at a strain rate of 0.0001 sec{sup -1}. As expected, the mechanical strength scaled with temperature depending on the glass transition temperature of …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "A diverse Senior Executive Service (SES), which generally represents the most experienced segment of the federal workforce, can be an organizational strength by bringing a wider variety of perspectives and approaches to policy development and decision making. In January 2003, GAO provided data on the diversity of career SES members as of October 2000 (GAO-03-34). In March 2000, GAO reported similar data for the Postal Career Executive Service (PCES) as of September 1999 (GAO/GGD-00-76). In its 2003 report, GAO also projected what the profile of the SES would be in October 2007 if appointment and separation trends did not change. In response to a request for updated information on diversity in the SES and the senior ranks of the U.S. Postal Service, GAO is providing data on race, ethnicity, and gender obtained from the Office of Personnel Management's (OPM) Central Personnel Data File and the Postal Service for (1) career SES positions as of the end of fiscal year 2007 and the SES developmental pool (i.e., GS-15 and GS-14 positions) as well as a comparison of actual fiscal year 2007 data to projections for fiscal year 2007 that …

This report provides a list of the policies, investigations, and issues of Immigration fraud.

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Medicaid, a joint federal-state program, financed the health care for about 59 million low-income people in fiscal year 2006. States have considerable flexibility in deciding what medical services and individuals to cover and the amount to pay providers, and the federal government reimburses a portion of states' expenditures according to a formula established by law. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is the federal agency responsible for overseeing Medicaid. Growing pressures on federal and state budgets have increased tensions between the federal government and states regarding this program, including concerns about whether states were appropriately financing their share of the program. GAO's testimony describes findings from prior work conducted from 1994 through March 2007 on (1) certain inappropriate state Medicaid financing arrangements and their implications for Medicaid's fiscal integrity and (2) outcomes and transparency of a CMS oversight initiative begun in 2003 to end such inappropriate arrangements."

Groundwater beneath T-Area, a former laboratory and semiworks operation at the Department of Energy (DOE) Savannah River Site, is contaminated by chlorinated solvents (cVOCs). Since the contamination was detected in the 1980s, the cVOCs at T-Area have been treated by a combination of soil vapor extraction and groundwater pump and treat. The site has received approval to discontinue the active treatments and implement a full scale test of enhanced attenuation--an engineering and regulatory strategy that has recently been developed by DOE and the Interstate Technology and Regulatory Council. Enhanced attenuation uses active engineering solutions to alter the target site in such a way that the contaminant plume will passively stabilize and shrink and to document that the action will be effective, timely, and sustainable. The paradigm recognizes that attenuation remedies are fundamentally based on a mass balance. Thus, long-term plume dynamics can be altered either by reducing the contaminant loading from the source or by increasing the rate of natural attenuation processes within all, or part of, the plume volume. The combination of technologies that emerged for T-Area included: (1) neat (pure) vegetable oil deployment in the deep vadose zone in the former source area, (2) emulsified vegetable oil deployment …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is in the midst of two new development efforts as part of the Constellation Program--the Ares I Crew Launch Vehicle and the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle. These projects are critical to the success of the overall program, which will return humans to spaceflight after Space Shuttle retirement in 2010. To reduce the gap in human spaceflight, NASA plans to launch Ares I and Orion in 2015--5 years after the Shuttle's retirement. GAO has issued a number of reports and testimonies that touch on various aspects of NASA's Constellation Program, particularly the development efforts underway for the Orion and Ares I projects. These reports and testimonies have questioned the affordability and overall acquisition strategy for each project. NASA has revised the Orion acquisition strategy and delayed the Ares I preliminary design review based on GAO's recommendations in these reports. In addition, GAO continues to monitor these projects on an ongoing basis at the request of members of Congress. Based on this work, GAO was asked to testify on the types of challenges that NASA faces in developing the Ares I and Orion …

