Work related to this project introduced the idea of an “effective monopole strength” Q* that acted as the effective angular momentum of the lowest shell of composite Fermions (CF). This allowed us to predict the angular momentum of the lowest band of energy states for any value of the applied magnetic field simply by determining N{sub QP} the number of quasielectrons (QE) or quasiholes (QH) in a partially filled CF shell and adding angular momenta of the N{sub QP} Fermions excitations. The approach reported treated the filled CF level as a “vacuum state” which could support QE and QH excitations. Numerical diagonalization of small systems allowed us to determine the angular momenta, the energy, and the pair interaction energies of these elementary excitations. The spectra of low energy states could then be evaluated in a Fermi liquid‐like picture, treating the much smaller number of quasiparticles and their interactions instead of the larger system of N electrons with Coulomb interactions.

Mesh generation in regions in Euclidean space is a central task in computational science, and especially for commonly used numerical methods for the solution of partial differential equations, e.g., finite element and finite volume methods. We focus on the uniform Delaunay triangulation of planar regions and, in particular, on how one selects the positions of the vertices of the triangulation. We discuss a recently developed method, based on the centroidal Voronoi tessellation (CVT) concept, for effecting such triangulations and present two algorithms, including one new one, for CVT-based grid generation. We also compare several methods, including CVT-based methods, for triangulating planar domains. To this end, we define several quantitative measures of the quality of uniform grids. We then generate triangulations of several planar regions, including some having complexities that are representative of what one may encounter in practice. We subject the resulting grids to visual and quantitative comparisons and conclude that all the methods considered produce high-quality uniform grids and that the CVT-based grids are at least as good as any of the others.

State-of-the-art polymer electrolyte fuel cells require a conditioning period to reach optimized cell performance. There is insuffi cient understanding about the behavior of catalysts during this period, especially with regard to the changing environment of the cathode electrocatalyst, which is typically Pt nanoparticles supported on high surface area Vulcan XC-72 carbon (Pt/C). The purpose of this research was to record preliminary observations of the changing environment during the conditioning phase using X-Ray Absorption Fine Structure (XAFS) spectroscopy. XAFS was recorded for a Pt/C cathode at the Pt L3-edge and a PtCo/C cathode at both the Pt L3-edge and Co K-edge. Using precision machined graphite cell-blocks, both transmission and fl uorescence data were recorded at Sector 12-BM-B of Argonne National Laboratory’s Advanced Photon Source. The fl uorescence and transmission edge steps allow for a working description of the changing electrocatalyst environment, especially water concentration, at the anode and cathode as functions of operating parameters. These features are discussed in the context of how future analysis may correlate with potential, current and changing apparent thickness of the membrane electrode assembly through loss of catalyst materials (anode, cathode, carbon support). Such direct knowledge of the effect of the conditioning protocol on the electrocatalyst …

Post-irradiation uranium isotopic atomic densities within the core of the High Flux Isotope Reactor (HFIR) were calculated and compared to uranium mass spectrographic data measured in the late 1960s and early 70s [1]. This study was performed in order to validate a Monte Carlo based depletion methodology for calculating the burn-up dependent nuclide inventory, specifically the post-irradiation uranium

Membrane-Associated Methane Monooxygenases from Type X and Type I Methanotrophs A.A. DiSirito and W.E. Antholine Project Number: DE-FG02-00ER15446 Final project report.

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The Ecological Footprint Model is a mechanism for measuring the environmental effects of operations at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, New Mexico (SNL/NM). This analysis quantifies environmental impact associated with energy use, transportation, waste, land use, and water consumption at SNL/NM for fiscal year 2005 (FY05). Since SNL/NM's total ecological footprint (96,434 gha) is greater than the waste absorption capacity of its landholdings (338 gha), it created an ecological deficit of 96,096 gha. This deficit is equal to 886,470lha, or about 3,423 square miles of Pinyon-Juniper woodlands and desert grassland. 89% of the ecological footprint can be attributed to energy use, indicating that in order to mitigate environmental impact, efforts should be focused on energy efficiency, energy reduction, and the incorporation of additional renewable energy alternatives at SNL/NM.

