A compound of the formula MX{sub n}L{sub m} wherein M = Th, Pu, Np,or Am thorium, X = a halide atom, n = 3 or 4, L is a coordinating ligand selected from the group consisting of aprotic Lewis bases having an oxygen-, nitrogen-, sulfur-, or phosphorus-donor, and m is 3 or 4 for monodentate ligands or is 2 for bidentate ligands, where n + m = 7 or 8 for monodentate ligands or 5 or 6 for bidentate ligands, a compound of the formula MX{sub n} wherein M, X, and n are as previously defined, and a process of preparing such actinide metal compounds including admixing the actinide metal in an aprotic Lewis base as a coordinating solvent in the presence of a halogen-containing oxidant, are provided.

A method and apparatus are disclosed for removing airborne contaminants entrained in a gas or airstream. The apparatus includes an electric filter characterized by a movable endless belt electrode, a grounded electrode, and a filter medium sandwiched therebetween. Inclusion of the movable, endless belt electrode provides the driving force for advancing the filter medium through the filter, and reduces frictional drag on the filter medium, thereby permitting a wide choice of filter medium materials. Additionally, the belt electrode includes a plurality of pleats in order to provide maximum surface area on which to collect airborne contaminants.

This invention generally relates to the remote removal of pelletized samples from cylindrical containment capsules. V-blocks are used to receive the samples and provide guidance to push out rods. Stainless steel liners fit into the v-channels on the v-blocks which permits them to be remotely removed and replaced or cleaned to prevent cross contamination between capsules and samples. A capsule holder securely holds the capsule while allowing manual up/down and in/out movement to align each sample hole with the v-blocks. Both end sections contain identical v-blocks; one that guides the drive out screw and rods or manual push out rods and the other to receive the samples as they are driven out of the capsule.

A bagging device for transferring material from a first chamber through an opening in a wall to a second chamber includes an outer housing communicating with the opening and having proximal and distal ends relative to the wall. An inner housing having proximal and distal ends corresponding to those of the outer housing is mounted in a concentrically spaced, sealed manner with respect to the distal end of the outer housing. The inner and outer housings and mounting means therebetween define an annular chamber, closed at its distal end and open at its proximal end, in which a pliable tube is slidably positioned in sealed engagement with the housings. The pliable tube includes a sealed end positioned adjacent the proximal end of the inner housing so as to maintain isolation between the first and second chambers. Displacement of the material to be bagged from the first chamber along the inner housing so as to contact the sealed portion of the pliable bag allows the material to be positioned within the pliable bag in the second chamber. The bag is then sealed and severed between where the material is positioned therein and the wall in providing a sealed container for handling …

A bagging device for transferring material from a first chamber through an opening in a wall to a second chamber includes an outer housing communicating with the opening and having proximal and distal ends relative to the wall. An inner housing having proximal and distal ends corresponding to those of the outer housing is mounted in a concentrically spaced, sealed manner with respect to the distal end of the outer housing. The inner and outer housings and mounting means therebetween define an annular chamber, closed at its distal end and open at its proximal end, in which a pliable tube is slidably positioned in sealed engagement with the housings. The pliable tube includes a sealed end positioned adjacent the proximal end of the inner housing so as to maintain isolation between the first and second chambers. Displacement of the material to be bagged from the first chamber along the inner housing so as to contact the sealed portion of the pliable bag allows the material to be positioned within the pliable bag in the second chamber. The bag is then sealed and severed between where the material is positioned therein and the wall in providing a sealed container for handling …

A new composition of matter has been discovered which is an explosive addition compound of ammonium nitrate (AN) and diethylenetriamine trinitrate (DETN) in a 50:50 molar ratio. the compound is stable over extended periods of time only at temperatures higher than 46/sup 0/C, decomposing to a fine-grained eutectic mixture (which is also believed to be new) of AN and DETN at temperatures lower than 46/sup 0/C. The compound of the invention has an x-ray density of 1.61 g/cm/sup 3/, explodes to form essentially only gaseous products, has higher detonation properties (i.e., detonation velocity and pressure) than those of any mechanical mixture having the same density and composition as the compound of the invention, is a quite insensitive explosive material, can be cast at temperatures attainable by high pressure steam, and is prepared from inexpensive ingredients. Methods of preparing the compound and the fine-grained eutectic composition of the invention are given.

This invention is comprised of an RF transport system which delivers a phase-stable RF signal to a load, such as an RF cavity of a charged particle accelerator. A circuit generates a calibration signal at an odd multiple frequency of the RF signal where the calibration signal is superimposed with the RF signal on a common cable that connects the RF signal with the load. Signal isolating diplexers are located at both the RF signal source end and load end of the common cable to enable the calibration to be inserted and extracted from the cable signals without any affect on the RF signal. Any phase shift in the calibration signal during traverse of the common cable is then functionally related to the phase shift in the RF signal. The calibration phase shift is used to control a phase shifter for the RF signal to maintain a stable RF signal at the load.

