We describe a general computational spectroscopic framework for interpreting observed spectra. The framework compares synthetic spectra with measured spectra, then optimizes the agreement using the Dakota toolkit to minimize a merit function that incorporates established spectroscopic techniques. We generate synthetic spectra using the self-consistent nonlocal thermodynamic equilibrium atomic kinetics and radiative transfer code Cretin, relativistic atomic structure and cross section data from Hullac, and detailed spectral line shapes from Totalb. We test the capabilities of both our synthetic spectra model and general spectroscopic framework by analyzing a K-shell argon spectrum from a Z-pinch dynamic hohlraum inertial confinement fusion capsule implosion experiment. The framework obtains close agreement between an experimental spectrum measured by a time integrated focusing spectrometer and the optimal synthetic spectrum. The synthetic spectra show that considering the spatial extent of the capsule and including the effects of optically thick resonance lines significantly affects the interpretation of measured spectra.

Latest measurements have revealed that the deviation from a maximal solar mixing angle is approximately the Cabibbo angle, i.e., QLC relation. We argue that it is not plausible that this deviation from maximality, be it a coincidence or not, comes from the charged lepton mixing. Consequently we have calculated the required corrections to the exactly bimaximal neutrino mass matrix ansatz necessary to account for the solar mass difference and the solar mixing angle. We point out that the relative size of these two corrections depends strongly on the hierarchy case under consideration. We find that the inverted hierarchy case with opposite CP parities, which is known to guarantee the RGE stability of the solar mixing angle, offers the most plausible scenario for a high energy origin of a QLC-corrected bimaximal neutrino mass matrix. This possibility may allow us to explain the QLC relation in connection with the origin of the charged fermion mass matrices.

The composition of the electrolyte is known to greatly influence the performance of dye-sensitized solar cells. It has been speculated that some components of the electrolyte passivate the TiO2 surface against recombination; however, this has never been confirmed experimentally. We hereby present the first case of passivation of the TiO2 surface against recombination by an additive in the electrolyte. Even though the additive also causes a downward movement of the TiO2 bands, suppression of recombination prevails and an overall improvement in open-circuit photovoltage is observed. This work was conducted in collaboration with the DOE Office of Science program.

Energetic particle irradiation is used to systematically introduce point defects into In{sub 1-x}Ga{sub x}N alloys over the entire composition range. Three types of energetic particles (electrons, protons, and {sup 4}He{sup +}) are used to produce a displacement damage dose spanning five decades. In InN and In-rich InGaN the free electron concentration increases with increasing irradiation dose but saturates at a sufficiently high dose. The saturation is due to Fermi level pinning at the Fermi Stabilization Energy (E{sub FS}), which is located at 4.9 eV below the vacuum level. Electrochemical capacitance-voltage (ECV) measurements show that the pinning of the surface Fermi energy at E{sub FS} is also responsible for the surface electron accumulation in as-grown InN and In-rich InGaN alloys. The results are in agreement with the amphoteric defect model that predicts that the same type of native defects are responsible for the Fermi level pinning in both cases.

We present comparisons of the CRANGE code to other well-known codes, SRIM and ASTAR, and to experimental results for ion-material interactions such as energy loss per unit length, ion range, and ion induced electron yield. These ion-material interaction simulations are relevant to the electron cloud effect in heavy ions accelerators for fusion energy and high energy density physics. Presently, the CRANGE algorithms are most accurate at energies above 1.0 MeV/amu. For calculations of energy loss per unit length of a potassium ion in stainless steel, results of CRANGE and SRIM agree to within ten percent above 1.0 MeV/amu. For calculations of the range of a helium ion in aluminum, results of CRANGE and ASTAR agree to within two percent above 1.0 MeV/amu. Finally, for calculations of ion induced electron yield for hydrogen ions striking gold, results of CRANGE agree to within ten percent with measured electron yields above 1.0 MeV/amu.

A quantitative study of n-type doping in highly crystalline organic semiconductor films establishes the predominant influence of electrostatic forces in these low-dielectric materials. Based on these findings, a self-consistent model of doped (purposely or not) organic semiconductors is proposed in which: (1) the equilibrium free carrier density, nf, is a small fraction of the total charge density; (2) a superlinear increase in conductivity with doping density is universal; (3) nf increases with applied electric field; and (4) the carrier mobility is field-dependent regardless of crystallinity.

