We present the scaling properties of Lambda, Xi, and their anti-particles produced at mid-rapidity in Au+Au collisions at RHIC at psNN = 200 GeV. The yield of multi-strange baryons per participant nucleon increases from peripheral to central collisions more rapidly than the Lambda yield, which appears to correspond to an increasing strange quark density of matter produced. The value of the strange phase space occupancy factor gamma s, obtained from a thermal model fit to the data, approaches unity for the most central collisions. We also show that the nuclear modification factors, RCP, of Lambda and Xi are consistent with each other and with that of protons in the transverse momentum range2.0< pT< 5.0 GeV/c. This scaling behaviour is consistent with a scenario of hadron formation from constituent quark degrees of freedom through quark recombination or coalescence.

This report includes information regarding issues and policy challenges with U.S.-European trade relations. Growing strains, resolving longstanding disputes, and strengthening the multilateral trading system are among topics discussed in this report.

At Brookhaven National Laboratory, a high current Electron Beam Ion Source (EBIS) has been developed as part of a new preinjector that is under construction to replace the Tandem Van de Graaffs as the heavy ion preinjector for the RHIC and NASA experimental programs. This preinjector will produce milliampere-level currents of essentially any ion species, with q/A {ge} 1/6, in short pulses, for injection into the Booster synchrotron. In order to produce the required intensities, this EBIS uses a 10A electron gun, and an electron collector designed to handle 300 kW of pulsed electron beam power. The EBIS trap region is 1.5 m long, inside a 5T, 2m long, 8-inch bore superconducting solenoid. The source is designed to switch ion species on a pulse-to-pulse basis, at a 5 Hz repetition rate. Singly-charged ions of the appropriate species, produced external to the EBIS, are injected into the trap and confined until the desired charge state is reached via stepwise ionization by the electron beam. Ions are then extracted and matched into an RFQ, followed by a short IH Linac, for acceleration to 2 MeV/A, prior to injection into the Booster synchrotron. An overview of the preinjector is presented, along with experimental …

The lack of an acceptable intrusion monitoring solution limits the deployment of 10GE (10 Gigabit-per-second Ethernet) technology across the LLNL's unclassified network infrastructure. The desire to operate at 10GE motivates us to evaluate the functionality and performance of a 10GE intrusion monitoring solution, the Force10 P10.

This report provides a history of the creation and evolution of the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct.

The authors present a preliminary measurement of the branching fraction and CP-violating parameters S and C for the decay B{sup 0} {yields} {omega}K{sub S}{sup 0}. The data sample corresponds to 232 x 10{sup 6} B{bar B} pairs produced from e{sup +}e{sup -} annihilation at the {Upsilon}(4S) resonance. They measure {Beta}(B{sup 0} {yields} {omega}K{sup 0}) = (5.9 {+-} 1.0 {+-} 0.4) x 10{sup -6}, S = 0.50{sub -0.38}{sup +0.34} {+-} 0.02 and C = -0.56{sub -0.27}{sup +0.29} {+-} 0.03.

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Optical Metrology tools, especially for short wavelength (EUV and X-Ray), must cover a wide range of spatial frequencies from the very low, which affects figure, to the important mid-spatial frequencies and the high spatial frequency range, which produces undesirable scattering. A major difficulty in using surface profilometers arises due to the unknown Point-Spread Function (PSF) of the instruments [1] that is responsible for distortion of the measured surface profile. Generally, the distortion due to the PSF is difficult to account because the PSF is a complex function that comes to the measurement via the convolution operation, while the measured profile is described with a real function. Accounting for instrumental PSF becomes significantly simpler if the result of measurement of a profile is presented in a spatial frequency domain as a Power Spectral Density (PSD) distribution [2]. For example, the measured PSD distributions provide a closed set of data necessary for three-dimensional calculations of scattering of light by the optical surfaces [3], [4]. The distortion of the surface PSD distribution due to the PSF can be modeled with the Modulation Transfer Function (MTF), which is defined over the spatial frequency bandwidth of the instrument [1], [2]. The measured PSD distribution can …

A rapid field portable sample and analysis system has been demonstrated at the Savannah River Site and the Hanford Site. The portable system can be used when rapid decisions are needed in the field during scoping or remediation activities, or when it is impractical to bring large volumes of water to the lab for analysis.

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The National Security Council (NSC) was established in 1947. This report describes the history of the NSC, how is structure and influence have varied over the years from one Administration to another, what its current structure and who its current members are, varying opinions as to what the role of the NSC should be, and future developments for the NSC.

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Automatic differentiation is a powerful technique for evaluating derivatives of functions given in the form of a high-level programming language such as Fortran, C, or C++. The program is treated as a potentially very long sequence of elementary statements to which the chain rule of differential calculus is applied over and over again. Combining automatic differentiation and the organizational structure of toolkits for parallel scientific computing provides a mechanism for evaluating derivatives by exploiting mathematical insight on a higher level. In these toolkits, algorithmic structures such as BLAS-like operations, linear and nonlinear solvers, or integrators for ordinary differential equations can be identified by their standardized interfaces and recognized as high-level mathematical objects rather than as a sequence of elementary statements. In this note, the differentiation of a linear solver with respect to some parameter vector is taken as an example. Mathematical insight is used to reformulate this problem into the solution of multiple linear systems that share the same coefficient matrix but differ in their right-hand sides. The experiments reported here use ADIC, a tool for the automatic differentiation of C programs, and PETSC, an object-oriented toolkit for the parallel solution of scientific problems modeled by partial differential equations.

