Transcript of a public hearing held by the Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq & Afghanistan held December 18, 2009 in Washington, D.C. This hearing includes testimony from federal officials and government contractors on the adequacy and oversight of contract training for Afghanistan's national army and police forces.

We present a stable and convergent method for the computation of flows of DNA-laden fluids in microchannels with complex geometry. The numerical strategy combines a ball-rod model representation for polymers tightly coupled with a projection method for incompressible viscous flow. We use Cartesian grid embedded boundary methods to discretize the fluid equations in the presence of complex domain boundaries. A sample calculation is presented showing flow through a packed array microchannel in 2D.

Two synthetic data sets were examined to study the possible methods for distinguishing the effects of changes in saturation, and changes in pore pressure, on seismic velocity and impedance measurements. The results show that the results obtained previously on the dependence of laboratory velocity data on changes in saturation carry over without change to the data in these data sets. The assumption in this case is that the only data available are the seismic velocities. This situation can arise in cross-well seismic tomography. Of more direct interest to this project is how these methods and results should change when the data are instead seismic impedance measurements. The main conclusions are that the most appropriate plotting methods for seismic impedance data in order to distinguish changes in saturation, changes in pressure, and saturation changes from pressure changes are ({rho}{mu}, {lambda}/{mu}) and ({mu}/{lambda}, {rho}{mu}{sup 2}/{lambda}). All of these plotting coordinates can be computed easily from the impedance data {rho}{nu}{sub p} and {rho}{nu}{sub s}, since {rho}{mu} = ({rho}{nu}{sub s}){sup 2}, and {rho}{lambda} = ({rho}{nu}{sub p}){sup 2} - 2({rho}{nu}{sub s}){sup 2}, while {lambda}/{mu} = {rho}{lambda}/{rho}{mu} and {rho}{mu}{sup 2}/{lambda} = ({rho}{mu}){sup 2}/{rho}{lambda}. These choices are not the only possibilities, but they seem to give the …

The objective of this report is: (1) Provide guidance to industry in the reduction of aerodynamic drag of heavy truck vehicles; and (2) Establish a database of experimental, computational, and conceptual design information, and demonstrate potential of new drag-reduction devices. The approaches used were: (1) Develop and demonstrate the ability to simulate and analyze aerodynamic flow around heavy truck vehicles using existing and advanced computational fluid dynamics (CFD) tools; (2) Through an extensive experimental effort, generate an experimental data base for code validation; (3) Using experimental data base, validate computations; (4) Provide industry with design guidance and insight into flow phenomena from experiments and computations; and (5) Investigate aero devices (e.g., base flaps, tractor-trailer gap stabilizer, underbody skirts and wedges, blowing and acoustic devices), provide industry with conceptual designs of drag reducing devices, and demonstrate the full-scale fuel economy potential of these devices.

The stability of lamellar interfaces in lamellar TiAl by straining at ambient temperatures has been investigated using in-situ straining techniques performed in a transmission electron microscope in order to obtain direct evidence to support the previously proposed creep mechanisms in refined lamellar TiAl based upon the interface sliding in association with the cooperative motion of interfacial dislocations. The results have revealed that both sliding and migration of lamellar interfaces can take place as a result of the cooperative motion of interfacial dislocations.

Significant progress in the development of burning plasma scenarios, steady-state scenarios at high fusion performance, and basic tokamak physics has been made by the DIII-D Team. Discharges similar to the ITER baseline scenario have demonstrated normalized fusion performance nearly 50% higher than required for Q = 10 in ITER, under stationary conditions. Discharges that extrapolate to Q {approx} 10 for longer than one hour in ITER at reduced current have also been demonstrated in DIII-D under stationary conditions. Proof of high fusion performance with full noninductive operation has been obtained. Underlying this work are studies validating approaches to confinement extrapolation, disruption avoidance and mitigation, tritium retention, ELM avoidance, and operation above the no-wall pressure limit. In addition, the unique capabilities of the DIII-D facility have advanced studies of the sawtooth instability with unprecedented time and space resolution, threshold behavior in the electron heat transport, and rotation in plasmas in the absence of external torque.

We present a crystal level model for thermo-mechanical deformation with phase transformation capabilities. The model is formulated to allow for large pressures (on the order of the elastic moduli) and makes use of a multiplicative decomposition of the deformation gradient. Elastic and thermal lattice distortions are combined into a single lattice stretch to allow the model to be used in conjunction with general equation of state relationships. Phase transformations change the mass fractions of the material constituents. The driving force for phase transformations includes terms arising from mechanical work, from the temperature dependent chemical free energy change on transformation, and from interaction energy among the constituents. Deformation results from both these phase transformations and elasto-viscoplastic deformation of the constituents themselves. Simulation results are given for the {alpha} to {epsilon} phase transformation in iron. Results include simulations of shock induced transformation in single crystals and of compression of polycrystals. Results are compared to available experimental data.