The purpose of the process integration project of the National Center for Photovoltaics (NCPV) is to develop an infrastructure that will allow researchers to gain new knowledge that is difficult--if not impossible--to obtain with existing equipment. This difficulty is due, in part, to the state of our existing tool set, which lacks sufficient in-situ or real-time measurement capabilities, or lacks access to analytical tools where the sample remains in a controlled environment between deposition and processing or measurement. This new infrastructure will provide flexible and robust integration of deposition, processing (etching, annealing, etc.), and characterization tools via a standardized transfer interface such that samples move between tools in a controlled ambient. This concept will also require the cooperation of experts from various material technologies and characterization disciplines to work directly with each other to obtain answers to key scientific and technological questions. Ultimately, this synergistic effort between NREL staff, universities, and the photovoltaic (PV) industry--around an integrated tool base--will add to the PV knowledge base and help move many PV technologies forward.

The Westinghouse Savannah River Company, a contractor to the Department of Energy, has compared Revisions 1 and 2 of NUREG-0700-Human System Interface Design Review Guideline, from the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission Nuclear Regulatory Guide. The comparison has been made with respect to which guidelines remained the same, the guidelines that were reformatted or reworded, additional guidelines, and deleted guidelines. This comparison was made in preparation of revising the previously developed Human Factors Engineering Analysis Tool for automating the review, analysis, and evaluation of human system interface designs. This tool has been described at previous conferences on human factors and the merits and benefits of the tool described. The tool has been successfully applied to over eight facilities at WSRC. This paper describes the methodology and results of the comparison and the plans to enhance the already successful automation tool. The number of criteria in NUREG-0700 increased from approximately 1650 in Revision 1 to almost 2200 in Revision 2. Approximately 1600 criteria remained the same, though they were significantly reorganized; while about 100 were reworded or reformatted to clarify or expand the guidance provided. Around 600 guidelines were added and approximately 70 deleted. The majority of the changes and additions …

The Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) Laboratory supports the Solar Energy Technologies Program through the measurement and characterization of solar energy-related materials and devices. The FTIR technique is a fast, accurate, and reliable method for studying molecular structure and composition. This ability to identify atomic species and their bonding environment is a powerful combination that finds use in many research and development efforts. A brief overview of the technical approach used is contained in Section 2 of this report. Because of its versatility and accessibility, the FTIR Laboratory is a valuable contributor to the Solar Energy Technologies Program. The laboratory provides support for, and collaborates with, several in-house programs as well as our industry and university partners. By the end of FY 2004, the FTIR Laboratory performed over 1100 measurements on PV-related materials. These contributions resulted in conference and workshop presentations and several peer-reviewed publications. A brief summary of a few of these efforts is contained in Section 3 of this report.

Oxygenated nanocrystalline CdS films show improved solar cell performance, but the physics and mechanism underlying this are not yet clearly understood. Raman study provides complementary information to the understanding obtained from other experimental investigations. A comprehensive analysis of the existing experimental data (including x-ray diffraction, transmission, transmission electron microscopy, and Raman) has led to the following conclusions: (1) The O-incorporation forms CdS1-xOx alloy nano-particles. (2) The observed evolution of the electronic structure is the result of the interplay between the alloy and quantum confinement effect. (3) The blue-shift of the LO phonon Raman peak is primarily due to the alloying effect. (4) Some oxygen atoms have taken the interstitial sites.

Cleanup at the Savannah River Site brings with it the need to clean out and close down the radioactive waste tanks constructed in support of the fuel rod dissolution process. An innovative technique for assaying waste tanks has been developed at the Savannah River Site. The technique uses a gamma detector in the annular space between the inner and outer tank walls of double walled tanks. Unique shielding, counting electronics, and deployment techniques were developed. The system provides information to facilitate mapping interstitial liquid levels, sludge layers and other structures in the waste tank located near the tank walls. The techniques used, results, and lessons learned will be discussed.

The pseudorapidity asymmetry and centrality dependence of charged hadron spectra in d+Au collisions at {radical}s{sub NN} = 200 GeV are presented. The charged particle density at mid-rapidity, its pseudorapidity asymmetry and centrality dependence are reasonably reproduced by a Multi-Phase Transport model, by HIJING, and by the latest calculations in a saturation model. Ratios of transverse momentum spectra between backward and forward pseudorapidity are above unity for p{sub T} below 5 GeV/c. The ratio of central to peripheral spectra in d+Au collisions shows enhancement at 2 < p{sub T} < 6 GeV/c, with a larger effect at backward rapidity than forward rapidity. Our measurements are in qualitative agreement with gluon saturation and in contrast to calculations based on incoherent multiple partonic scatterings.

