This report discusses the Supreme Court's decision in McConnell v. FEC. The court upheld against facial constitutional challenges key portions of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (BCRA), (P.L. 107-155, commonly known as the McCain-Feingold or Shays-Meehan campaign finance reform law).

The CDF RunIIa silicon detector made the transition from commissioning to data taking. CDF's online and offline tracking algorithms, the performance of Layer 00 and the RunIIb silicon upgrade project are covered in this article.

The recent experimental advances in cold atomic traps have induced a great amount of interest in fields from condensed matter to particle physics, including approaches and prospects from the theoretical point of view. In this work we investigate the general properties and the ground state of an asymmetrical dilute gas of cold fermionic atoms, formed by two particle species having different densities. We have show in a recent paper, that a mixed phase composed of normal and superfluid components is the energetically favored ground state of such a cold fermionic system. Here we extend the analysis and verify that in fact, the mixed phase is the preferred ground state of an asymmetrical superfluid in various situations. We predict that the mixed phase can serve as a way of detecting superfluidity and estimating the magnitude of the gap parameter in asymmetrical fermionic systems.

This report mainly discusses a Chronological List on Commemorative Observances for 2003 and 2004,indicating the proclamation number and its federal registration citation.

The chemical process industries are among the most energy intensive in the US. While much of the energy use cannot be avoided, (e.g., feedstock energy or separations costs), there are tremendous gains to be had through simulation-based optimizations. The heart of any chemical operation is the chemical reactor and it is here that gains can be made either directly (e.g., reduced heat flux) or indirectly (e.g., reduced downstream separations cost due to more efficient reactor design). The objective of this project was to develop an integrated suite of software to facilitate the simulation and optimization of chemical reactors. In the phase of the project supported by this grant, we focused specifically on gas-phase chemical processes such as combustion and pyrolysis.

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The present Fermilab D0 silicon microstrip tracker, the silicon microstrip tracker which was designed to replace it, and plans for upgrading the present silicon tracker are described.

Plutonium, because of its radioactive nature, ages from the ''inside out'' by means of self-irradiation damage and thus produces Frankel-type defects (vacancies and self-interstitial atoms) and defect clusters. The self-irradiation damage in Plutonium-239 occurs mainly by {alpha}-particle decay, where most of the damage comes from the U-235 recoil nucleus. The defects resulting from the residual lattice damage and helium in-growth could result in microstructural and physical property changes. Because these self-irradiation effects would normally require decades to measure, with a fraction (7.5 wt%) of Pu-238 is added to the reference plutonium alloy thus accelerating the aging process by approximately 18 times the normal rate. By monitoring the properties of the Pu-238 spiked alloy over a period of about 3.5 years, the properties of plutonium in storage can be projected for periods up to about 60 years. This paper presents density and volume changes observed from the immersion density and dilatometry measurements equivalent to aging the reference plutonium alloys to nine years.

Fossil fuels currently provide 85% of the world's energy needs, with the majority coming from coal, due to its low cost, wide availability, and high energy content. The extensive use of coal-fired power assumes that the resulting CO{sub 2} emissions can be vented to the atmosphere. However, exponentially increasing atmospheric CO{sub 2} levels have brought this assumption under critical review. Over the last decade, this discussion has evolved from whether exponentially increasing anthropogenic CO{sub 2} emissions will adversely affect the global environment, to the timing and magnitude of their impact. A variety of sequestration technologies are being explored to mitigate CO{sub 2} emissions. These technologies must be both environmentally benign and economically viable. Mineral carbonation is an attractive candidate technology as it disposes of CO{sub 2} as geologically stable, environmentally benign mineral carbonates, clearly satisfying the first criteria. The primary challenge for mineral carbonation is cost-competitive process development. CO{sub 2} mineral sequestration--the conversion of stationary-source CO{sub 2} emissions into mineral carbonates (e.g., magnesium and calcium carbonate, MgCO{sub 3} and CaCO{sub 3})--has recently emerged as one of the most promising sequestration options, providing permanent CO{sub 2} disposal, rather than storage. In this approach a magnesium-bearing feedstock mineral (typically serpentine or olivine; …

