Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Since the attacks of September 11, 2001, combating terrorism has been one of the nation's highest priorities. As part of that effort, preventing nuclear and radioactive material from being smuggled into the United States--perhaps to be used by terrorists in a nuclear weapon or in a radiological dispersal device (a "dirty bomb")--has become a key national security objective. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is responsible for providing radiation detection capabilities at U.S. ports-of-entry. Until April 2005, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) under DHS managed this program. However, on April 15, 2005, the president directed the establishment, within DHS, of the Domestic Nuclear Detection Office (DNDO), whose duties include acquiring and supporting the deployment of radiation detection equipment. CBP continues its traditional screening function at ports-of-entry to interdict dangerous nuclear and radiological materials through the use of radiation detection equipment, including portal monitors. The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), one of the Department of Energy's (DOE) national laboratories, manages the deployment of radiation portal monitors for DHS. Current portal monitors, which cost about $55,000 per monitor, detect the presence of radiation, but cannot distinguish between harmless radiological …

Free weekly newspaper that includes business and classified advertising.

Daily student newspaper from the University of North Texas in Denton, Texas that includes local, state and campus news along with advertising.

Video footage from the KXAS-TV/NBC station in Fort Worth, Texas, to accompany a news story.

Video footage from the KXAS-TV/NBC station in Fort Worth, Texas, to accompany a news story.

None

This report describes the recent changes to file a federal income tax return as a head of household.

Image of students standing outside and wearing backpacks. The one closest to the camera is in focus and he is wearing a UNT T-Shirt. Behind him are three others, and one of them is holding a book and using her cell-phone.

None

We study the initial-state-radiation processes e{sup +}e{sup -} {yields} K{sup +}K{sup -}{pi}{sup +}{pi}{sup -}{gamma} and e{sup +}e{sup -} {yields} K{sup +}K{sup -} {pi}{sup 0}{pi}{sup 0}{gamma} using an integrated luminosity of 232 fb{sup -1} collected at the {Upsilon}(4S) mass with the BABAR detector at SLAC. Even though these reactions are dominated by intermediate states with excited kaons, we are able to study for the first time the cross section for e{sup +}e{sup -} {yields} {phi}(1020)f{sub 0}(980) as a function of center-of-mass energy. We observe a structure near threshold consistent with a 1{sup --} resonance with mass m=2.175 {+-} 0.010 {+-} 0.015 GeV/c{sup 2} and width {Lambda} = 58 {+-} 16 {+-} 20 MeV. We observe no Y (4260) signal and set a limit of {Beta}{sub Y{yields}{phi}{pi}{sup +}{pi}{sup -}} {center_dot} {Lambda}{sub ee}{sup Y} < 0.4 eV (90% confidence level), which excludes some models.

This paper demonstrates the use of coupled fluid flow andgeomechanical fault slip (fault reactivation) analysis to estimate themaximum sustainable injection pressure during geological sequestration ofCO2. Two numerical modeling approaches for analyzing faultslip areapplied, one using continuum stress-strain analysis and the other usingdiscrete fault analysis. The results of these two approaches to numericalfault-slip analyses are compared to the results of a more conventionalanalytical fault-slip analysis that assumes simplified reservoirgeometry. It is shown that the simplified analytical fault-slip analysismay lead to either overestimation or underestimation of the maximumsustainable injection pressure because it cannot resolve importantgeometrical factors associated with the injection induced spatialevolution of fluid pressure and stress. We conclude that a fully couplednumerical analysis can more accurately account for the spatial evolutionof both insitu stresses and fluid pressure, and therefore results in amore accurate estimation of the maximum sustainable CO2 injectionpressure.

Using 65 million {Upsilon}(4S) {yields} B{bar B} events collected with the BABAR detector at the PEP-II e{sup +}e{sup -} storage ring at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, they measure the color-favored branching fractions {Beta}({bar B}{sup 0} {yields} D{sup +}{pi}{sup -}) = (2.63 {+-} 0.05 {+-} 0.22) x 10{sup -3}, {Beta}({bar B}{sup 0} {yields} D*{sup +}{pi}{sup -}) = (2.79 {+-} 0.08 {+-} 0.18) x 10{sup -3}, {Beta}(B{sup -} {yields} D{sup 0}{pi}{sup -}) = (4.90 {+-} 0.07 {+-} 0.23) x 10{sup -3} and {Beta}(B{sup -} {yields} D*{sup 0} {pi}{sup -}) = (5.52 {+-} 0.17 {+-} 0.43) x 10{sup -3}, where the first error is statistical and the second is systematic. With these results and the current world average for the branching fraction for the color-suppressed decay {bar B}{sup 0} {yields} D{sup (*)0}{pi}{sup 0}, the cosines of the strong phase difference {delta} between the I = 1/2 and I = 3/2 isospin amplitudes are determined to be cos{sigma} = 0.860{sub -0.006-0.028}{sup +0.007+0.029} for the {bar B} {yields} D{pi} process and cos{sigma} = 0.917{sub -0.016-0.051}{sup +0.018+0.059} for the {bar B} {yields} D*{pi} process. The results for cos{delta} suggest that final-state interactions are presented in the D{pi} system.