The present invention relates generally to metal foils and methods of making the same. More particularly, this invention pertains to the fabrication of very thin, unbacked metal foils.

A method for preparing olefins and halogenated olefins is provided comprising contacting halogenated compounds with diamonds for a sufficient time and at a sufficient temperature to convert the halogenated compounds to olefins and halogenated olefins via elimination reactions.

A ball mounting fixture for a roundness gage is disclosed. The fixture includes a pair of chuck assemblies oriented substantially transversely with respect to one another and mounted on a common base. Each chuck assembly preferably includes a rotary stage and a wobble plate affixed thereto. A ball chuck affixed to each wobble plate is operable to selectively support a ball to be measured for roundness, with the wobble plate permitting the ball chuck to be tilted to center the ball on the axis of rotation of the rotary stage. In a preferred embodiment, each chuck assembly includes a vacuum chuck operable to selectively support the ball to be measured for roundness. The mounting fixture enables a series of roundness measurements to be taken with a conventional rotating gagehead roundness instrument, which measurements can be utilized to determine the sphericity of the ball.

Adiabatic ion bunching is achieved in a cyclotron axial ion injection system through the incorporation of a radio frequency quadrupole system, which receives ions from an external ion source via an accelerate-decelerate system and a focusing einzel lens system, and which adiabatically bunches and then injects the ions into the median plane of a cyclotron via an electrostatic quadrupole system and an inflection mirror.

A surface is textured by co-sputter etching with a target and a seed material with the surface at a pre-selected temperature. By pre-selecting the temperature of the surface while sputter etching, it is possible to predetermine the reflectance properties of the etched surface. The surface may be textured to absorb sunlight efficiently and have minimal emittance in the infrared region so as to be well-suited for use as a solar absorber for photothermal energy conversion.

Rhenium is recovered from an alloy containing that metal and either one or both of the metals molybdenum and tungsten by the following steps: (1) heating the alloy in the presence of O/sub 2/ to remove the Re from the alloy as gaseous Re/sub 2/O/sub 7/; (2) condensing the gaseous Re/sub 2/O/sub 7/; (3) dissolving the obtained solid Re/sub 2/O/sub 7/ in H/sub 2/O; (4) treating the solution of Re/sub 2/O/sub 7/ and H/sub 2/O with KCl to form KReO/sub 4/; and (5) heating the KReO/sub 4/ in the presence of H/sub 2/ to form Re.

This invention provides simple, inexpensive, independent and passive, conducting loops for stabilizing a plasma ring having externally produced equilibrium fields on opposite sides of the plasma ring and internal plasma currents that interact to tilt and/or shift the plasma ring relative to the externally produced equilibrium field so as to produce unstable tilting and/or shifting modes in the plasma ring. More particularly this invention provides first and second passive conducting loops for containing first and second induced currents in first and second directions corresponding to the amplitude and directions of the unstable tilting and/or shifting modes in the plasma ring. To this end, the induced currents provide additional magnetic fields for producing restoring forces and/or restoring torques for counteracting the tilting and/or shifting modes when the conducting loops are held fixed in stationary positions relative to the externally produced equilibrium fields on opposite sides of the plasma ring.

A plurality of pivotal reflectors direct a high-power laser beam onto a workpiece, and a rotatable reflector is movable to a position wherein it intercepts the beam and deflects a major portion thereof away from its normal path, the remainder of the beam passing to the pivotal reflectors through an aperture in the rotating reflector. A plurality of targets are movable to positions intercepting the path of light traveling to the pivotal reflectors, and a preliminary adjustment of the latter is made by use of a low-power laser beam reflected from the rotating reflector, after which the same targets are used to make a final adjustment of the pivotal reflectors with the portion of the high-power laser beam passed through the rotating reflector. The system was developed to cut the casings of spent nuclear fuel elements into segments as the initial step in recovering usable fuel. (WHK)

Disclosed are a composition for use in storing hydrogen and a method for making the composition. The composition comprises a mixture of two or more hydrides, each hydride having a different series of hydrogen sorption isotherms that contribute to the overall isotherms of the mixture. The hydrides are chosen so that the isotherms of the mixture have regions wherein the H equilibrium pressure increases with increasing hydrogen, preferably linearly. The isotherms of the mixture can be adjusted by selecting hydrides with different isotherms and by varying the amounts of the individual hydrides, or both. Preferably, the mixture is made up of hydrides that have isotherms with substantially flat plateaus and in nearly equimolar amounts. The composition is activated by degassing, exposing to H, and then heating below the softening temperature of any of the constituents. When the composition is used to store hydrogen, its hydrogen content can be found simply by measuring P{sub H}{sub 2} and determining H/M from the isothermic function of the composition.

