The development of inertial fusion as a power source will require achieving four principal milestones: ignition and propagating burn; high gain at low drive energy for the reactor driver; pulse repetition rates of a few Hz; and long-term reliability and economics of a reactor. To keep development time and costs to a minimum, these should be accomplished with as few major facilities as possible. A viable scenario for the Inertial Fusion Energy (IFE) Program would include establishing the first milestone in a Nova Upgrade for ignition and gain and the latter three in an upgradable, low-power Engineering Test Facility (ETF)/Demonstration Power Plant (DPP), i.e. two major facilities. To be successful in as short a time as possible operations at the major facilities would have to be supported by off-line reactor driver and other reactor technology development efforts. These efforts would evaluate and prioritize the myriad of options available at present for power plant and subsystem concepts. This paper describes the elements of such a program that could make the first commercial power available in the decade of the 2020s and estimates the resources needed. This program would be carried out in phases with major go/no-go decision points before each large …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a legislative requirement, GAO reviewed the effectiveness of the Department of Justice's (DOJ) Weed and Seed Program, focusing on how: (1) the program is managed by DOJ's Executive Office for Weed and Seed (EOWS); (2) EOWS monitors local Weed and Seed sites to ensure that grant requirements are met; (3) EOWS determines when sites have become self-sustaining; and (4) EOWS and selected sites are measuring program results."

We discuss the generation of inhomogeneity in the baryon-number density during the cosmic quark-hadron phase transition. We use a simple model with thin-wall phase boundaries and ideal-gas equations of state. The nucleation of the phase transition introduces a new distance scale into the universe which will be the scale of the generated inhomogeneity. We review the estimate of this scale. During the transition baryon number is likely to collect onto a layer at the phase boundary. These layers may in the end be deposited as small regions of very high baryon density. 21 refs., 1 fig.

'The report, Technical Basis for Safe Operations with Pu-239 Polymer in NMS S Operating Facilities (F H Areas), (WSRC-TR-99-00008) was issued in an effort to upgrade the Authorization Basis (AB) for H Area facilities relative to nuclear criticality. At the time, insufficient data were found in the literature to quantify the adsorption of Pu polymer onto the surfaces of stainless steel tanks. Additional experimental or literature information on the adsorption of Pu(IV) polymer and its removal was deemed necessary to support the H Area AB. The results obtained are also applicable to processing in F Area facilities.Additional literature sources suggest that adsorption on the tank walls should not be a safety concern. The sources show that the amount of Pu polymer that adsorbs from a solution comes to a limiting amount in 5 to 7 days after which no additional Pu is adsorbed. Adsorption increases with Pu concentration and decreases with acid concentration. The adsorbed amounts are small varying from 0.5 mg/cm2 for a 0.5 g/l Pu / 0.5M HNO3 solution to 11 mg/cm2 for a 1-3 g/l Pu / 0.1M HNO3 solution. Additionally, acid concentrations greater than 0.1M will remove a percentage of adsorbed Pu.The experimental results have generally …

While much research is needed to assess the reality and consequences of alpha-induced instabilities, crude transport estimates for the TAE mode indicate that as little as 10 percent of the alpha energy would be deposited in steady-state. Even so, CIT and the ITER technology phase would meet their minimal goals of Q = 5 if only the alphas themselves are ejected and not the fuel itself. Higher gain up to Q {approximately} 20 may be possible in driven reactors of a different design, depending on the effects of aspect ratio and other geometric features on confinement. Very high gain still requires alpha testing. 5 refs.

A weekly publication, the Texas Register serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas. Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents such as requests for proposals. After adoption, these rulemaking actions are codified into the Texas Administrative Code.

A weekly publication, the Texas Register serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas. Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents such as requests for proposals. After adoption, these rulemaking actions are codified into the Texas Administrative Code.

A weekly publication, the Texas Register serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas. Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents such as requests for proposals. After adoption, these rulemaking actions are codified into the Texas Administrative Code.