High temperature hohlraums (HTH) are designed to reach high radiation temperatures by coupling a maximum amount of laser energy into a small target in a short time. These 400-800 {micro}m diameter gold cylinders rapidly fill with hot plasma during irradiation with multiple beams in 1ns laser pulses. The high-Z plasmas are dense, (electron density, n{sub e}/n{sub c} {approx} 0.1-0.4), hot (electron temperature, T{sub e} {approx} 10keV) and are bathed in a high-temperature radiation field (radiation temperature, T{sub rad} {approx} 300eV). Here n{sub c}, the critical density, equals 9 x 10{sup 21}/cm{sup 3}. The laser beams heating this plasma are intense ({approx} 10{sup 15} - 10{sup 17} W/cm{sup 2}). The coupling of the laser to the plasma is a rich regime for Laser-Plasma Interaction (LPI) physics. The LPI mechanisms in this study include beam deflection and forward scattering. In order to understand the LPI mechanisms, the plasma parameters must be known. An L-band spectrometer is used to measure the and electron temperature. A ride-along experiment is to develop the x-radiation emitted by the thin back wall of the half-hohlraum into a thermal radiation source.

Soil salinity is an important constraint to agricultural sustainability, but accurate information on its variation across agricultural regions or its impact on regional crop productivity remains sparse. We evaluated the relationships between remotely sensed wheat yields and salinity in an irrigation district in the Colorado River Delta Region. The goals of this study were to (1) document the relative importance of salinity as a constraint to regional wheat production and (2) develop techniques to accurately identify saline fields. Estimates of wheat yield from six years of Landsat data agreed well with ground-based records on individual fields (R{sup 2} = 0.65). Salinity measurements on 122 randomly selected fields revealed that average 0-60 cm salinity levels > 4 dS m{sup -1} reduced wheat yields, but the relative scarcity of such fields resulted in less than 1% regional yield loss attributable to salinity. Moreover, low yield was not a reliable indicator of high salinity, because many other factors contributed to yield variability in individual years. However, temporal analysis of yield images showed a significant fraction of fields exhibited consistently low yields over the six year period. A subsequent survey of 60 additional fields, half of which were consistently low yielding, revealed that this …

This thesis describes a search for the decay B{sup -} {yields} {tau}{sup -}{bar {nu}}{sub {tau}} in 231.8 x 10{sup 6} {Upsilon}(4S) decays recorded with the BABAR detector at the SLAC PEP-II B-Factory. A sample of events with one reconstructed exclusive semi-leptonic B decay (B{sup +} {yields} {bar D}*{sup 0} {ell}{sup +}{nu}{sub {ell}}) is selected, and in the recoil a search for B{sup -} {yields} {tau}{sup -} {bar {nu}}{sub {tau}} signal is performed in the following {tau} decay modes: {tau}{sup -} {yields} e{sup -}{bar {nu}}{sub e}{nu}{sub {tau}}, {tau}{sup -} {yields} {mu}{sup -}{bar {nu}}{sub {mu}}{nu}{sub {tau}}, {tau}{sup -} {yields} {pi}{sup -}{nu}{sub {tau}}, {tau}{sup -} {yields} {pi}{sup -}{pi}{sup 0}{nu}{sub {tau}}, and {tau}{sup -} {yields} {pi}{sup -}{pi}{sup +}{pi}{sup -}{nu}{sub {tau}}. They find no evidence of signal, and they set a preliminary upper limit on the branching fraction of {beta}(B{sup -} {yields} {tau}{sup -}{bar {nu}}{sub {tau}}) < 2.8 x 10{sup -4} at the 90% confidence level (CL). This result is then combined with a statistically independent BABAR search for B{sup -} {yields} {tau}{sup -}{bar {nu}}{sub {tau}} to give a combined preliminary limit of {Beta}(B{sup -} {yields} {tau}{sup -}{bar {nu}}{sub {tau}}) < 2.6 x 10{sup -4} at 90% CL.

The prevention of deforestation and promotion of afforestation have often been cited as strategies to slow global warming. Deforestation releases CO{sub 2} to the atmosphere, which exerts a warming influence on Earth's climate. However, biophysical effects of deforestation, which include changes in land surface albedo, evapotranspiration, and cloud cover also affect climate. Here we present results from several large-scale deforestation experiments performed with a three-dimensional coupled global carbon-cycle and climate model. These are the first such simulations performed using a fully three-dimensional model representing physical and biogeochemical interactions among land, atmosphere, and ocean. We find that global-scale deforestation has a net cooling influence on Earth's climate, since the warming carbon-cycle effects of deforestation are overwhelmed by the net cooling associated with changes in albedo and evapotranspiration. Latitude-specific deforestation experiments indicate that afforestation projects in the tropics would be clearly beneficial in mitigating global-scale warming, but would be counterproductive if implemented at high latitudes and would offer only marginal benefits in temperate regions. While these results question the efficacy of mid- and high-latitude afforestation projects for climate mitigation, forests remain environmentally valuable resources for many reasons unrelated to climate.