An object of the present invention is to provide a method for separating and recovering hydrogen isotopes that avoids the disadvantages of the prior art, is more simple, and allows for continuous hydrogen isotope separation and recovery. The disclosed invention does not require the use of isotope exchange reaction catalysts and/or hydrogen sulfide gas. The present invention achieves the advantages of the thermal diffusion and the chemical exchange processes. The disclosed invention provides a method for separating and recovering hydrogen isotopes from a fluid containing the hydrogen isotopes by providing counter-current cold and hot streams of the fluid containing the hydrogen isotopes separated by a proton exchange membrane made of thermally insulating and chemically transparent material that allows exchange of heavy and light hydrogen isotopes there through. The heavier isotopes migrate to the cold stream producing a deuterium and tritium-enriched fluid, while lighter isotopes migrate to the hot stream producing a lighter isotope-enriched fluid. The heavy and light isotopes are withdrawn from the cold and hot streams respectively. According to the present invention, the fluid is water or hydrogen gas, and the desired hydrogen isotope species are deuterium and/or tritium. Further, according to the present invention, the streams of said …

An inertial trap and grooved impactor for providing a sharp cutoff for particles over 15 microns from entering an inhalable particulate sampler is disclosed. The impactor head has a tapered surface and is provided with V-shaped grooves. The tapered surface functions for reducing particle blow-off or reentrainment while the grooves prevent particle bounce. Water droplets and any resuspended material over the 15 micron size are collected by the inertial trap and deposited in a reservoir associated with the impactor.

A method is described for the preparation of defined, isomerically pure phospholipid-nucleoside conjugates as a prodrug in which the drug (araC) is attached to the phospholipid by a monophosphate linkage. Key intermediates in the process involve selective blocking and deblocking of the nucleoside derivative. These particular monophosphate-linked derivatives represent a new class of prodrug, which are useful by themselves or in combination with diphosphate linked derivatives. Several new compositions involving diphosphate linked derivatives are described in which the products are isomerically pure and having defined fatty acid chain lengths.

An improved nuclear diagnostic method identifies a contained target material by measuring on-axis, mono-energetic uncollided particle radiation transmitted through a target material for two penetrating radiation beam energies, and applying specially developed algorithms to estimate a ratio of macroscopic neutron cross-sections for the uncollided particle radiation at the two energies, where the penetrating radiation is a neutron beam, or a ratio of linear attenuation coefficients for the uncollided particle radiation at the two energies, where the penetrating radiation is a gamma-ray beam. Alternatively, the measurements are used to derive a minimization formula based on the macroscopic neutron cross-sections for the uncollided particle radiation at the two neutron beam energies, or the linear attenuation coefficients for the uncollided particle radiation at the two gamma-ray beam energies. A candidate target material database, including known macroscopic neutron cross-sections or linear attenuation coefficients for target materials at the selected neutron or gamma-ray beam energies, is used to approximate the estimated ratio or to solve the minimization formula, such that the identity of the contained target material is discovered.

Apparatus is described for detecting flaws in a tubular workpiece in a single scan. The coils of a dual coil bobbin eddy current inspection probe are wound at a 45/sup 0/ angle to the transverse axis of the probe, one coil having an angular position about the axis about 90/sup 0/ relative to the angular position of the other coil, and the angle of intersection of the planes containing the coils being about 60/sup 0/.

A resonantly photo-pumped x-ray laser is formed of a vanadium and titanium foil combination that is driven by two beams of intense line focused optical laser radiation. Ground state neon-like titanium ions are resonantly photo-pumped by line emission from fluorine-like vanadium ions.

In this invention, the efficiency of a two-junction (cascade) tandem photovoltaic device is improved by adjusting (decreasing) the top cell thickness to achieve current matching. An example of the invention was fabricated out of Ga{sub 0.52}In{sub 0.48}P and GaAs. Additional lattice-matched systems to which the invention pertains include Al{sub x}Ga{sub l-x}/GaAs (x=0.3 {minus} 0.4), GaAs/Ge and Ga{sub y}In{sub 1-y}P/Ga{sub y+0.5}In{sub 0.5-{sub Y}} As (O<y<5).

A diffuser assembly is provided for narrow groove welding using an automatic gas tungsten arc welding torch. The diffuser assembly includes manifold adapted for adjustable mounting on the welding torch which is received in a central opening in the manifold. Laterally extending manifold sections communicate with a shield gas inlet such that shield gas supplied to the inlet passes to gas passages of the manifold sections. First and second tapered diffusers are respectively connected to the manifold sections in fluid communication with the gas passages thereof. The diffusers extend downwardly along the torch electrode on opposite sides thereof so as to release shield gas along the length of the electrode and at the distal tip of the electrode. The diffusers are of a transverse width which is on the order of the thickness of the electrode so that the diffusers can, in use, be inserted into a narrow welding groove before and after the electrode in the direction of the weld operation.