Crevice corrosion is currently mostly studied using either one of two techniques depending on the information desired. The first method involves two multicrevice formers or washers fastened on both sides of a sample plate. This technique provides exposure information regarding the severity of crevice corrosion (depth, position, frequency of attack) but delivers little or no electrochemical information. The second method involves the potentiodynamic or potentiostatic study of an uncreviced sample in a model crevice solution or under a crevice former in aggressive solution where crevice corrosion may initiate and propagate and global current is recorded. However, crevice corrosion initiation and propagation behavior is highly dependent on exact position in the crevice over time. The distance from the crevice mouth will affect the solution composition, the pH, the ohmic potential drop and the true potential in the crevice. Coupled multi-electrode arrays (MEA) were used to study crevice corrosion in order to take in account spatial and temporal evolution of electrochemistry simultaneously. Scaling laws were used to rescale the crevice geometry while keeping the corrosion electrochemical properties equivalent to that of a natural crevice at a smaller length scale. one of the advantages was to be able to use commercial alloys available …

This report discusses aviation modernization program, more specifically the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet program and Key issues surrounding the program that relate to the total number of Super Hornets to be procured.

The F/A-18E/F Super Hornet is the Navy's highest priority aviation modernization program. The decision to undertake F/A-18E/F Super Hornet program was made during a period of great turbulence in Navy aviation modernization. During this time frame the Navy struggled to identify and implement the best way to modernize its aging fleet of F-14 fighters and A-6E attack aircraft. The Department of Defense is currently facing a shortage of radar and communications jamming capability. The Super Hornet has been approved for international export, but no sales have been made as of June 2006. Key issues surrounding the program relate to the total number of Super Hornets to be procured.

This report contains all the geochemical and selected physical characterization data collected on vadose zone sediment recovered from 5 direct push characterization holes emplaced to investigate vadose zone contamination associated with leaks from tanks 241-TY-105 (UPR-200-W-152) and 241-TY-106 (UPR-200-W-153). Tank 241-TY-105 is estimated to have leaked 35,000 gal of tributyl phosphate (TBP) waste from the uranium recovery process to the vadose zone in 1960. Tank 241-TY-106 is estimated to have leaked 20,000 gal of TBP-uranium recovery waste to the vadose zone in 1959. Although several drywells in the vicinity of tank 241-TY-106 contain measurable quantities of cesium-137 and/or cobalt-60, their relatively low concentrations indicate that the contaminant inventory in the vadose zone around tank 241-TY-106 is quite small. Additionally, this report contains all the geochemical and selected physical characterization data collected on vadose zone sediment recovered from 7 direct push characterization holes emplaced to investigate vadose zone contamination associated with an overfill event and leak from tank 241-T-101.

At present, the United States has two main programs for temporarily importing low-skilled workers, sometimes referred to as guest workers. Agricultural guest workers enter through the H-2A program and other guest workers enter through the H-2B program. Employers interested in importing workers under either program must first apply to the U.S. Labor Department for a certification that U.S. workers capable of performing the work are not available and that the employment of alien workers will not adversely affect the wages and working conditions of similarly employed U.S. workers. Other requirements of the programs differ.

The overall purpose of this project is to evaluate the biological and economic feasibility of restoring high-quality forests on mined land, and to measure carbon sequestration and wood production benefits that would be achieved from forest restoration procedures. We are currently estimating the acreage of lands in VA, WV, KY, OH, and PA mined under SMCRA and reclaimed to non-forested post-mining land uses that are not currently under active management, and therefore can be considered as available for carbon sequestration. To determine actual sequestration under different forest management scenarios, a field study was installed as a 3 x 3 factorial in a random complete block design with three replications at each of three locations, Ohio, West Virginia, and Virginia. The treatments included three forest types (white pine, hybrid poplar, mixed hardwood) and three silvicultural regimes (competition control, competition control plus tillage, competition control plus tillage plus fertilization). Each individual treatment plot is 0.5 acres. Each block of nine plots is 4.5 acres, and the complete installation at each site is 13.5 acres. During the reporting period we compiled and evaluated all soil properties measured on the study sites. Statistical analysis of the properties was conducted, and first year survival and …

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High aspect ratio structures are often present in MEMS devices and EPON SU-8 is often used to produce such structures because of its low cost. It is essential to know the mechanical properties of SU-8 for producing reliable MEMS products. However, the mechanical properties of SU-8 may depend on the manufacturing process and the size of the structure, which is in the micron domain. Hence, one needs to test specimens that are similar in size to MEMS structures to determine if the mechanical properties change with processing protocol. In this work, the authors applied the newly developed technique SIEM (Speckle Interferometry with Electron Microscopy) to the determination of SU-8's mechanical properties.