To foster continued growth in the U.S. photovoltaic (PV) industry, the U.S. Department of Energy initiated the PV Manufacturing R&D (PVMR&D) Project--a partnership with U.S. PV industry participants to perform cost-shared manufacturing research and development. Throughout FY 2004, PVMR&D managed fourteen subcontracts across the industry. The impact of PVMR&D is quantified by reductions in direct module manufacturing costs, scale-up of existing PV production capacity, and accrual of cost savings to the public and industry. An analysis of public and industry investment shows that both recaptured funds by mid-1998 based on estimated manufacturing cost savings from PVMR&D participation. Since project inception, total PV manufacturing capacity has increased from 14 MW to 201 MW at the close of 2003, while direct manufacturing costs declined from $5.55/W to $2.49/W. These results demonstrate continued progress toward the overriding goals of the PVMR&D project.

In FY99, Solar Heating and Lighting set the goal to reduce the life-cycle cost of saved-energy for solar domestic hot water (SDHW) systems in mild climates by 50%, primarily through use of polymer technology. Two industry teams (Davis Energy Group/SunEarth (DEG/SE) and FAFCO) have been developing un-pressurized integral-collector-storage (ICS) systems having load-side heat exchangers, and began field-testing in FY04. DEG/SE?s ICS has a rotomolded tank and thermoformed glazing. Based upon manufacturing issues, costs, and poor performance, the FAFCO team changed direction in late FY04 from an un-pressurized ICS to a direct thermosiphon design based upon use of pool collectors. Support for the teams is being provided for materials testing, modeling, and system testing. New ICS system models have been produced to model the new systems. A new ICS rating procedure for the ICS systems is undergoing testing and validation. Pipe freezing, freeze protection valves, and overheating have been tested and analyzed.

This presentation discusses the investigation/extension of high temperature strain gage applications sensors to SOFC applications.

In this paper, we evaluate Titanium's usability as a high-level parallel programming language through a case study, where we implement a subset of Chombo's functionality in Titanium. Chombo is a software package applying the Adaptive Mesh Refinement methodology to numerical Partial Differential Equations at the production level. In Chombo, the library approach is used to parallel programming (C++ and Fortran, with MPI), whereas Titanium is a Java dialect designed for high-performance scientific computing. The performance of our implementation is studied and compared with that of Chombo in solving Poisson's equation based on two grid configurations from a real application. Also provided are the counts of lines of code from both sides.

Real-time spectroscopic ellipsometry (RTSE) has proven to be an exceptionally valuable tool in the optimization of hot wire CVD (HWCVD) growth of both silicon heterojunction (SHJ) solar cells and thin epitaxial layers of crystal silicon (epi-Si). For SHJ solar cells, RTSE provides real-time thickness information and rapid feedback on the degree of crystallinity of the thin intrinsic layers used to passivate the crystal silicon (c-Si) wafers. For epi-Si growth, RTSE provides real-time feedback on the crystallinity and breakdown of the epitaxial growth process. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) has been used to verify the RTSE analysis of thickness and crystallinity. In contrast to TEM, RTSE provides feedback in real time or same-day, while TEM normally requires weeks. This rapid feedback has been a key factor in the rapid progress of both the SHJ and epi-Si projects.

The GaAsN alloy can have a band gap as small as 1.0 eV when the nitrogen composition is about 2%. Indium can also be added to the alloy to increase lattice matching to GaAs and Ge. These properties are advantageous for developing a highly-efficient, multi-junction solar cell. However, poor GaAsN cell properties, such as low open-circuit voltage, have led to inadequate performance. Deep-level transient spectroscopy of p-type GaAsN has identified an electron trap having an activation energy near 0.2 eV and a trap density of at least 1016 cm-3. This trap level appears with the addition of small amounts of nitrogen to GaAs, which also corresponds to an increased drop in open-circuit voltage.