Nuclear materials were first used to end the World War II. They were produced and maintained during the cold war for global security reasons. In the succeeding 50 years since the Atoms for Peace Initiative, nuclear materials were produced and used in global civilian reactors and fuel cycles intended for peaceful purposes. The Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) of 1970 established a framework for appropriate applications of both defense and civilian nuclear activities by nuclear weapons states and non-nuclear weapons states. As global inventories of nuclear materials continue to grow, in a diverse and dynamically changing manner, it is time to evaluate current and future trends and needed actions: what are the current circumstances, what has been done to date, what has worked and what hasn't? The aim is to identify mutually reinforcing programmatic directions, leading to global partnerships that measurably enhance international security. Essential elements are material protection, control and accountability (MPC&A) of separated nuclear materials, interim storage, and geologic repositories for all nuclear materials destined for final disposal. Cooperation among key partners, such as the MPC&A program between the U.S. and Russia for nuclear materials from dismantled weapons, is necessary for interim storage and final disposal of nuclear materials. Such …

Analytical simulations of fast-electron currents induced by high-density laser-plasma interactions require estimation of various plasma and beam parameters, including temperatures, densities, and collision rates. This note describes a technique used to estimate or calculate these parameters for the case of contemporary multi-terawatt experiments using foil targets as well as for anticipated fast-ignition-scale experiments.

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One of the major motivations driving recent interest in FFAGs is their use for the cost-effective acceleration of muons. This paper summarizes the progress in this area that was achieved leading up to and at the FFAG workshop at KEK from July 7-12, 2003. Much of the relevant background and references are also given here, to give a context to the progress we have made.

Marine Corp Recruit Depot (MCRD), Parris Island, SC, home of the Easter Recruiting Region Marine Corp Boot Camp, found itself in a situation common to Department of Defense (DOD) facilities. It had to deal with several different types of installed energy-related control systems that could not talk to each other. This situation was being exacerbated by the installation of a new and/or unique type of control system for every new building being constructed or older facility that was being upgraded. The Wastewater Treatment Facility (WWTF) and lift station controls were badly in need of a thorough inspection and a new Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system upgrade to meet environmental, safety, manpower, and maintenance concerns. A project was recently completed to implement such a wastewater treatment SCADA upgrade, which is compatible with other upgrades to the energy monitoring and control systems for Parris Island buildings and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) Decision Support for Operations and Maintenance (DSOM) system installed at the Central Energy Plant (CEP). This project included design, specification, procurement, installation, and testing an upgraded SCADA alarm, process monitoring, and display system; and training WWTF operators in its operation. The ultimate goal of this and the …

We are currently developing a component based, parallel visualization and graphical analysis tool for visualizing and analyzing data on two- and three-dimensional (20, 30) meshes. The tool consists of three primary components: a graphical user interface (GUI), a viewer, and a parallel compute engine. The components are designed to be operated in a distributed fashion with the GUI and viewer typically running on a high performance visualization server and the compute engine running on a large parallel platform. The viewer and compute engine are both based on the Visualization Toolkit (VTK), an open source object oriented data manipulation and visualization library. The compute engine will make use of parallel extensions to VTK, based on MPI, developed by Los Alamos National Laboratory in collaboration with the originators of P K . The compute engine will make use of meta-data so that it only operates on the portions of the data necessary to generate the image. The meta-data can either be created as the post-processing data is generated or as a pre-processing step to using VisIt. VisIt will be integrated with the VIEWS' Tera-Scale Browser, which will provide a high performance visual data browsing capability based on multi-resolution techniques.

Metallic films are grown with a sponge-like morphology in the as-deposited condition using planar magnetron sputtering. The morphology of the deposit is characterized by metallic continuity in three dimensions with continuous porosity on the sub-micron scale. The stabilization of the metallic sponge is directly correlated with a limited range for the sputter deposition parameters of working gas pressure and substrate temperature. This sponge-like morphology augments the features as generally understood in the classic zone models of growth for physical vapor deposits. Nickel coatings are deposited with working gas pressures up to 4 Pa and for substrate temperatures up to 1100 K. The morphology of the deposits is examined in plan and in cross-section with scanning electron microscopy. The parametric range of gas pressure and substrate temperature (relative to absolute melt point) for the deposition processing under which the metallic sponges are produced appear universal for many metals, as for example, including gold, silver, and aluminum.