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Current polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) require humidifi cation for acceptable proton conductivity. Development of a novel polymer that is conductive without a water-based proton carrier is desirable for use in automobiles. Imidazole (Im) is a possible replacement for water as a proton solvent; Im can be tethered to the polymer structure by means of covalent bonds, thereby providing a solid state proton conducting membrane where the solvating groups do not leach out of the fuel cell. These covalent bonds can alter the electron availability of the Im molecule. This study investigates the effects of electron-withdrawing and electron-donating substituents on the conductivity of Im complexed with methanesulfonic acid (MSA) in the form of ionic liquids. Due to the changes in the electronegativity of nitrogen, it is expected that 2-phenylimidazole (2-PhIm, electron-withdrawing) will exhibit increased conductivity compared to Im, while 2-methylimidazole (2-MeIm, electron-donating) will exhibit decreased conductivity. Three sets of ionic liquids were prepared at defi ned molar ratios: Im-MSA, 2-PhIm-MSA, and 2-MeIm- MSA. Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), and 1H-NMR were used to characterize each complex. Impedance analysis was used to determine the conductivity of each complex. Both the 2-PhIm-MSA and 2-MeIm-MSA ionic liquids were found to …

The impressive mechanical and electronic properties of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) make them ideally suited for use in a variety of nanostructured devices, especially in the realm of energy production and storage. In particular, vertically-aligned CNT “forests” have been the focus of increasing investigation for use in supercapacitor electrodes and as hydrogen adsorption substrates. Vertically-aligned CNT growth was attempted on metal substrates by waterassisted chemical vapor deposition (CVD). CNT growth was catalyzed by iron-molybdenum (FeMo) nanoparticle catalysts synthesized by a colloidal method, which were then spin-coated onto Inconel® foils. The substrates were loaded into a custom-built CVD apparatus, where CNT growth was initiated by heating the substrates to 750 °C under the fl ow of He, H2, C2H4 and a controlled amount of water vapor. The resultant CNTs were characterized by a variety of methods including Raman spectroscopy, transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and the growth parameters were varied in an attempt to optimize the purity and growth yield of the CNTs. The surface area and hydrogen adsorption characteristics of the CNTs were quantifi ed by the Brunauer- Emmett-Teller (BET) and Sieverts methods, and their capacitance was measured via cyclic voltammetry. While vertically-aligned CNT growth could not …

Particle-in-cell (PIC) methods have proven to be eft#11;ective in discretizing the Vlasov-Maxwell system of equations describing the core of toroidal burning plasmas for many decades. Recent physical understanding of the importance of edge physics for stability and transport in tokamaks has lead to development of the fi#12;rst fully toroidal edge PIC code - XGC1. The edge region poses special problems in meshing for PIC methods due to the lack of closed flux surfaces, which makes fi#12;eld-line following meshes and coordinate systems problematic. We present a solution to this problem with a semi-#12;field line following mesh method in a cylindrical coordinate system. Additionally, modern supercomputers require highly concurrent algorithms and implementations, with all levels of the memory hierarchy being effe#14;ciently utilized to realize optimal code performance. This paper presents a mesh and particle partitioning method, suitable to our meshing strategy, for use on highly concurrent cache-based computing platforms.

The objective of this research was to develop and apply methods for more accurate predictions of reaction rates based on high-level quantum chemistry. We have developed and applied efficient, robust methods for fitting global ab initio potential energy surfaces (PESs) for both spectroscopy and dynamics calculations and for performing direct dynamics simulations. Our approach addresses the problem that high-level quantum calculations are often too costly in computer time for practical applications resulting in the use of levels of theory that are often inadequate for reactions. A critical objective was to develop practical methods that require the minimum number of electronic structure calculations for acceptable fidelity to the ab initio PES. Our method does this by a procedure that determines the optimal configurations at which ab initio points are computed, and that ensures that the final fitted PES is uniformly accurate to a prescribed tolerance. Our fitting methods can be done automatically, with little or no human intervention, and with no prior knowledge of the topology of the PES. The methods are based on local fitting schemes using interpolating moving least-squares (IMLS). IMLS has advantages over the very effective modified-Shepard methods developed by Collins and others in that higher-order polynomials can …

Obtaining accurate solutions for convection–diffusion equations is challenging due to the presence of layers when convection dominates the diffusion. To solve this problem, we design an adaptive meshing algorithm which optimizes the alignment of anisotropic meshes with the numerical solution. Three main ingredients are used. First, the streamline upwind Petrov–Galerkin method is used to produce a stabilized solution. Second, an adapted metric tensor is computed from the approximate solution. Third, optimized anisotropic meshes are generated from the computed metric tensor by an anisotropic centroidal Voronoi tessellation algorithm. Our algorithm is tested on a variety of two-dimensional examples and the results shows that the algorithm is robust in detecting layers and efficient in avoiding non-physical oscillations in the numerical approximation.

