A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on small business tax requirements, focusing on: (1) the federal filing, reporting, and deposit requirements that apply to small businesses; and (2) the actual experience of small businesses in meeting these requirements, including their involvement in the Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) enforcement process."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Army's Comanche Helicopter Program, focusing on: (1) the risks in the Army's restructured plans for developing and testing the Comanche; (2) the changes in the Comanche's performance capabilities and requirements; (3) cost estimates for development; and (4) the Comanche's impact on the Army's overall aviation modernization efforts."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on state and local public tax disclosure programs, focusing on: (1) which state and local governments are operating programs to publicly disclose the names of taxpayers that are delinquent in paying the income taxes they owe or do not file income tax returns; (2) the differences, if any, among these programs; and (3) state and local revenue office officials' views on whether their disclosure programs are improving compliance."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of Defense's accounting for and reporting on the costs of the foreign military sales (FMS) program, focusing on whether the Navy has properly charged its FMS customers for goods and services already provided."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "GAO identified weaknesses in the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) personnel practices."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a legislative requirement, GAO provided information on internal control weaknesses identified during GAO's audits of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation's (FDIC) 1998 financial statements."

The first is an email from Walter Olson to Charles C. Francis about the anti-gay pledge, and a piece that Olson wrote about it. The second is an email from Karl Rove to Charles C. Francis and it is also about the anti-gay pledge being circulated by Bill Horn.

Recently, a 3D, polychromatic, nonlinear simulation code was developed to study the growth of nonlinear harmonics in self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE) free-electron lasers (FELs). The simulation was applied to the parameters for each stage of the Advanced Photon Source (APS) SASE FEL, intended for operation in the visible, UV, and short UV wavelength regimes, respectively, to study the presence of nonlinear harmonic generation. Significant nonlinear harmonic growth is seen. Here, a discussion of the code development, the APS SASE FEL, the simulations and results, and, finally, the proposed experimental procedure for verification of such nonlinear harmonic generation at the APS SASE FEL will be given.

This brief describes a strategy that, when implemented, will allow the attributes, i.e., the physical properties, of nuclear weapon and other configurations of fissile material to be estimated from Nuclear Material Identification System (NMIS) signatures for arms control, treaty verification, and transparency purposes. Attributes are estimated by condensing measured NMIS signatures into ''features'' that approximately represent physical characteristics of the measurement such as gamma-ray transmission, induced fission, etc. The features are obtained from NMIS signatures to estimate quantities related to gamma and neutron transmission through the inspected item and gamma and neutron scattering and production via induced fission within the inspected item. Multivariate, i.e., multiple-feature, linear models have been successfully employed to estimate attributes, and multivariate nonlinear models are currently under investigation. Attributes estimated employing this strategy can then be examined to test the supposition that the inspected item is in fact a nuclear weapon.

Manipulator system cold validation testing (CVT) was performed in support of the Fuel Retrieval System (FRS) Sub-Project, a subtask of the Spent Nuclear Fuel Project at the Hanford Site in Richland, Washington. The FRS will be used to retrieve and repackage K-Basin Spent Nuclear Fuel (SNF) currently stored in old K-Plant storage basins. The FRS is required to retrieve full fuel canisters from the basin; clean the fuel elements inside the canister to remove excessive uranium corrosion products (or sludge); remove the contents from the canisters; and sort the resulting debris, scrap, and fuel for repackaging. The fuel elements and scrap will be collected in fuel storage and scrap baskets in preparation for loading into a multi canister overpack (MCO), while the debris is loaded into a debris bin and disposed of as solid waste. The FRS is composed of three major subsystems. The Manipulator Subsystem provides remote handling of fuel, scrap, and debris; the In-Pool Equipment subsystem performs cleaning of fuel and provides a work surface for handling materials; and the Remote Viewing Subsystem provides for remote viewing of the work area by operators. There are two complete and identical FRS systems, one to be installed in the K-West …

A preliminary compatibility study was carried out between the plastic-bonded PETN-based high explosive LX-16 and the adhesive Halthane 73-18. The work, based on the Chemical Reactivity Test (CRT), used non-standard times and temperatures to find conditions corresponding to accelerated decomposition. This study is a prequel to a more comprehensive isothermal and thermal cycling study that will include both material evaluation and test fire.

There is a significant amount of unconverted light incident in the NIF target chamber. The baseline plan for managing this light is to use a sub-aperture CSG design. This CSG selection impacts the target chamber and near-opposing FOAs due to: (1) zero order unconverted light footprint, and (2) high order dispersed unconverted light. In this memo we describe the impact of the zero order light on the range of beam pointing for individual beams. We show that zero order footprint for 1w light enters into the near-opposite FOAs for several ports if the beams are pointed away from the target chamber center. Additionally, for the case where 3w is allowed to propagate past target chamber center, the converted light may enter into the near-opposite FOAs. The second aperture in the PAM is required to protect the FOAs and still accommodate offset beam pointing on NIF. We present details on the aperture requirements to accommodate a range of beam pointing.

Metacomputing systems are intended to support remote and/or concurrent use of geographically distributed computational resources. Resource management in such systems is complicated by five concerns that do not typically arise in other situations: site autonomy and heterogeneous substrates at the resources, and application requirements for policy extensibility, co-allocation, and online control. We describe a resource management architecture that addresses these concerns. This architecture distributes the resource management problem among distinct local manager, resource broker, and resource co-allocator components and defines an extensible resource specification language to exchange information about requirements. We describe how these techniques have been implemented in the context of the Globus metacomputing toolkit and used to implement a variety of different resource management strategies. We report on our experiences applying our techniques in a large testbed, GUSTO, incorporating 15 sites, 330 computers, and 3600 processors.