This report documents research that was done during a ten week internship in the Sapphire research group at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory during the Summer of 2003. The goal of the study was to develop an algorithm that is capable of isolating (segmenting) moving objects in low resolution video sequences. This capability is currently being developed by the Sapphire research group as the first stage in a longer term video data mining project. This report gives a chronological account of what ideas were tried in developing the algorithm and what was learned from each attempt. The final version of the algorithm, which is described in detail, gives good results and is fast.

Experimental data that exhibits a continuous-wave, second-harmonic intensity threshold (15 kW/cm{sup 2}) that causes two-photon nonlinear absorption which leads to time-dependent photochromic damage in periodically poled KTiOPO{sub 4} is presented and verified through a thermal dephasing model.

(1) LLNL measured the material removal rate from stainless steel, silicon carbide, rhenium, N5, hastalloy X, and titanium as a function of pulse fluence at a wavelength of 810 nm for pulse durations of 150 fs, 1.5 ps, 20 ps, and 500 ps. The spot size of the beam used was 150 microns in diameter and the nominal material thickness was 1-2 mm. These experiments were performed on the existing 1 kHz laser system. Holes of different penetration depths were obtained to ascertain change in removal rate as a function of depth. Measurements included electron microscopy of selected samples. (2) The experiments in I were repeated for all materials but select pulse durations with the sample in a vacuum of base pressure 10 mTorr to determine if hole quality and ablation rate is improved. (3) LLNL measured material removal rate from stainless steel, silicon carbide, rhenium, N5, hastalloy X, and titanium as a function of pulse fluence at a wavelength of 532 nm for pulse duration at 200 ns. The spot size of the beam used was 200 microns in diameter and the material thickness was the same as in task I. Holes of different penetration depths were obtained to …

Our identification research for the past several years has focused on the problem of correctly discriminating small-magnitude explosions from a background of earthquakes, mining tremors, and other events. Small magnitudes lead to an emphasis on regional waveforms. The goal is to reduce the variance within the population of each type of event, while increasing the separation between the explosions and the other event types. We address this problem for both broad categories of seismic waves, body waves, and surface waves. First, we map out the effects of propagation and source size in advance so that they can be accounted for and removed from observed events. This can dramatically reduce the population variance. Second, we try to optimize the measurement process to improve the separation between population types. For body waves we focus on the identification power of the short-period regional phases Pn, Pg, Sn and Lg, and coda that can often be detected down to very small magnitudes. It is now well established that particular ratios of these phases, such as 6- to 8-Hz Pn/Lg, can effectively discriminate between closely located explosions and earthquakes. To extend this discrimination power over broad areas, we developed a revised Magnitude and Distance Amplitude …

Solid-state lasers have held great promise for the generation of high-average-power, high-quality output beams for a number of decades. However, the inherent difficulty of scaling the active solid-state gain media while continuing to provide efficient cooling has limited demonstrated powers to <5kW. Even at the maximum demonstrated average powers, the output is most often delivered as continuous wave (CW) or as small energy pulses at high pulse repetition frequency (PRF) and the beam divergence is typically >10X the diffraction limit. Challenges posed by optical distortions and depolarization arising from internal temperature gradients in the gain medium of a continuously cooled system are only increased for laser designs that would attempt to deliver the high average power in the form of high energy pulses (>25J) from a single coherent optical aperture. Although demonstrated phase-locking of multiple laser apertures may hold significant promise for the future scaling of solid-state laser systems,1 the continuing need for additional technical development and innovation coupled with the anticipated complexity of these systems effectively limits this approach for near-term multi-kW laser operation outside of a laboratory setting. We have developed and demonstrated a new operational mode for solid-state laser systems in which the cooling of the gain …

