Recital presented at the UNT College of Music Recital Hall in partial fulfillment of the Master of Music (MM) degree.

This third volume of the Savage Frontier series focuses on the evolution of the Texas Rangers and frontier warfare in Texas during the years 1840 and 1841. Comanche Indians were the leading rival to the pioneers during this period. Peace negotiations in San Antonio collapsed during the Council House Fight, prompting what would become known as the Great Comanche Raid in the summer of 1840. Stephen L. Moore covers the resulting Battle of Plum Creek and other engagements in new detail. Rangers, militiamen, and volunteers made offensive sweeps into West Texas and the Cross Timbers area of present Dallas-Fort Worth. During this time Texas's Frontier Regiment built a great military road, roughly parallel to modern Interstate 35. Moore also shows how the Colt repeating pistol came into use by Texas Rangers. Finally, he sets the record straight on the battles of the legendary Captain Jack Hays. Through extensive use of primary military documents and first-person accounts, Moore provides a clear view of life as a frontier fighter in the Republic of Texas. The reader will find herein numerous and painstakingly recreated muster rolls, as well as casualty lists and a compilation of 1841 rangers and minutemen. For the exacting historian …

James Abijah Brooks (1855-1944) was one of the four Great Captains in Texas Ranger history, others including Bill McDonald, John Hughes, and John Rogers. Over the years historians have referred to the captain as “John” Brooks, because he tended to sign with his initials, but also because W. W. Sterling’s classic Trails and Trials of a Texas Ranger mistakenly named him as Captain John Brooks. Born and raised in Civil War-torn Kentucky, a reckless adventurer on the American and Texas frontier, and a quick-draw Texas Ranger captain who later turned in his six-shooter to serve as a county judge, Brooks’s life reflects the raucous era of the late nineteenth and early twentieth-century American West. As a Texas Ranger, Brooks participated in the high profile events of his day, from the fence-cutting wars to the El Paso prizefight, from the Conner Fight–where he lost three fingers from his left hand–to the Temple rail strike, all with a resolute demeanor and a fast gun. A shoot-out in Indian Territory nearly cost him his life and then jeopardized his career, and a lifelong bout with old Kentucky bourbon did the same. With three other distinguished Ranger captains, Brooks witnessed and helped promote the …

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "This letter responds to a Congressional request that we provide responses to questions related to our recent testimony before Congress on reauthorizing federal rail safety programs. Our testimony discussed how the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) (1) focuses its efforts on the highest priority risks related to train accidents in planning its oversight, (2) identifies safety problems on railroad systems in carrying out its oversight, and (3) assesses the impact of its oversight efforts on safety. This testimony was based on our recent report on these topics."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Over the next 5 years, the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) expects to invest $49 billion in the BMD system's development and fielding. MDA's strategy is to field new capabilities in 2-year blocks. In January 2006, MDA initiated its second block--Block 2006--to protect against attacks from North Korea and the Middle East. Congress requires GAO to assess MDA's progress annually. This year's report addresses MDA's progress during fiscal year 2006 and follows up on program oversight issues and the current status of MDA's quality assurance program. GAO assessed the progress of each element being developed by MDA, examined acquisition laws applicable to major acquisition programs, and reviewed the impact of implemented quality initiatives."