In defining the powers and duties of the three branches of government, the U.S. Constitution never explicitly referred to Science, except in the patent clause. But many technical responsibilities are implied in references to weights and measures, the census, and the like. Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and in particular Benjamin Franklin, were highly literate in science, but it was their disciple, President John Quincy Adams who promoted as a matter of policy a direct role of the government in science--in particular with respect to astronomy, land surveys and navigation--all physical sciences. Some agencies of government--notably the National Bureau of Standards and the Department of Agriculture were founded in the early days of the Republic with scientific and technical missions. Since then the involvement of the government with science has waxed and waned but the major expansion of the interaction between physics and government occurred after World War II when physicists demonstrated the power of their craft during mobilization of science in support of the war effort. In discussing the interaction of physics with government we should distinguish ''science in government''--scientific input into policy making--from ''government in science,'' which is the support and management of that part of the overall scientific …

The purpose of this report is to present experimental results that can be used to establish one segment of the safety basis for transportation and storage of plutonium residue materials.

Several catalytic aftertreatment technologies rely on the conversion of NO to NO2 to achieve efficient reduction of NOx and particulates in diesel exhaust. These technologies include the use of selective catalytic reduction of NOx with hydrocarbons, NOx adsorption, and continuously regenerated particulate trapping. These technologies require low sulfur fuel because the catalyst component that is active in converting NO to NO2 is also active in converting SO2 to SO3 . The SO3 leads t o increase in particulates and/or poison active sites on the catalyst. A non-thermal plasma can be used for the selective partial oxidation of NO to NO2 in the gas-phase under diesel engine exhaust conditions. This paper discusses how a non-thermal plasma can efficiently oxidize NO to NO2 without oxidizing SO2 to SO3 .

We demonstrate high critical current density superconducting films of YBa{sub 2}Cu{sub 3}O{sub 7{minus}{delta}} (YBCO) and Tl{sub 2}Ba{sub 2}CaCu{sub 2}O{sub 8{minus}{delta}} (Tl-2212) using LaNiO{sub 3} (LNO) buffer layers. YBCO films grown on an LNO buffer layer have only a slightly lower J{sub c} (5K, H=0) than films grown directly on a bare LaAlO{sub 3} substrate. It is noteworthy that YBCO films grown on LNO buffer layers exhibit minor microstructural disorder and enhanced flux pinning. LNO-buffered Tl-2212 samples show large reductions in J{sub c} at all temperatures and fields compared to those grown on bare LaAlO{sub 3}, correlating to both a-axis grain and nonsuperconducting phase formation. With additional optimization, LNO could be a promising buffer layer for both YBCO and Tl-based superconducting films, perhaps ideally suited for coated conductor applications.

The Silicon Vertex Tracker is the CDF online tracker which will re- construct 2D tracks using hit positions measured by the Silicon Vertex Detector and Central Outer Chamber tracks found by the eXtremely Fast Tracker. The precision measurement of the track impact parameter will allow triggering on events contain- ing B hadrons. This will allow the investigation of several important problems in B physics, like CP violation and B_s mixing, and to search for new heavy particles decaying to b{anti b}.

The use of dessicant materials for cooling and dehumidification is an effective, economical, environmentally safe method for meeting indoor air quality standards established by the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE). To maximize the technology's potential for reducing energy consumption and improving indoor air quality, DOE established the Advanced Desiccant Cooling and Dehumidification Program. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory partners with industry to support and educate industry users, as well as to support technology transfer and benchmark current performance.

This assessment describes the potential Year 2000 (Y2K) problems and describes the methods for achieving Y2K Compliance for Project W-211, Initial Tank Retrieval Systems (ITRS). The purpose of this assessment is to give an overview of the project. This document will not be updated and any dates contained in this document are estimates and may change. The scope of project W-211 is to provide systems for retrieval of radioactive wastes from ten double-shell tanks (DST). systems will be installed in tanks 102-AP, 104-AP, 105-AN, 104-AN, 102-AZ, 101-AW, 103-AN, 107-AN, 102-AY, and 102-SY. The current tank selection and sequence supports phase I feed delivery to privatized processing plants. A detailed description of system dates, functions, interfaces, potential Y2K problems, and date resolutions can not be described since the project is in the definitive design phase. This assessment will describe the methods, protocols, and practices to assure that equipment and systems do not have Y2K problems.

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Waste receipts to the double-shell tank system are analyzed and wastes through the year 2018 are projected based on assumption as of July 1999. A computer simulation of site operations is performed, which results in projections of tank fill schedules, tank transfers, evaporator operations, tank retrieval, and aging waste tank usage. This projection incorporates current budget planning and the clean-up schedule of the Tri-Party Agreement.

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This report details concerns surrounding the election of Abdulaziz Bouteflika to the presidency of Algeria in 1999. Specifically, the opposing party labeled the election as corrupt. After seven years of civil war Bouteflika proposed a civil concord and is restoring Algerian foreign relations to what they once were. Currently, the relationship between the U.S. and Algeria looks positive for the foreseeable future.