Several problems exist with current methods used to align DNA sequences for comparative sequence analysis. Most dynamic programming algorithms assume that conserved sequence elements are collinear. This assumption appears valid when comparing orthologous protein coding sequences. Functional constraints on proteins provide strong selective pressure against sequence inversions, and minimize sequence duplications and feature shuffling. For non-coding sequences this collinearity assumption is often invalid. For example, enhancers contain clusters of transcription factor binding sites that change in number, orientation, and spacing during evolution yet the enhancer retains its activity. Dotplot analysis is often used to estimate non-coding sequence relatedness. Yet dot plots do not actually align sequences and thus cannot account well for base insertions or deletions. Moreover, they lack an adequate statistical framework for comparing sequence relatedness and are limited to pairwise comparisons. Lastly, dot plots and dynamic programming text outputs fail to provide an intuitive means for visualizing DNA alignments.

Research into the mechanisms involved in the sensing and responses of microorganisms to changes in their environment is currently very active in a large number of laboratories in the US, Europe, Japan, and Israel. A wide range of eukaryotic and prokaryotic species are being studies with regard to their sensing of chemical changes, light and redox signal and intercellular signaling, leading either to changes in motile behavior, gene expression or development. It has become increasingly apparent that the mechanisms involved in development have application in higher organisms while the sensing systems in bacteria are involved in a very wide range of physiological traits, from pathogenicity, through to biofilm formation. This is an area where a wide range of state of the art tools have been used and developed over the past few decades. Approaches include behavioral studies, electro-physiology, genetics, molecular biology, structural biology, biophysics and single molecule microscopy, immunocytochemistry and molecular and mathematical modeling, all of this helped by the large number of bacterial and eukaryotic microbial genome sequences now available. The central goal of this meeting is to bring together investigators using this wide range of approaches and different systems to compare data, share ideas and approaches and seeks …

Thin hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) layers deposited by hot-wire chemical vapor deposition (HWCVD) are investigated as emitters and back-surface-field (BSF) contacts to make silicon heterojunction solar cells on p-type crystalline silicon wafers. A common requirement for excellent emitter and BSF quality is minimization of interface recombination. Best results require immediate a Si:H deposition and an abrupt and flat interface to the c-Si substrate. We obtain record 16.9% and 14.8% efficiencies on p-type planar float-zone (FZ) and Czochralski (CZ) silicon substrates, respectively, with HWCVD a-Si:H(n) emitters and Al-BSF contacts. Initial efforts with p-type HWCVD Si thin films as the BSF have yielded 12.5% efficiency on p type CZ-Si.

The DOE Solar Energy Technologies Program includes a sub-key activity entitled ''Photovoltaic Module Reliability R&D''. This activity has been in existence for several years to help ensure that the PV technologies that advance to the commercial module stage have acceptable service lifetimes and annual performance degradation rates. The long-term (2020) goal, as stated in the Solar Program Multi-Year Technical Plan [1], is to assist industry with the development of PV systems that have 30-year service lifetimes and 1% annual performance degradation rates. The corresponding module service lifetimes and annual performance degradation rate would have to be 30 years lifetime and approximately 0.5% (or less, depending on the type of PV system) annual performance degradation. Reaching this goal is critical to achieving the PV technology Levelized Energy Cost Targets, as listed and described in the Solar Program Multi-Year Technical Plan. This paper is an overview of the Module Reliability R&D sub-key activity. More details and the major results and accomplishments are covered in the papers presented in the PV Module Reliability Session of the DOE Solar Energy Technology Review Meeting, October 25-28, 2004, in Denver, Colorado.

Heightened natural gas prices have emerged as a key energy-policy challenge for at least the early part of the 21st century. With the recent run-up in gas prices and the expected continuation of volatile and high prices in the near future, a growing number of voices are calling for increased diversification of energy supplies. Proponents of renewable energy technologies identify these clean energy sources as an important part of the solution. Increased deployment of renewable energy (RE) can hedge natural gas price risk in more than one way, but a recent report by Berkeley Lab evaluates one such benefit in detail: by displacing gas-fired electricity generation, RE reduces natural gas demand and thus puts downward pressure on gas prices. Many recent modeling studies of increased RE deployment have demonstrated that this ''secondary'' effect of lowering natural gas prices could be significant; as a result, this effect is increasingly cited as justification for policies promoting RE. The Berkeley Lab report summarizes recent modeling studies that have evaluated the impact of RE deployment on gas prices, reviews the reasonableness of the results of these studies in light of economic theory and other research, and develops a simple tool that can be used …

This paper presents a brief overview of the status and accomplishments during Fiscal Year (FY)2004 of the Photovoltaic (PV) Module Reliability and Performance R&D Subtask, which is part of the PV Module Reliability R&D Project (a joint NREL-Sandia project).