The ignition temperature of nitrogen-diluted dimethyl ether (DME) by heated air in counterflow was experimentally determined for DME concentration from 5.9 to 30%, system pressure from 1.5 to 3.0 atmospheres, and pressure-weighted strain rate from 110 to 170/s. These experimental data were compared with two mechanisms that were respectively available in 1998 and 2003, with the latter being a substantially updated version of the former. The comparison showed that while the 1998-mechanism uniformly over-predicted the ignition temperature, the 2003-mechanism yielded surprisingly close agreement for all experimental data. Sensitivity analysis for the near-ignition state based on both mechanisms identified the deficiencies of the 1998-mechanism, particularly the specifics of the low-temperature cool flame chemistry in effecting ignition at higher temperatures, as the fuel stream is being progressively heated from its cold boundary to the high-temperature ignition region around the hot-stream boundary. The 2003-mechanism, consisting of 79 species and 398 elementary reactions, was then systematically simplified by using the directed relation graph method to a skeletal mechanism of 49 species and 251 elementary reactions, which in turn was further simplified by using computational singular perturbation method and quasi-steady-state species assumption to a reduced mechanism consisting of 33 species and 28 lumped reactions. It …

The behavior of nanostructured materials/small-volumestructures and biologi-cal/bio-implantable materials, so-called "nano"and "bio" materials, is currently much in vogue in materials science. Oneaspect of this field, which to date has received only limited attention,is their fracture and fatigue properties. In this paper, we examine twotopics in this area, namely the premature fatigue failure ofsilicon-based micron-scale structures for microelectromechanical systems(MEMS), and the fracture properties of mineralized tissue, specificallyhuman bone.

OAK-B135 The project involved a study of a fundamental response of terrestrial vegetation to rising atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration, namely, the change in leaf conductance to gas diffusion associated with a change in the aperture of the microscopic pores (stomata) on the surface of leaves.

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Chemical inhibition of laminar propane flames by organophosphorus compounds has been studied experimentally, using a laboratory Mache Hebra nozzle burner and a flat flame burner with molecular beam mass spectrometry (MBMS), and with a computational flame model using a detailed chemical kinetic reaction mechanism. Both fuel-lean and fuel-rich propane flames were studied to examine the role of equivalence ratio in flame inhibition. The experiments examined a wide variety of organophosphorus compounds. We report on the experimental species flame profiles for tri-methyl phosphate (TMP) and compare them with the species flame profile results from modeling of TMP and di-methyl methyl phosphonate (DMMP). Both the experiments and kinetic modeling support and illustrate previous experimental studies in both premixed and non-premixed flames that inhibition efficiency is effectively the same for all of the organophosphorus compounds examined, independent of the molecular structure of the initial inhibitor molecule. The chemical inhibition is due to reactions involving the small P-bearing species HOPO{sub 2} and HOPO that are produced by the organophosphorus compounds (OPCs). The ratios of the HOPO{sub 2} and HOPO concentrations differ between the lean and rich flames, with HOPO{sub 2} dominant in lean flames while HOPO dominates in rich flames. The resulting HOPO{sub 2} …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The strong productivity gains in the U.S. economy have hinged in part on transportation networks working more efficiently. The nation's ports, which handle 95 percent of overseas freight tonnage, are a key link in this network, and efficient intermodal links between ship, rail, and highways are vital to continued productivity gains. GAO was asked to address (1) the challenges to freight mobility, (2) the limitations key stakeholders have encountered in addressing these challenges, and (3) strategies that may aid decision makers in enhancing freight mobility. GAO's work was based on a synthesis of previous studies and a review of conditions at 10 ports and surrounding areas that handle almost two-thirds of all containers moving in and out of the country."

This report briefly reviews the status of climate science, international negotiations, and congressional activity focused specifically on climate change.

Carcinogenic heterocyclic amines are produced from overcooked foods and are highly mutagenic in most short-term test systems. One of the most abundant of these amines, 2-amino-1-methyl-6-phenylimidazo[4,5-b]pyridine (PhIP), induces breast, colon and prostate tumors in rats. Human dietary epidemiology studies suggest a strong correlation between either meat consumption or well-done muscle meat consumption and cancers of the colon, breast, stomach, lung and esophagus. For over 20 years our laboratory has helped define the human exposure to these dietary carcinogens. In this report we describe how various environmental exposures may modulate the risk from exposure to heterocyclic amines, especially PhIP. To assess the impact of foods on PhIP metabolism in humans, we developed an LC/MS/MS method to analyze the four major PhIP urinary metabolites following the consumption of a single portion of grilled chicken. Adding broccoli to the volunteers' diet altered the kinetics of PhIP metabolism. At the cellular level we have found that PhIP itself stimulates a significant estrogenic response in MCF-7 cells, but even more interestingly, co-incubation of the cells with herbal teas appear to enhance the response. Numerous environmental chemicals found in food or the atmosphere can impact the exposure, metabolism, and cell proliferation response of heterocyclic amines.

