Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether business arrangements between corporations and practicing veterinarians constitute the practice of veterinary medicine, and related questions (RQ-1086)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Validity of rider to appropriations act requiring certain state agencies to expend appropriated funds for training provided by the Texas Commission on Human Rights (RQ-1029)

Letter opinion issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether a retired military officer may carry a firearm under the provisions of House Bill 2909 Act of June 1, 1997, 75th Leg., R.S., ch. 1261, § 13, 1997 Tex. Gen. Laws 4766, 4771 (RQ-1131)

Letter opinion issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether an individual may simultaneously serve as municipal judge and as a director of the Gulf of Coast Waste Disposal Authority, and a related question (RQ-1103)

Letter opinion issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether out-of-state juvenile adjudicated delinquent for a sexual offense and transferred to Texas for probation pursuant to Uniform Interstate Compact on Juveniles may be required to register as sex offender (RQ-1152)

Letter opinion issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether the Texas Lottery Commission may establish a priority of payments for monies deducted from lottery winnings (RQ-1069)

A statistics-based model is being developed to predict the laser-damage-limited lifetime of UV optical components on the NIF laser. In order to provide data for the model, laser damage experiments were performed on the Beamlet laser system at LLNL (aperture: 34 cm x 34 cm). Three prototype NIF focus lenses were exposed to 351 nm pulses (1.5 ns or 3 ns) during four experimental campaigns, each consisting of 23 to 38 pulses at NIF relevant fluences. Each lens was sol-gel AR coated and all laser exposures were performed in a vacuum environment. Through inspections of the lens before, during and after the campaigns, pulse-to-pulse damage growth rates were measured for damage initiating both on the surfaces and at bulk inclusions. Radial growth rates measured for rear surface damage was typically 10x higher than that measured in the bulk or at the front surface. No significant correlation of growth rate to precursor type was indicated. For 5 J/cm², 3 ns pulses the typical radial growth rate was nominally 20 µm/pulse. Average growth rates measured on three lenses made by two manufacturers were in good agreement. While the growth rate clearly increased with fluence, the data obtained was insufficient to quantify the …

The Laser Program at LLNL has developed automated facilities for damage testing optics up to 1 meter in diameter. The systems were developed to characterize the statistical distribution of localized damage performance across large-aperture National Ignition Facility optics. Full aperture testing is a key component of the quality assurance program for several of the optical components. The primary damage testing methods used are R:1 mapping and raster scanning. Automation of these test methods was required to meet the optics manufacturing schedule. The automated activities include control and diagnosis of the damage-test laser beam as well as detection and characterization of damage events.

A novel photothermal microscopy (PTM) is developed which uses only one laser beam, working as both the pump and the probe. The principle of this single-beam PTM is based on the detection of the second harmonic component of the laser modulated scattering (LMS) signal. This component has a linear dependence on the optical absorptance of the tested area and a quadratic dependence on the pump laser power. Using a pump laser at the wavelengths of 514.5- and 532-nm high-resolution photothermal scans are performed for polished fused silica surfaces and a HfO{sub 2}/SiO{sub 2} multilayer coatings. The results are compared with those from the traditional two-beam PTM mapping. It is demonstrated that the single-beam PTM is more user-friendly (i.e. no alignment is needed) than conventional two-beam PTM and, offers a higher spatial resolution for defect detection.

Laser-induced damage of transparent fused silica optical components by 355 nm illumination occurs primarily at surface defects produced during the grinding and polishing processes. These defects can either be surface defects or sub-surface damage.Wet etch processing in a buffered hydrogen fluoride (HF) solution has been examined as a tool for characterizing such defects. A study was conducted to understand the effects of etch depth on the damage threshold of fused silica substrates. The study used a 355 nm, 7.5 ns, 10 Hz Nd:YAG laser to damage test fused silica optics through various wet etch processing steps. Inspection of the surface quality was performed with Nomarski microscopy and Total Internal Reflection Microscopy. The damage test data and inspection results were correlated with polishing process specifics. The results show that a wet etch exposes subsurface damage while maintaining or improving the laser damage performance. The benefits of a wet etch must be evaluated for each polishing process.

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Daily newspaper from Baytown, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

Semiweekly newspaper from Boerne, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

Weekly newspaper from Harper, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

Daily newspaper from Altus, Oklahoma that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

Weekly newspaper from Emory, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

For the aggressive fluence requirements of the NIF laser, some level of laser-induced damage to the large (40 x 40 cm) 351 nm final optics is inevitable. Planning and utilization of NIF therefore requires reliable prediction of the functional degradation of the final optics. Laser damage tests are typically carried out with Gaussian beams on relatively small test areas. The tests yield a damage probability vs energy fluence relation. These damage probabilities are shown to depend on both the beam fluence distribution and the size of area tested. Thus, some analysis is necessary in order to use these test results to determine expected damage levels for large aperture optics. The authors present a statistical approach which interprets the damage probability in terms of an underlying intrinsic surface density of damaging defects. This allows extrapolation of test results to different sized areas and different beam shapes (NIF has a flattop beam). The defect density is found to vary as a power of the fluence (Weibull distribution).

