This report discusses the National Flood Insurance Act and the proposed 21st Century Flood Reform Act in the House. House leaders submitted an Amendment in the Nature of a Substitute (H.R. 2874ANS) on November 6, 2017, that would modify H.R. 2874, the 21st Century Flood Reform Act, to add provisions from the six other bills approved by the House Financial Services Committee. H.R. 2874 would authorize the NFIP until September 30, 2022. This report summarizes selected provisions of the bill, concentrating on changes related to premiums and surcharges, affordability, increasing participation, the role of private insurance, treatment of multiple loss properties, and some provisions related to floodplain mapping and mitigation.

Report about the Ab-initio Reaction Calculations for Carbon-12 (ESP Technical Report): ALCF-2 Early Science Program Technical Report

The purpose of this report is to describe and discuss the provisions for providing abortion services to military personnel, their dependents, and other military health care beneficiaries at military medical facilities. The report describes the history of these provisions, with particular emphasis on legislative actions. Finally, this report discusses a number of proposals to modify the law, as well as other related legislative and administrative actions.

This report focuses on the sections of the House and Senate versions of the Fiscal Year 2017 National Defense Authorization Act (H.R. 4909 and S. 2943, respectively) that appear closely linked to the respective armed services committees' stated efforts to reform the acquisition system. For purposes of this analysis, CRS selected 31 sections of the House bill and 67 sections of the Senate bill.

This report briefly summarizes opioid-related bills that were considered during "Opioid Week" (the week of May 9, 2016) The summaries in this report may be useful illustrations of the range of approaches Members of Congress have proposed to address the problem of opioid addiction.

This report discusses the budget for the 2008 Farm Bill, and its reauthorization. Moreover, the report discusses the increasing level of demand for fiscal constraint and the current large budget deficits.

This research project was designed to play a vital role in the development of low cost sugars from cellulosic biomass and contributing to the national effort to displace fossil fuel usage in the USA transportation sector. The goal was to expand the portfolio of cell wall degrading enzymes through innovative research at the nano-scale level, prospecting for novel cellulases and building a kinetic framework for the development of more effective enzymatic conversion processes. More precisely, the goal was to elucidate the molecular mechanisms for some cellulases that are very familiar to members of our research team and to investigate what we hope are novel cellulases or new enzyme combinations from the world of plant pathogenic fungi and bacteria. Hydrolytic activities of various cellulases and cellulase cocktails were monitored at the nanoscale of cellulose fibrils and the microscale of pretreated cellulose particles, and we integrated this insight into a heterogeneous reaction framework. The over-riding approach for this research program was the application of innovative and cutting edge optical and high-throughput screening and analysis techniques for observing how cellulases hydrolyze real substrates.

Report concerning the current federal budget process, including criticisms of that process. Information is provided regarding the current horizons used in the budget process, including already existing long-term components; the rationale for increased focus on long term budgeting; general challenges to long-term budgeting; and an analysis of general proposals that have been made to increase the focus of long-term budgeting in the budget process.

This report provides an overview of tax benefits for adoptive parents.

The core purpose of this Phase I STTR was to evaluate the feasibility of a new method of producing a recombinant version of manganese peroxidase (MnP) enzyme. MnP is a potentially valuable enzyme for producing high value lignin products and also for industrial de-coloring operations such as biobleaching of pulp and color removal from textile dye effluents. This lignin-modifying enzyme is produced in small amounts by the native host, a white rot fungus. Previous work by Oregon State University developed a secreted recombinant version of the enzyme in the yeast Pichia pastoris. Unfortunately, the expression is barely moderate and the enzyme is heavily glycosylated, which inhibits purification. In this work, the gene for the enzyme is given a tag which targets production of the enzyme to the peroxisome. This is a promising approach since this location is also where heme and hydrogen peroxide are sequestered, which are both necessary cofactors for MnP. More than ten recombinant strains were constructed, verified, and expressed in the Pichia system. Constitutive (GAP) and methanol-induced promoters (AOX) were tried for peroxisomal targeted, cytosolic, and secreted versions of MnP. Only the secreted strains showed activity. The amount of expression was not significantly changed. The degree of …

Faster, more powerful and dense computing hardware generates significant heat and imposes considerable data center cooling requirements. Traditional computer room air conditioning (CRAC) cooling methods are proving increasingly cost-ineffective and inefficient. Studies show that using the volume of room air as a heat exchange medium is wasteful and allows for substantial mixing of hot and cold air. Further, it limits cabinet/frame/rack density because it cannot effectively cool high heat density equipment that is spaced closely together. A more cost-effective, efficient solution for maximizing heat transfer and enabling higher heat density equipment frames can be accomplished by utilizing properly positioned “phase change” or “two-phase” pumped refrigerant cooling methods. Pumping low pressure, oil-free phase changing refrigerant through microchannel heat exchangers can provide up to 90% less energy consumption for the primary cooling loop within the room. The primary benefits of such a solution include reduced energy requirements, optimized utilization of data center space, and lower OPEX and CAPEX. Alcatel-Lucent recently developed a modular cooling technology based on a pumped two-phase refrigerant that removes heat directly at the shelf level of equipment racks. The key elements that comprise the modular cooling technology consist of the following. A pump delivers liquid refrigerant to finned …

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This report begins with a discussion of the technology used by Aereo and FilmOn X that permit subscribers to watch live broadcast television as well as already-aired programming. It then examines the public performance right in the Copyright Act and discusses the interpretation of the transmit clause and public performance right by the courts in the Aereo and FilmOn cases. The report concludes with a brief overview of future litigation by these parties and related legislative proposals in the 113th Congress.