We announce the public release of a one dimensional version of the Photon Clean Method (PCM1D). This code is in the general class of 'inverse Monte Carlo' methods and is specifically designed to interoperate with the public analysis tools available from the Chandra Science Center and the HEASARC. The tool produces models of event based data on a photon by photon basis. The instrument models are based on the standard ARF and RMF fits files. The resulting models have a high number of degrees of freedom of order the number of photons detected providing an alternative analysis compared to the usual method of fitting models with only a few parameters. The original work on this method is described in ADASS 1996 (Jernigan and Vezie).

The interaction of supernova shocks and interstellar clouds is an important astrophysical phenomenon which can lead to mass-stripping (transfer of material from cloud to surrounding flow, ''mass-loading'' the flow) and possibly increase the compression in the cloud to high enough densities to trigger star formation. Our experiments attempt to simulate and quantify the mass-stripping as it occurs when a shock passes through interstellar clouds. We drive a strong shock using 5 kJ of the 30 kJ Omega laser into a cylinder filled with low-density foam with an embedded 120 {micro}m Al sphere simulating an interstellar cloud. The density ratio between Al and foam is {approx} 9. Time-resolved x-ray radiographs show the cloud getting compressed by the shock (t {approx} 5 ns), undergoing a classical Kelvin-Helmholtz roll-up (12 ns) followed by a Widnall instability (30 ns), an inherently 3d effect that breaks the 2d symmetry of the experiment. Material is continuously being stripped from the cloud at a rate which is shown to be inconsistent with laminar models for mass-stripping (the cloud is fully stripped by 80 ns-100 ns, ten times faster than the laminar model). We present a new model for turbulent mass-stripping that agrees with the observed rate and …

A brief pedagogical overview of the phenomenology of Z{prime} gauge bosons is ILC in determining Z{prime} properties is also discussed. and explore in detail how the LHC may discover and help elucidate the models, review the current constraints on the possible properties of a Z{prime} nature of these new particles. We provide an overview of the Z{prime} studies presented. Such particles can arise in various electroweak extensions of that have been performed by both ATLAS and CMS. The role of the the Standard Model (SM). We provide a quick survey of a number of Z{prime}.

The overall objective of this proposal is to enable Iowa State University to establish a Center that enjoys world-class stature and eventually enhances the economy through the transfer of innovation from the laboratory to the marketplace. The funds have been used to support experimental proposals from interdisciplinary research teams in areas related to catalysis and green chemistry. Specific focus areas included: • Catalytic conversion of renewable natural resources to industrial materials • Development of new catalysts for the oxidation or reduction of commodity chemicals • Use of enzymes and microorganisms in biocatalysis • Development of new, environmentally friendly reactions of industrial importance These focus areas intersect with barriers from the MYTP draft document. Specifically, section 2.4.3.1 Processing and Conversion has a list of bulleted items under Improved Chemical Conversions that includes new hydrogenation catalysts, milder oxidation catalysts, new catalysts for dehydration and selective bond cleavage catalysts. Specifically, the four sections are: 1. Catalyst development (7.4.12.A) 2. Conversion of glycerol (7.4.12.B) 3. Conversion of biodiesel (7.4.12.C) 4. Glucose from starch (7.4.12.D) All funded projects are part of a soybean or corn biorefinery. Two funded projects that have made significant progress toward goals of the MYTP draft document are: Catalysts to convert …

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

This report examines Latin America's current political environment and its apparent effect on energy production in the region. It also examines regional integration efforts, including Venezuela's oil programs offering oil to many Latin American and Caribbean countries on a preferential basis, the Mexico-led Meso-American Energy Integration Program, and the proposed South American natural gas pipeline. The report also examines policy approaches that have been proposed for increased hemispheric energy cooperation, congressional interest: in the topic of hemispheric energy security, and related legislative initiatives in the 109th Congress.

This report provides a Brief Overview of Recent Practices on Continuing Appropriations Acts. Most of the operations of federal departments and agencies are funded each year through the enactment of 11 regular appropriation acts.

The brownfields tax incentive expired on December 31, 2005. Enacted in 1997, the provision allowed a taxpayer to fully deduct the costs of environmental cleanup in the year the costs were incurred, rather than spreading the costs over a period of years. The provision was adopted to stimulate the cleanup and developers of less seriously contaminated sites by providing a benefit to taxpaying developers of brownfield properties. This report contains information on the background of brownfields, survey findings from brownfield tax incentive applications, and related figures.