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) most recently estimated that the gross tax gap--the difference between what taxpayers pay in taxes voluntarily and on time and what they should pay under the law--reached $345 billion for tax year 2001. The tax gap arises when taxpayers fail to comply with their individual income, corporate income, employment, estate, or excise tax obligations through (1) underreporting of tax liabilities on tax returns; (2) underpayment of taxes due from filed returns; or (3) nonfiling, which refers to the failure to file a required tax return altogether or on time. IRS's tax gap estimates are based on a variety of data sources. Recently, IRS studied individual taxpayer compliance through the National Research Program (NRP), and used the resulting compliance data to estimate the tax gap for individual income tax underreporting and the portion of employment tax underreporting attributed to self-employment taxes for tax year 2001. NRP, which involved reviewing around 46,000 individual tax returns, has yielded very important new information on taxpayer compliance for the first time since IRS's previous compliance measurement study was undertaken for tax year 1988. Compliance measurement studies such as …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Future Combat System (FCS) is central to Army transformation efforts, comprising 14 integrated weapon systems and an advanced information network. In previous work, GAO found that the elements of a sound business case--firm requirements, mature technologies, a knowledge-based acquisition strategy, a realistic cost estimate, and sufficient funding--were not present. As a result, FCS is considered high risk and in need of special oversight and review. Congress has mandated that the Department of Defense (DOD) decide in early 2009 whether FCS should continue. GAO is required to review the program annually. In this report, GAO analyzes FCS development, including its requirements definition; status of critical technologies, software development, and complementary programs; soundness of its acquisition strategy related to design, production and spin-out of capabilities to current forces; and reasonableness of costs and sufficiency of funding."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) continues to respond to hurricanes Katrina and Rita. GAO's previous work identified suspected fraud, waste, and abuse resulting from control weaknesses associated with FEMA's Individuals and Households Program (IHP) and the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) purchase card program. Congress asked GAO to follow up on this previous work to determine whether potentially improper and/or fraudulent payments continued to be made. GAO testified on the results of our audit and investigative efforts on December 6, 2006. This report summarizes the results of our follow-up work."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program--a multinational acquisition program for the Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps, and eight cooperative international partners--is the Department of Defense's (DOD) most expensive aircraft acquisition program. DOD currently estimates it will spend $623 billion to develop, procure, and operate and support the JSF fleet. The JSF aircraft, which includes a variant design for each of the services, represents 90 percent of the remaining planned investment for DOD's major tactical aircraft programs. In fiscal year 2004, the JSF program was rebaselined to address technical challenges, cost increases, and schedule overruns. This report--the third mandated by Congress--describes the program's progress in meeting cost, schedule, and performance goals since rebaselining and identifies various challenges the program will likely face in meeting these goals in the future."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "As financial institutions increasingly operate globally and diversify their businesses, entities with an interest in financial stability cite the need for supervisors to oversee the safety and soundness of these institutions on a consolidated basis. Under the Comptroller General's Authority, GAO reviewed the consolidated supervision programs at the Federal Reserve System (Federal Reserve), Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS), and Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to (1) describe policies and approaches that U.S. consolidated supervisors use to oversee large and small holding companies; (2) review the management of the consolidated supervision programs, including use of program objectives and performance measures; and (3) evaluate how well consolidated supervisors are collaborating with other supervisors and each other in their activities. In conducting this study, GAO reviewed agency policy documents and supervisory reports and interviewed agency and financial institution officials."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) has seen increased competition from conventional mortgage and insurance providers. Additionally, because of the worsening performance of the mortgages it insures, FHA has estimated that its single-family insurance program would require a subsidy--that is, appropriations--in fiscal year 2008 in the absence of program changes. To help FHA adapt to the evolving market, proposed changes to the National Housing Act would allow greater flexibility in setting insurance premiums and reduce down-payment requirements. To assist Congress in considering the financial challenges facing FHA, this testimony provides information from recent reports GAO has issued and ongoing work concerning the proposed legislation that address different aspects of FHA's risk management. Specifically, this testimony looks at (1) FHA's management of risk related to loans with down-payment assistance, (2) instructive practices for managing risks of new products, (3) FHA's development and use of its mortgage scorecard, and (4) FHA's estimation of program costs."

Soils contain the largest inventory of organic carbon on the Earth's surface. Therefore, it is important to understand how soil organic carbon (SOC) is distributed in soils. This study directly measured SOC distributions within soil microaggregates and its associations with major soil elements from three soil groups (Phaeozem, Cambisol, and Ultisol), using scanning transmission X-ray microscopy (STXM) and near-edge X-ray absorption fine structure (NEXAFS) spectroscopy at a spatial resolution of 30 nm. Unlike previous studies, small intact soil microaggregates were examined directly in order to avoid preparatory procedures that might alter C speciation. We found that SOC exists as distinct particles (tens to hundreds of nm) and as ubiquitous thin coatings on clay minerals and iron-oxides coatings. The distinct SOC particles have higher fractions of aromatic C than the coatings. NEXAFS spectra of the C coatings within individual microaggregates were relatively similar. In the Phaeozem soil, the pervasive spectral features were those of phenolic and carboxylic C, while in the Cambisol soil the most common spectral feature was the carboxyl peak. The Ultisol soil displayed a diffuse distribution of aromatic, phenolic, and carboxylic C peaks over all surfaces. In general, a wide range of C functional groups coexist within individual …

Operons are a major feature of all prokaryotic genomes, buthow and why operon structures vary is not well understood. To elucidatethe life-cycle of operons, we compared gene order between Escherichiacoli K12 and its relatives and identified the recently formed anddestroyed operons in E. coli. This allowed us to determine how operonsform, how they become closely spaced, and how they die. Our findingssuggest that operon evolution may be driven by selection on geneexpression patterns. First, both operon creation and operon destructionlead to large changes in gene expression patterns. For example, theremoval of lysA and ruvA from ancestral operons that contained essentialgenes allowed their expression to respond to lysine levels and DNAdamage, respectively. Second, some operons have undergone acceleratedevolution, with multiple new genes being added during a brief period.Third, although genes within operons are usually closely spaced becauseof a neutral bias toward deletion and because of selection against largeoverlaps, genes in highly expressed operons tend to be widely spacedbecause of regulatory fine-tuning by intervening sequences. Althoughoperon evolution may be adaptive, it need not be optimal: new operonsoften comprise functionally unrelated genes that were already inproximity before the operon formed.