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The Competition asked student teams from several US Universities to propose business models, technological systems, and policy framework to accelerate the penetration of new vehicle and fuel technologies into the markets. In May 2009 the final selection of teams was announced and four of five finalist teams flew to Washington DC to present to the US Department of Energy. The five finalist teams were 1. Filter Sensing Technologies (FST) (MIT), 2. Flex Cathode Technology for Electric Vehicle Batteries, 3. Green Guidance (RPI), 4. Levant Power (MIT), and 5. Wind-Driven Paddlewheel Cylinder for Energy Storage in Freighter Trucks (Villanova). The five finalists’ entries are described.

Klebsiella pneumoniae, a gram-negative enteric bacterium, is found in nosocomial infections which are acquired during hospital stays for about 10% of hospital patients in the United States. The crystal structure of a putative oxidoreductase from K. pneumoniae has been determined. The structural information of this K. pneumoniae protein was used to understand its function. Crystals of the putative oxidoreductase enzyme were obtained by the sitting drop vapor diffusion method using Polyethylene glycol (PEG) 3350, Bis-Tris buffer, pH 5.5 as precipitant. These crystals were used to collect X-ray data at beam line X12C of the National Synchrotron Light Source (NSLS) at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL). The crystal structure was determined using the SHELX program and refi ned with CNS 1.1. This protein, which is involved in the catalysis of an oxidation-reduction (redox) reaction, has an alpha/beta structure. It utilizes nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADP) or nicotine adenine dinucleotide (NAD) to perform its function. This structure could be used to determine the active and co-factor binding sites of the protein, information that could help pharmaceutical companies in drug design and in determining the protein’s relationship to disease treatment such as that for pneumonia and other related pathologies.

Parylene films, coating gold substrates, were removed by laser ablation using 248 nm light from an excimer laser. Each sample was processed by a different number of pulses in one of three different environments: air at atmospheric pressure, nitrogen at atmospheric pressure, and vacuum. The laser-induced craters were analyzed by optical microscopy and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Multi-pulse ablation thresholds of gold and parylene were estimated.

Borosilicate glass was selected as the baseline technology for immobilization of the Cs/Sr/Ba/Rb (Cs), lanthanide (Ln) and transition metal fission product (TM) waste steams as part of a cost benefit analysis study.[1] Vitrification of the combined waste streams have several advantages, minimization of the number of waste forms, a proven technology, and similarity to waste forms currently accepted for repository disposal. A joint study was undertaken by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) and Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) to develop acceptable glasses for the combined Cs + Ln + TM waste streams (Option 1) and Cs + Ln combined waste streams (Option 2) generated by the AFCI UREX+ set of processes. This study is aimed to develop baseline glasses for both combined waste stream options and identify key waste components and their impact on waste loading. The elemental compositions of the four-corners study were used along with the available separations data to determine the effect of burnup, decay, and separations variability on estimated waste stream compositions.[2-5] Two different components/scenarios were identified that could limit waste loading of the combined Cs + LN + TM waste streams, where as the combined Cs + LN waste stream has no single component that …

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High-energy electrons are currently the best probes of the internal structure of nucleons (protons and neutrons). By collecting data on electrons scattering off light nuclei, such as deuterium and helium, one can extract structure functions (SFs), which encode information about the quarks that make up the nucleon. Spin-dependent SFs, which depend on the relative polarization of the electron beam and the target nucleus, encode quark spins. Proton SFs can be measured directly from electron-proton scattering, but those of the neutron must be extracted from proton data and deuterium or helium-3 data because free neutron targets do not exist. At present, there is no reliable method for accurately determining spin-dependent neutron SFs in the low-momentum-transfer regime, where nucleon resonances are prominent and the functions are not smooth. The focus of this study was to develop a new method for extracting spin-dependent neutron SFs from nuclear data. An approximate convolution formula for nuclear SFs reduces the problem to an integral equation, for which a recursive solution method was designed. The method was then applied to recent data from proton and deuterium scattering experiments to perform a preliminary extraction of spin-dependent neutron SFs in the resonance region. The extraction method was found to …