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) as part of its Department of Energy (DOE), Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), and Vehicle Technologies Program (VTP) effort has investigated class 8 tractor-trailer aerodynamics for many years. This effort has identified many drag producing flow structures around the heavy vehicles and also has designed and tested many new active and passive drag reduction techniques and concepts for significant on the road fuel economy improvements. As part of this effort a database of experimental, computational, and conceptual design for aerodynamic drag reduction devices has been established. The objective of this report is to provide design guidance for trailer base devices to improve their aerodynamic performance. These devices are commonly referred to as boattails, base flaps, tail devices, and etc. The information provided here is based on past research and our most recent full-scale experimental investigations in collaboration with Navistar Inc. Additional supporting data from LLNL/Navistar wind tunnel, track test, and on the road test will be published soon. The trailer base devices can be identified by 4 flat panels that are attached to the rear edges of the trailer base to form a closed cavity. These devices have been engineered in many different forms …

Under this program, Aspen Aerogels has developed an industrial insulation called Pyrogel HT, which is 4-5 times more thermally efficient than current non-aerogel technology. Derived from nanoporous silica aerogels, Pyrogel HT was specifically developed to address a high temperature capability gap not currently met with Aspen Aerogels{trademark} flagship product, Pyrogel XT. Pyrogel XT, which was originally developed on a separate DOE contract (DE-FG36-06GO16056), was primarily optimized for use in industrial steam processing systems, where application temperatures typically do not exceed 400 C. At the time, further improvements in thermal performance above 400 C could not be reasonably achieved for Pyrogel XT without significantly affecting other key material properties using the current technology. Cumulative sales of Pyrogel HT into domestic power plants should reach $125MM through 2030, eventually reaching about 10% of the total insulation market share in that space. Global energy savings would be expected to scale similarly. Over the same period, these sales would reduce domestic energy consumption by more than 65 TBtu. Upon branching out into all industrial processes in the 400 C-650 C regime, Pyrogel HT would reach annual sales levels of $150MM, with two-thirds of that being exported.

This report discusses the current political state of Afghanistan, as well as the Afghan government. This report also discusses Afghanistan's relationship with the United States, particularly U.S. efforts to urge President Hamid Karzai, to address corruption within the Afghan government. The report also includes discussion of election fraud and corruption in Afghanistan.

This report discusses the current political state of Afghanistan, as well as the Afghan government. This report also discusses Afghanistan's relationship with the United States, particularly U.S. efforts to urge President Hamid Karzai, to address corruption within the Afghan government. The report also includes discussion of election fraud and corruption in Afghanistan.

This report discusses the current political state of Afghanistan, as well as the Afghan government. This report also discusses Afghanistan's relationship with the United States, particularly U.S. efforts to urge President Hamid Karzai, to address corruption within the Afghan government. The report also includes discussion of election fraud and corruption in Afghanistan.

This report discusses Afghanistan's history of conflict, governmental structure, human rights issues, and security policies and initiatives. A special focus is put on the U.S. involvement in Afghan security and ongoing fights against the Taliban and other terrorist groups and U.S. aid to Afghanistan both economically and militarily. It includes fiscal year 2018 aid requests for both military assistance and economic and humanitarian aid.

This report seeks to inform the discussion on the potential reauthorization of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), through analysis of the components of the AGOA legislation; U.S. import trends associated with AGOA; the impact of AGOA on African economies and U.S.-Africa trade; and the issues surrounding the reauthorization process.

This report considers the U.S. Department of Agriculture's program for Research, Education, and Economics (REE). Moreover, the report discusses the amount of funding for the REE and debates the direction of it.

At the World Trade Organization's (WTO's) Ninth Ministerial Conference in Bali, Indonesia, December 3-7, 2013, ministers adopted the so-called Bali Package--a series of decisions aimed at streamlining trade (referred to as trade facilitation), allowing developing countries more options for providing food security, boosting least-developed-country trade, and helping development more generally. This report focuses on those aspects of the Bali Package that deal with and are specific to agriculture. It also includes a section (at the end of the report) that provides an update on the status of implementation of the various Bali Package provisions agreed to by the WTO.

In addition to thermal radiation and fission products, nuclear explosions result in a very high flux of unfissioned neutrons. Within an atmospheric nuclear explosion, these neutrons can activate the various elemental components of natural air, potentially adding to the radioactive signature of the event as a whole. The goal of this work is to make an order-of-magnitude estimate of the total amount of air activation products that can result from an atmospheric nuclear explosion.

This report examines the current state of Algeria, including the country's associations with terrorism, despite steady decreases of domestic terrorism; the lessening in power of the Algerian military; and growing oil revenues.