The formation of regularly-spaced metal nanostructures in selectively-placed insulating nanowires is an important step toward realization of a wide range of nano-scale electronic and opto-electronic devices. Here we report templated synthesis of Au nanospheres embedded in silica nanowires, with nanospheres consistently spaced with a period equal to three times their diameter. Under appropriate conditions, nanowires form exclusively on Si nanostructures because of enhanced local oxidation and reduced melting temperatures relative to templates with larger dimensions. We explain the spacing of the nanospheres with a general model based on a vapor-liquid-solid mechanism, in which an Au/Si alloy dendrite remains liquid in the nanotube until a critical Si concentration is achieved locally by silicon oxide-generated nanowire growth. Additional Si oxidation then locally reduces the surface energy of the Au-rich alloy by creating a new surface with minimum area inside of the nanotube. The isolated liquid domain subsequently evolves to become an Au nanosphere, and the process is repeated.

The accidental overfilling of waste liquid from tank BX-102 at the Hanford Site in 1951 put about 10 metric tons of U(VI) into the vadose zone. In order to understand the dominant geochemical reactions and transport processes occurred during the initial infiltration and help understand current spatial distribution, we simulated the waste liquid spilling event in laboratory sediment columns using synthesized metal waste solution. We found that, as the plume propagating through sediments, pH decreased greatly (as much as 4 units) at the moving plume front. Infiltration flow rates strongly affect U behavior. Slower flow rates resulted in higher sediment-associated U concentrations, and higher flow rates ({ge} 5 cm/day) permitted practically unretarded U transport. Therefore, given the very high K{sub sat} of most of Hanford formation, the low permeability zones within the sediment could have been most important in retaining high concentrations of U during initial release into the vadose zone. Massive amount of colloids, including U-colloids, formed at the plume fronts. Total U concentrations (aqueous and colloid) within plume fronts exceeded the source concentration by up to 5-fold. Uranium colloid formation and accumulation at the neutralized plume front could be one mechanism responsible for highly heterogeneous U distribution observed …

A strong effect of a moderately elevated surface temperature on net carbon deposition and deuterium co-deposition in the DIII-D divertor was observed under detached conditions. A DiMES sample with a gap 2 mm wide and 18 mm deep was exposed to lower-single-null (LSN) L-mode plasmas first at room temperature, and then at 200 C. At the elevated temperature, deuterium co-deposition in the gap was reduced by an order of magnitude. At the plasma-facing surface of the heated sample net carbon erosion was measured at a rate of 3 nm/s, whereas without heating net deposition is normally observed under detachment. In a related experiment three sets of molybdenum mirrors recessed 2 cm below the divertor floor were exposed to identical LSN ELMy H-mode discharges. The first set of mirrors exposed at ambient temperature exhibited net carbon deposition at a rate of up to 3.7 nm/s and suffered a significant drop in reflectivity. In contrast, two other mirror sets exposed at elevated temperatures between 90 C and 175 C exhibited practically no carbon deposition.

Bioremediation of metals and radionuclides has had manyfield tests, demonstrations, and full-scale implementations in recentyears. Field research in this area has occurred for many different metalsand radionuclides using a wide array of strategies. These strategies canbe generally characterized in six major categories: biotransformation,bioaccumulation/bisorption, biodegradation of chelators, volatilization,treatment trains, and natural attenuation. For all field applicationsthere are a number of critical biogeochemical issues that most beaddressed for the successful field application. Monitoring andcharacterization parameters that are enabling to bioremediation of metalsand radionuclides are presented here. For each of the strategies a casestudy is presented to demonstrate a field application that uses thisstrategy.

The VARIANT module of the DIF3D code has been upgraded to utilize surface-dependent discontinuity factors. The performance of the new capability is verified using two-dimensional core cases with control rods in reflector and fuel blocks. Cross sections for VHTR components were generated using the DRAGON and HELIOS codes. For rodded block cross sections, the DRAGON calculations used a single-block model or the multi-block models combined with MCNP4C flux solutions, whereas the HELIOS calculations utilized multi-block models. Results from core calculations indicate that multiplication factor, block power, and control rod worth are significantly improved by using surface-dependent discontinuity factors.

Free weekly newspaper that includes business and classified advertising.

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.

Weekly Jewish newspaper from Fort Worth, Texas that includes local, state and national news along with extensive advertising.

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This report provides an overview of the changes by the Bureau of Land Management on grazing regulations.