For more than a decade, Congress and the Executive Branch have tried to stem spiraling health care costs through various regulatory actions at the Federal and State levels. Planning laws, for example, focus regulatory attention on the capacity of the health care industry to provide health services. Other laws have created programs to monitor and control the use of services provided to individual patients. Direct wage and price controls were applied to the health industry in the early 1970's and in recent years Congress has debated whether to impose controls over hospital spending in the United States. This report discusses the debate surrounding various approaches to lower health care costs.

The appropriate centering force terms are added to the ion-focused regime hose equations and their effect on hose development is calculated. It is found that while hose at very high frequencies is stabilized, the overall suppression is only moderate and other stabilization processes need to be explored.

In this report we document the operating scenario models and calculations as they exist and comment on those aspects of the models where performance is sensitive to the assumptions that are made. We also focus on areas where improvements need to be made in the mathematical descriptions of phenomena, work which is in progress. To illustrate the process of calculating performance, and to be very specific in our documentation, part 2 of this report contains the complete equations and sequence of calculations used to determine parameters for the MARS mode of operation in MFTF-B. Values for all variables for a particular set of input parameters are also given there. The point design so described is typical, but should be viewed as a snapshot in time of our ongoing estimations and predictions of performance.

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Potential DOD requirements for noninterruptable power sources could total 1 MW thermal by FY 1990. Of the three isotopes considered, (/sup 90/Sr, /sup 147/Pm, /sup 238/Pu) /sup 90/Sr is the only one available in sufficient amounts to meet this requirement. To meet the DOD FY 1990 requirements, it would be necessary to undertake /sup 90/Sr recovery operations from spent fuel reprocessing at SRP, Hanford, and the Barnwell Nuclear Fuels Plant (BNFP). /sup 90/Sr recovery from the existing alkaline high level waste (HLW) at Hanford and SRP is not attractive because the isotopic purity of the /sup 90/Sr is below that required for DOD applications. Without reprocessing LWR spent fuel, SRP and Hanford could not supply the demand of 1 MW thermal until FY 1996. Between FY 1983 and FY 1996, SRP and Hanford could supply approximately 0.70 MW of /sup 90/Sr and 0.15 MW of /sup 147/Pm. SRP could supply an additional 0.15 MW from the production and recovery of /sup 238/Pu. Strontium-90 is the most economical of the three heat source radionuclides considered. The /sup 90/Sr unit recovery cost from SRP fresh acid waste would be $180/watt. The BNFP /sup 90/Sr recovery cost would be $130/watt to $235/watt depending …

The dynamic response of a thin steel disk to a transient thermal pulse induced by a pulsed neodymium-glass laser was studied experimentally and compared with numerical results from a finite element code. The experiment was designed to provide data for use in code development work for erosion/corrosion studies.

This report is about National Security and Scientific Information

The design of modern straight-axis linked-mirror plasma-confinement configurations involves a balance between many competing requirements. The dipole and quadrupole components of magnetic induction required in one confinement region often do not match onto the fields of an adjacent region without complications that seriously affect particle drifts or confinement stability. Here, the relevant factors are set down together with the techniques for analytical optimization of the design of a general configuration. A general sufficient condition for the stability of an arbitrary guiding-center MHD equilibrium is derived. This condition makes explicit the stabilizing qualities of good normal curvature and diamagnetic axial current. The instability drive depends on two terms: one carries the sign of normal curvature and the other relates to the relative signs of geodeics curvature and geodesic torsion. The theory is applied to low-beta, large-aspect-ratio equilibria for which analytic expressions for the confining magnetic fields are known. Two optimizations are required to specify the arbitrary features of the quadrupole and dipole fields. One optimization is nonlinear and can be performed by the ordinary calculus of variations; the second optimization is linear and subject to the rules of game theory. Appropriate quality factors are obtained, thus giving the designer quantitative measures …

Bunched beams of 100 and 150 GeV have been stored in the Fermilab Main Ring for periods of up to one hour. The observations of beam current and beam profiles are analyzed for the effects of gas scattering, chromaticity and non-linear magnetic field.

A tandem-mirror configuration can be created by combining hot electron end-cell plasmas with neutral-beam pumping. A region of large negative potential formed in each end cell confines electrons in the central cell. The requirement of charge neutrality causes the central-cell potential to become negative with respect to ground in order to equate ion loss to electron loss. Start-up and formation of the axial potential distribution, neutral-beam pumping, hot electron feed, electron-cyclotron-resonance heating (ECRH) power requirements, and stability are discussed in general terms. Each of these considerations impose constraints on the operation of TMX as a negative machine. The start-up requirements and scenario are also presented. Work on the design and analysis of negative tandems is continuing. The status of work to date is presented here with problem areas for future work identified.