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Defense (DOD) spends more on information technology (IT) annually than any other department or agency, accounting for about half of the $59 billion governmentwide IT budget in fiscal year 2004. It is thus important that consistent, accurate, and complete DOD IT budget information is available to the Congress and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) so that they can make informed decisions among competing demands for funds. Accordingly, GAO reviewed the department's fiscal year 2004 IT budget submission to determine whether it was reliable, including identifying opportunities for future improvement."

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The objective of this project is to quantify the ability of the electrical induced polarization (IP) method to noninvasively monitor the reduction in reactive iron performance that is known to reduce the effectiveness of the permeable reactive barrier (PRB) with time. The primary scientific goals include: (1) fundamental laboratory studies to evaluate the sensitivity of the IP method to: Fe0 total surface area Fe0 surface chemistry physical/chemical changes to the Fe0 surface resulting from oxidation and precipitation (2) monitoring of the electrical tomographic response of the Kansas City PRB over a three-year period and assessment, via correlation with aqueous geochemical data and extracted iron cores, of whether electrical signatures associated with reduced PRB performance are resolvable in field studies (3) optimization of a three-dimensional tomographic imaging algorithm for application to highly conductive, high electrical contrast environments as represented by a PRB IP theory and empirical data resulting from the original development of the method for mineral exploration suggests that the method is highly relevant in the study of reactive iron barriers. Laboratory and field IP studies on mineral deposits illustrate the sensitivity of IP parameters to metal concentration, particle size and metal surface chemistry. IP theory, based on electrical (Warburg) …

An important challenge in computational modeling is the development of new computational methods and capabilities for studying molecular-scale structures over very large time-scales. In particular, there is great interest in understanding the nucleation and growth of carbon soot particles as well as their fate in the atmosphere. We have recently developed and implemented a new computational tool to time-integrate the detailed structure of atomistically resolved surfaces and nanostructures driven by chemical and physical kinetic rule-based rate expressions. Fundamental chemical and physical processes such as chemical reactions, surface adsorption and surface diffusion are performed using a non-lattice real-space kinetic Monte Carlo scheme and driven by user-defined rule-based kinetic rate expressions, while atomic structure relaxation is approached using molecular dynamics. We demonstrate the sensitivity of particle evolution to chemical and physical kinetic mechanism using a parallel implementation of the combined Monte Carlo and molecular dynamics code.

We describe the development of the electronics that will be used to read out the Fiber Tracker and Preshower detectors in Run IIb. This electronics is needed for operation at 132ns bunch crossing, and may provide a measurement of the z coordinate of the Fiber Tracker hits when operating at 396ns bunch crossing. Specifically, we describe the design and preliminary tests of the Trip chip, MCM IIa, MCM IIb and MCM IIc. This document also serves as a user manual for the Trip chip and the MCM.

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Over 15 million acres in the United States are suspected of being, or known to be, contaminated with military munitions. These sites include ranges on closing military installations, closed ranges on active installations, and formerly used defense sites. Under the Defense Environmental Restoration Program, established in 1986, the Department of Defense (DOD) must identify, assess, and clean up military munitions contamination at these sites. DOD estimates these activities will cost from $8 billion to $35 billion. Because of the magnitude of DOD's cleanup effort, both in terms of cost and affected acreage, as well as the significant public safety, health, and environmental risks that military munitions may pose, The Ranking Minority Member of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce asked us to evaluate (1) DOD's progress in implementing its program to identify, assess, and clean up military munitions sites and (2) DOD's plans to clean up remaining sites in the future."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "GAO was asked to assess the condition of key equipment items and to determine if the services have adequate plans for sustaining, modernizing, or replacing them. To address these questions, we selected 25 major equipment items, and determined (1) their current condition, (2) whether the services have mapped out a program strategy for these items, (3) whether current and projected funding is consistent with these strategies, and (4) whether these equipment items are capable of fulfilling their wartime missions."