A weekly publication, the Texas Register serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas. Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents such as requests for proposals. After adoption, these rulemaking actions are codified into the Texas Administrative Code.

Letter opinion issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether a municipality which withdraws from a transit authority created under the terms of article 1118y, V.T.C.S., may subsequently levy a sales tax under chapter 321, Tax Code, or under sections 4A or 4B of article 5190.6, V.T.C.S. (RQ-817)

Letter opinion issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether a county investment officer, under the Public Funds Investment Act, Gov't Code ch. 2256 is responsible for investing county and district clerk trust funds, funds collected by the county tax assessor, and the district attorney hot check fund (ID# 38426)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether the Charitable Immunity and Liability Act of 1987, Civil Practices and Remedies Code chapter 84, applies to a resource conservation and development council established under 16 U.S.C. chapter 54, subchapter V (RQ-881)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether the Court Reporters Certification Board is subject to article 6252-13f, V.T.C.S., which establishes the State Office of Administrative Hearings (RQ-138)

The reinjection task on optimizing injection into the Palinpinon geothermal field in the Philippines was completed. Progress is summarized on experimental investigation of absorption, estimation of adsorption parameters from experimental and field data, the theoretical study of adsorption isotherms, and interpreting pressure data. (MHR)

Several courts in the various circuits have considered whether the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination applies to fear of incrimination in foreign countries, and they have come to divergent conclusions. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari in United States v. Balsys, and on June 25, 1998, decided that a witness may not invoke the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination in which only a foreign prosecution is possible. This report provides background on United States v. Balsys and examines the court's opinion.

PETC has implemented a number of advanced combustion research projects that will lead to the establishment of a broad, commercially acceptable engineering data base for the advancement of coal as the fuel of choice for boilers, furnaces, and process heaters. Vortec Corporation's Coal-Fired Combustion System for Industrial Process Heating Applications has been selected for Phase III development under contract DE-AC22-91PC91161. This advanced combustion system research program is for the development of innovative coal-fired process heaters which can be used for high temperature melting, smelting, recycling, and refining processes. The process heater concepts to be developed are based on advanced glass melting and ore smelting furnaces developed and patented by Vortec Corporation. The process heater systems to be developed have multiple use applications; however, the Phase HI research effort is being focused on the development of a process heater system to be used for producing glass frits and wool fiber from boiler and incinerator ashes. The primary objective of the Phase III project is to develop and integrate all the system components, from fuel through total system controls, and then test the complete system in order to evaluate its potential marketability. The economic evaluation of commercial scale CMS processes has begun. …

The goal of this work was to detect ``single-leg separated`` Bjoerk-Shiley Convexo-Concave heart valves which had been implanted in sheep. A ``single-leg separated`` heart valve contains a fracture in the outlet strut resulting in an increased risk of mechanical failure. The approach presented in this report detects such fractures by applying statistical pattern recognition with the nearest neighbor classifier to the acoustic signatures of the valve opening. This approach is discussed and results of applying it to real data are given.

The purpose of this analysis is to identify and analyze concepts for the acquisition of data in support of the Performance Confirmation (PC) program at the potential subsurface nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain. This analysis is being prepared to document an investigation of design concepts, current available technology, technology trends, and technical issues associated with data acquisition during the PC period. This analysis utilizes the ''Performance Confirmation Plan'' (CRWMS M&O 2000b) to help define the scope for the PC data acquisition system. The focus of this analysis is primarily on the PC period for a minimum of 30 years after emplacement of the last waste package. The design of the data acquisition system shall allow for a closure deferral up to 300 years from initiation of waste emplacement. (CRWMS M&O 2000h, page 5-1). This analysis is a revision to and supercedes analysis, ''Performance Confirmation Data Acquisition System'', DI No. BCAI00000-017 17-0200-00002 Rev 00 (CRWMS M&O 1997), and incorporates the latest repository design changes following the M&O & DOE evaluation of a series of Enhanced Design Alternatives (EDAs), as described in the ''Enhanced Design Alternatives II Report'' (CRWMS M&O 1999d). Significant design changes include: thermal line loading of the emplacement …