Embedded gold and mechanical deformation in silica were used to investigate initiation of laser-induced damage at 3.55-nm (7.6 ns). The nanoparticle-covered surfaces were coated with between 0 and 500 nm of SiO{sub 2} by e-beam deposition. The threshold for observable damage and initiation site morphology for these ''engineered'' surfaces was determined. The gold nanoparticle coated surfaces with 500nm SiO{sub 2} coating exhibited pinpoint damage threshold of <0.7 J/cm{sup 2} determined by light scattering and Nomarski microscopy. The gold nanoparticle coated surfaces with the 100nm SiO{sub 2} coatings exhibited what nominally appeared to be film exfoliation damage threshold of 19 J/cm{sup 2} via light scattering and Nomarski microscopy. With atomic force microscopy pinholes could be detected at fluences greater than 7 J/cm{sup 2} and blisters at fluences greater than 3 J/cm{sup 2} on the 100 nm-coated surfaces. A series of mechanical indents and scratches were made in the fused silica substrates using a nano-indentor. Plastic deformation without cracking led to damage thresholds of -25 J/cm{sup 2}, whereas indents and scratches with cracking led to damage thresholds of only {approx}5 J/cm{sup 2}. Particularly illuminating was the deterministic damage of scratches at the deepest end of the scratch, as if the scratch acted …

Neptunium, because of its long half life, is an element of long-term interest to the Yucca Mountain repository. The fate of neptunium under repository settings is unknown. This report provides a review and new interpretation of past tests on commercial spent nuclear fuel and experimental evidence on the fate of neptunium. Tests on commercial spent nuclear fuel preformed previously at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) used a bathtub setup by immersing spent fuel in either deionized water or a groundwater typical of those at Yucca Mountain. The main goal of the tests was to determine the different concentrations of radionuclides in solution with different types of cladding defects. Neptunium was not the focus of these tests, nor were the tests designed to study neptunium. Drip tests performed at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) are unsaturated tests that drip water at different rates on spent fuel. Relatively new tests at ANL examine the corrosion of Np-doped U3O8 in humid air at various temperatures. This review concludes that all tests reported here have analytical problems (i.e., relatively high detection limits for Np) and have been configured such that they limit the ability to interpret the available neptunium data. Past tests on spent nuclear …

X-ray imaging will be an important diagnostic tool for inertial confinement fusion (ICF) research at the National Ignition Facility (NIF). However, high neutron yields will make x-ray imaging much more difficult than it is at smaller facilities. We analyze the feasibility and performance of a High-Energy X-Ray Imager (HEXRI) to be used on cryogenic DT implosions at NIF, with particular emphasis on spatial-resolution, field of view, signal-to-background and signal-to-noise ratios. Using a pinhole about 4 {micro}m in diameter a resolution of 5.8 {micro}m is achieved at 9 keV, limited by restrictions in the pinhole positioning. The resolution varies between 8.5 and 4.5 {micro}m in the 5-20 keV spectral range. Different options for the scintillating materials have been evaluated with the goal of having a sufficiently fast phosphor screen to allow time gating for minimizing neutron-induced background. Signal/Background (SBR) and Signal/Noise (SNR) ratios (limited to x-rays) have been calculated for different commercially-available scintillators, both showing adequate values with either a tantalum or a platinum pinhole substrate.

In filled PDMS based composites, such as M97XX stress cushions, significant mechanical reinforcement of the polymer component is obtained from hydrogen bonding between the silica filler surface hydroxyls and the siloxane polymer backbone. It is expected that these interactions are influenced by the amount and structure of interfacial water. We have chosen to investigate in detail the effect of chemisorbed and physisorbed water on the interfacial structure and dynamics in silica-filled PDMS-based composites. Toward this end, we have combined classical molecular dynamics simulations and experimental studies employing nanoindentation, temperature programmed desorption (TPD), Dynamic Mechanical Analysis (DMA), and Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) analyses. Our TPD results suggest that moisture desorption and adsorption in M9787 can be approximated by the interaction of its silica constituents (Cab-0-Sil-M-7D and Hi-Sil-233) with moisture. Our experimental data also reveal that, in general, as heat-treated silica particles are exposed to moisture, chemisorbed states, then physisorbed states are gradually filled up in that order. Molecular modeling results suggest that the polymer-silica contact distance and the mobility of interfacial polymer chains significantly decreased as the hydration level at the interface was reduced. The reduced mobility of the PDMS chains in the interfacial domain reduced the bulk motional properties of …

The standing-wave electric-field profile within multilayer coatings is significantly perturbated by a nodular defect. The intensity, which is proportional to the electric field squared, is increased in the high index material by {>=}3x at normal incidence and {>=}12x at 45 degrees incidence angle. Therefore it is not surprising that nodular defects are initiation sites of laser-induced damage. In this study, the impact of reflectance-band centering and incident angle are explored for a 1 {micro}m diameter nodular defect seed overcoated with a 24 layer high-reflector constructed of quarter-wave thick alternating layers of hafnia and silica. The modeling was performed using a three-dimensional finite-element analysis code.