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Overall objective of this project was to develop a technology platform for cleaning/conditioning the syngas from an integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) system at elevated temperatures (500-1,000 F) and gasifier pressures to meet the tolerance limits for contaminants, including H{sub 2}S, COS, NH{sub 3}, HCl, Hg, and As. This technology development effort involved progressive development and testing of sorbent/catalytic materials and associated processes through laboratory, bench, pilot, and demonstration testing phases, coupled with a comprehensive systems analysis at various stages of development. The development of the regenerable RTI-3 desulfurization sorbent - a highly attrition-resistant, supported ZnO-based material - was the key discovery in this project. RTI-3's high attrition resistance, coupled with its high reactivity, effectively allowed its application in a high-velocity transport reactor system. Production of the RTI-3 sorbent was successfully scaled up to an 8,000-lb batch by Sued-Chemie. In October 2005, RTI obtained U.S Patent 6,951,635 to protect the RTI-3 sorbent technology and won the 2004 R&D 100 Award for development of this material. The RTI-3 sorbent formed the basis for the development of the High-Temperature Desulfurization System (HTDS), a dual-loop transport reactor system for removing the reduced sulfur species from syngas. An 83-foot-tall, pilot HTDS unit was constructed …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Since the 1940s, the Department of Energy (DOE) has been processing natural uranium into enriched uranium, which has a higher concentration of the isotope uranium-235 that can be used in nuclear weapons or reactors. This has resulted in over 700,000 metric tons of leftover depleted uranium, also known as "tails," that have varying residual concentrations uranium-235. The tails are stored at DOE's uranium enrichment plants in Portsmouth, Ohio and Paducah, Kentucky. Although the tails have historically been considered a waste product and an environmental liability, recently an about tenfold increase in uranium prices may give DOE options to use some of the tails in ways that could provide revenue to the government. GAO's testimony is based on its March 31, 2008, report entitled Nuclear Material: DOE Has Several Potential Options for Dealing with Depleted Uranium Tails, Each of Which Could Benefit the Government (GAO-08-606R). The testimony focuses on (1) DOE's potential options for its tails and (2) the potential value of DOE's tails and factors that affect the value. It also contains an analysis of DOE's legal authority to carry out the potential options. In its report, GAO …

This report examines the economic drivers, technology constraints, and market potential for plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) in the U.S. A PHEV is a hybrid vehicle with batteries that can be recharged by connecting to the grid and an internal combustion engine that can be activated when batteries need recharging. The report presents and examines a series of PHEV market penetration scenarios. Based on input received from technical experts and industry representative contacted for this report and data obtained through a literature review, annual market penetration rates for PHEVs are presented from 2013 through 2045 for three scenarios. Each scenario is examined and implications for PHEV development are explored.

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The pressure dependence of the Raman shift of diamond for highly stressed anvils at the diamond-anvil sample interface has been measured for different culet shapes up to 180 GPa at ambient temperature. By using hydrogen samples, which constitute both a quasi-hydrostatic medium and a sensitive pressure sensor, some of the effects of culet and tip size have been determined. We propose that the divergent results in the literature can be partly ascribed to different anvil geometries. Experiments show increasing second order dependence of the diamond Raman shift with pressure for decreasing tip size. This is an important consideration when using the diamond anvils as a pressure sensor.

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The genomes of many epithelial tumors exhibit extensive chromosomal rearrangements. All classes of genome rearrangements can be identified using End Sequencing Profiling (ESP), which relies on paired-end sequencing of cloned tumor genomes. In this study, brain, breast, ovary and prostate tumors along with three breast cancer cell lines were surveyed with ESP yielding the largest available collection of sequence-ready tumor genome breakpoints and providing evidence that some rearrangements may be recurrent. Sequencing and fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) confirmed translocations and complex tumor genome structures that include coamplification and packaging of disparate genomic loci with associated molecular heterogeneity. Comparison of the tumor genomes suggests recurrent rearrangements. Some are likely to be novel structural polymorphisms, whereas others may be bona fide somatic rearrangements. A recurrent fusion transcript in breast tumors and a constitutional fusion transcript resulting from a segmental duplication were identified. Analysis of end sequences for single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) revealed candidate somatic mutations and an elevated rate of novel SNPs in an ovarian tumor. These results suggest that the genomes of many epithelial tumors may be far more dynamic and complex than previously appreciated and that genomic fusions including fusion transcripts and proteins may be common, possibly yielding tumor-specific …

Cancer cells are endowed with diverse biological capabilities driven by myriad inherited and somatic genetic and epigenetic aberrations that commandeer key cancer-relevant pathways. Efforts to elucidate these aberrations began with Boveri's hypothesis of aberrant mitoses causing cancer and continue today with a suite of powerful high-resolution technologies that enable detailed catalogues of genomic aberrations and epigenomic modifications. Tomorrow will likely bring the complete atlas of reversible and irreversible alteration in individual cancers. The challenge now is to discern causal molecular abnormalities from genomic and epigenomic 'noise', to understand how the ensemble of these aberrations collaborate to drive cancer pathophysiology. Here, we highlight lessons learned from now classical examples of successful translation of genomic discoveries into clinical practice, lessons that may be used to guide and accelerate translation of emerging genomic insights into practical clinical endpoints that can impact on practice of cancer medicine.

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