Evidence for capillary waves at a liquid/vapor interface are presented from extensive molecular dynamics simulations of a system containing up to 1.24 million Lennard-Jones particles. Careful measurements show that the total interfacial width depends logarithmically on L{sub {parallel}}, the length of the simulation cell parallel to the interface, as predicted theoretically. The strength of the divergence of the interfacial width on L{sub {parallel}} depends inversely on the surface tension {gamma}. This allows us to measure {gamma} two ways since {gamma} can also be obtained from the difference in the pressure parallel and perpendicular to the interface. These two independent measures of {gamma} agree provided that the interfacial order parameter profile is fit to an error function and not a hyperbolic tangent, as often assumed. We explore why these two common fitting functions give different results for {gamma}.

This research and development contract has resulted in several benefits for Trace Engineering and the PV industry that are directly attributable to the PVMaT program: Application of the hardware based protection circuit developed in Phase I was completed on Trace's existing DR and SW series product lines. This additional protection circuit was phased into full production starting in April of 1997. This resulted in a substantial improvement in factory yields and a very significant reduction of field failures - a drop of as much as 80% on some product models. Accelerated development and introduction of the Power Module enclosure/balance of systems package. This product is a big step towards the standardization of system and equipment design for Trace's customers. Developed the cost reduced 2.5-kW modular inverter based on the current SW series software and topology. This new inverter/charger uses many new construction and manufacturing methods to reduce cost by 40%, simplify production, decrease parts count by over 20%, reduce labor required by 30%, and increase the flexibility in the manufacturing process. It will enter production in the first quarter of 1999 as the Trace Engineering PS series inverter/charger.

This document describes the condition of the multi-sensor cone penetrometer probe system at project termination.

In the aftermath of the Cold War, the United States has begun addressing the environmental consequences of five decades of nuclear weapons production. In November 1989, DOE established the Office of Environmental Restoration and Waste Management (EM) as the central authority for cleaning up the DOE weapons complex legacy of pollution, for preventing further environmental contamination, and for instituting responsible environmental management. While performing its tasks, EM found that many aspects of its large and complex mission could not be achieved using existing science and technology or without incurring unreasonable costs, risks, or schedule impacts. Consequently, a process was developed to solicit needs from around the DOE complex and focus the science and technology resources of EM-50, the National Laboratories, private industry, and colleges and universities on those needs. This document describes those needs that the Hanford Site has identified as requiring additional science or technology to complete.

SUMMiT (Sandia Ultra-planar Multi-level MEMS Technology) at the Sandia National Laboratories' MDL (Microelectronics Development Laboratory) is a standardized MEMS (Microelectromechanical Systems) technology that allows designers to fabricate concept prototypes. This technology provides four polysilicon layers plus three sacrificial oxide layers (with the third oxide layer being planarized) to enable fabrication of complex mechanical systems-on-a-chip. Quantified reproducibility of the SUMMiT process is important for process engineers as well as designers. Summary statistics for critical MEMS technology parameters such as film thickness, line width, and sheet resistance will be reported for the SUMMiT process. Additionally, data from Van der Pauw test structures will be presented. Data on film thickness, film uniformity and critical dimensions of etched line widths are collected from both process and monitor wafers during manufacturing using film thickness metrology tools and SEM tools. A standardized diagnostic module is included in each SWiT run to obtain post-processing parametric data to monitor run-to-run reproducibility such as Van der Pauw structures for measuring sheet resistance. This characterization of the SUMMiT process enables design for manufacturability in the SUMMiT technology.

The purpose of this document is to provide EPA Headquarters with additional analytical data on the presence of PCBs in painted surfaces.