Daily newspaper from Chickasha, Oklahoma that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

Four federal agencies administer most of the U.S. government's land. The National Park Service administers the Park System for recreation use and preservation. The Fish and Wildlife Service manages wildlife refuges primarily for protecting and improving fish and wildlife habitats. The Bureau of Land Management manages the public lands for sustained yields of multiple uses - grazing, recreation, timber, and fish and wildlife. The Forest Service similarly manages the national forests. Most forests and public lands are also available for mineral exploration and development. Three special land systems are also administered by these agencies: the Wilderness System, for preserving pristine areas; the Trail System, for non-motorized recreation; and the Wild and Scenic Rivers System, for river recreation. Congress has also established many special designations for certain lands. This report summarizes the permitted and prohibited uses of lands managed by these four agencies, as well as of the many special designations. It will be updated at the beginning of the 107th Congress. For more detailed information see CRS Report 98-991, Federal Land Management Agencies: Background on Land and Resource Management.

Daily newspaper from Sapulpa, Oklahoma that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

Silver/glass mirrors have excellent optical properties but need a method of support in order to be used in concentrating solar thermal systems. In collaboration with the Cummins dish/Stirling development program, they started investigating sandwich construction as a way to integrate silver/glass mirrors into solar optical elements. In sandwich construction, membranes such as sheet metal or plastic are bonded to the front and back of a core (like a sandwich). For solar optical elements, a glass mirror is bonded to one of the membranes. This type of construction has the advantages of a high strength-to-weight ratio, and reasonable material and manufacturing cost. The inherent stiffness of sandwich construction mirror panels also facilitates large panels. This can have cost advantages for both the amount of hardware required as well as reduced installation and alignment costs. In addition, by incorporating the panels into the support structure reductions in the amount of structural support required are potentially possible.

Removal and immobilization of mercury ions from industrial waste streams is a difficult and expensive problem requiring an efficient and selective extractant that is resistant to corrosive conditions. We have now developed an acid-resistant thiacrown polymer that has potential utility as a selective and cost-effective Hg²⁺ extractant. Copolymerization of a novel C-substituted thiacrown, N,N-(4-vinylbenzylmethyl)-2-aminomethyl- ,4,&l 1,14- pentathiacycloheptadecane, with DVB (80% divinylbenzene) using a radical initiator generated a highly cross-linked polymer containing pendant thiacrowns. Mercury extraction capabilities of the polymer were tested in acidic media (pH range: 1.5 to 6.2) and the extraction of Hg²⁺ was determined to be 95⁺% with a mixing time of 30 minutes. The thiacrown polymer was also determined to be selective for Hg*+, competing ions such as Pb²⁺, Cd²⁺, A1³⁺, and Fe³⁺. even in the presence of high concentrations of The bound Hg²⁺ ions can then be stripped from the polymer, allowing the polymer to be reused without significant loss of loading capacity.

A reliable metric is required to describe the damage resistance of large aperture 3{omega} transmissive optics for the National Ignition Facility (NIF) laser. The trend from single site testing to the more statistically valid Gaussian scanning test requires a well modeled experimental procedure, accurate monitoring of the test parameters, and careful interpretation of the resulting volumes of data. The methods described here provide reliable quality assurance data, as well as intrinsic damage concentration information used to predict the performance expected under use conditions. This paper describes the equipment, test procedure, and data analysis used to evaluate large aperture 3{omega} optics for the NIF laser.

Advanced, coal-based power plants will require durable and reliable hot gas filtration systems to remove particulate contaminants from the gas streams to protect downstream components such as turbine blades from erosion damage. It is expected that the filter elements in these systems will have to be made of ceramic materials to withstand goal service temperatures of 1600 F or higher. Recent demonstration projects and pilot plant tests have indicated that the current generation of ceramic hot gas filters (cross-flow and candle configurations) are failing prematurely. Two of the most promising materials that have been extensively evaluated are clay-bonded silicon carbide and alumina-mullite porous monoliths. These candidates, however, have been found to suffer progressive thermal shock fatigue damage, as a result of rapid cooling/heating cycles. Such temperature changes occur when the hot filters are back-pulsed with cooler gas to clean them, or in process upset conditions, where even larger gas temperature changes may occur quickly and unpredictably. In addition, the clay-bonded silicon carbide materials are susceptible to chemical attack of the glassy binder phase that holds the SiC particles together, resulting in softening, strength loss, creep, and eventual failure.