The cytoskeletal protein alpha II-spectrin has specifi c neurodegenerative mechanisms that allow the necrotic (injury-induced) and apoptotic (non-injury-induced) pathways of proteolysis to be differentiated in an immunoblot. Consequently, αII-spectrin breakdown products (SBDPs) are potential biomarkers for diagnosing traumatic brain injury (TBI). The purpose of the following investigation, consisting of two studies, was to evaluate the utility of the spectrin biomarker in diagnosing TBI in fi sh that travel through hydroelectric dams in the Columbia and Snake Rivers. The fi rst study used hyperbaric pressure chambers to simulate the pressure changes that affect fi sh during passage through a Federal Columbia River Power System (FCRPS) Kaplan turbine. The second study tested the effect of a removable spillway weir (RSW) on the passage of juvenile chinook (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha). This study was conducted in tandem with a balloon-tag study by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Brain samples from fi sh were collected and analyzed using an immunoblot for SBDPs, and imaging software was used to quantify the protein band density and determine the ratio of cleaved protein to total protein. The biomarker analyses found higher SBDP expression levels in fi sh that were exposed to lower pressure nadirs and fi sh that …

This study was undertaken to examine alternate crystalline (ceramic/mineral) and glass waste forms for immobilizing spent salt from the Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative (AFCI) electrochemical separations process. The AFCI is a program sponsored by U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to develop and demonstrate a process for recycling spent nuclear fuel (SNF). The electrochemical process is a molten salt process for the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel in an electrorefiner and generates spent salt that is contaminated with alkali, alkaline earths, and lanthanide fission products (FP) that must either be cleaned of fission products or eventually replaced with new salt to maintain separations efficiency. Currently, these spent salts are mixed with zeolite to form sodalite in a glass-bonded waste form. The focus of this study was to investigate alternate waste forms to immobilize spent salt. On a mole basis, the spent salt is dominated by alkali and Cl with minor amounts of alkaline earth and lanthanides. In the study reported here, we made an effort to explore glass systems that are more compatible with Cl and have not been previously considered for use as waste forms. In addition, alternate methods were explored with the hope of finding a way to produce …

The 19th International Conference on Arabidopsis Research was a successful meeting attended by 815 scientists from around the world including 322 from the United States, 146 attendees from Canada, 179 from Europe, 134 from Asia, and 34 from a combination of Australia, South America, Africa and the Middle East. The scientific program was of excellent quality featuring 64 talks, including 41 from invited speakers. The Keynote Lecture, delivered by Chris Somerville (Energy Biosciences Institute/UC Berkeley) was particularly relevant to US agriculture and energy research and was titled The Development of Cellulosic Biofuels. There were also 6 community-organized workshops featuring 30 additional talks on topics including Frontiers in Plant Systems Biology, Sources and strategies for Gene Structure, Gene Function, and Metabolic Pathway annotation at TAIR and AraCyc, Advanced Bioinformatic Resources for Arabidopsis, Laser Microtechniques and Applications with Arabidopsis, Plant Proteomics- Tools, Approaches, Standards and Breakthroughs in Studying the Proteome, and Phytohormone Biosynthesis and Signal Transduction. Conference organizers arranged a special seminar by Jim Collins (head of the Directorate of Biosciences at NSF) to provide a community discussion forum regarding the future of Arabidopsis research. Approximately 575 posters were presented in topic areas including, among others, Development, Signal Transduction, Cell Walls, Non-Arabidopsis …

I review recent progress in understanding the structure of the nucleon sea and the role of the nucleon's pion cloud. In particular, I discuss the consequences of the pion cloud for the d-bar - u-bar asymmetry in the proton, the neutron's electric form factor, and the proton's electric to magnetic form factor ratio.