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Status of the SABRE South experiment at the Stawell underground physics laboratory

The SABRE (Sodium iodide with Active Background REjection) experiments aim to detect an annual rate modulation from dark matter interactions in ultra-high purity NaI(Tl) crystals. The SABRE South experiment is located at the Stawell Underground Physics Laboratory (SUPL), Australia, and is the first deep underground laboratory in the Southern Hemisphere. SABRE South is designed to disentangle seasonal or site-related effects from the dark matter-like modulated signal first observed by DAMA/LIBRA in the Northern Hemisphere using an active veto and muon detection system. It is a partner to the SABRE North effort at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso (LNGS). SABRE South is instrumented with ultra-high purity NaI(Tl) crystals immersed in a linear alkyl benzene (LAB) based liquid scintillator veto, further surrounded by passive steel and polyethylene shielding and a plastic scintillator muon veto. Significant work has been undertaken to understand the experimental backgrounds and performance of the crystals. The SABRE South experiment is under construction, and will be commissioned from late 2022 to early 2023. We will present the final design of SABRE South, the status of its construction, its expected background, and its sensitivity to a DAMA/LIBRA like modulation. We will also present recent quenching factor measurements of sodium nuclear recoils in NaI(Tl) crystals measured at the Heavy Ion Accelerator Facility, and a report on the status of SUPL.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

Magnetic field sensors for detection of trapped flux in superconducting radio frequency cavities

Superconducting radio-frequency (SRF) cavities are fundamental building block of modern particle accelerators. They operate at liquid helium temperatures 2-4 K to achieve very high quality factors 1e10-1e11. Trapping of magnetic flux within the superconductor is a significant contribution to the residual RF losses which limit the achievable quality factor. Suitable diagnostic tools are in high demand to understand the mechanisms of flux trapping in technical superconductors and the fundamental components of such diagnostic tool are magnetic field sensors. We have studied the performance of commercially available Hall probes, anisotropic magnetoresistive sensors and flux-gate magnetometers with respect to their sensitivity and capability to detect localized, low magnetic flux amplitudes, of the order of few tens of magnetic flux quantum at liquid helium temperature. Although Hall probes have the lowest magnetic field sensitivity (~96$ nV$/microT at 2 K), their physical dimensions are such that they have the ability to detect the lowest number of trapped vortices among the three type of sensors. Hall probes and anisotropic magnetoresistive sensors have been selected to be used in a setup to map regions of trapped flux on the surface of a single-cell SRF cavity.

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION↗

Variational Optical Phase Learning on a Continuous-Variable Quantum Compiler

Quantum process learning is a fundamental primitive that draws inspiration from machine learning with the goal of better studying the dynamics of quantum systems. One approach to quantum process learning is quantum compilation, whereby an analog quantum operation is digitized by compiling it into a series of basic gates. While there has been significant focus on quantum compiling for discrete-variable systems, the continuous-variable (CV) framework has received comparatively less attention. We present an experimental implementation of a CV quantum compiler that uses two-mode squeezed light to learn a Gaussian unitary operation. We demonstrate the compiler by learning a parameterized linear phase unitary through the use of target and control phase unitaries to demonstrate a factor of 5.4 increase in the precision of the phase estimation and a 3.6-fold acceleration in the time-to-solution metric when leveraging quantum resources. We further show how our approach can be extended to higher-dimensional compilation tasks. Our results are enabled by the tunable control of our cost landscape via variable squeezing, thus providing a critical framework to simultaneously increase precision and reduce time-to-solution.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

RNAi and genome editing of sugarcane: Progress and prospects

SUMMARY Sugarcane, which provides 80% of global table sugar and 40% of biofuel, presents unique breeding challenges due to its highly polyploid, heterozygous, and frequently aneuploid genome. Significant progress has been made in developing genetic resources, including the recently completed reference genome of the sugarcane cultivar R570 and pan‐genomic resources from sorghum, a closely related diploid species. Biotechnological approaches including RNA interference (RNAi), overexpression of transgenes, and gene editing technologies offer promising avenues for accelerating sugarcane improvement. These methods have successfully targeted genes involved in important traits such as sucrose accumulation, lignin biosynthesis, biomass oil accumulation, and stress response. One of the main transformation methods—biolistic gene transfer or Agrobacterium ‐mediated transformation—coupled with efficient tissue culture protocols, is typically used for implementing these biotechnology approaches. Emerging technologies show promise for overcoming current limitations. The use of morphogenic genes can help address genotype constraints and improve transformation efficiency. Tissue culture‐free technologies, such as spray‐induced gene silencing, virus‐induced gene silencing, or virus‐induced gene editing, offer potential for accelerating functional genomics studies. Additionally, novel approaches including base and prime editing, orthogonal synthetic transcription factors, and synthetic directed evolution present opportunities for enhancing sugarcane traits. These advances collectively aim to improve sugarcane's efficiency as a crop for both sugar and biofuel production. This review aims to discuss the progress made in sugarcane methodologies, with a focus on RNAi and gene editing approaches, how RNAi can be used to inform functional gene targets, and future improvements and applications.

Brant, Eleanor [Agronomy Department, Plant Molecul↗

How Selective Transport Layer Improves Efficiency and Durability of Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells

In any electrochemical device, the separator or membrane allows specific ions to transport but blocks electrons and other chemical species, enabling the electrochemical energy to be harvested. However, small amounts of undesired species are known to permeate through the membrane, reducing overall system efficiency and lifetime. An emerging concept called the “Selective Transport Layer” preferentially allows only protons to pass through but reduces the permeance of other species by a meaningful degree. Here, in this study, we demonstrate that a 60 nm thick graphene oxide composite layer can be very effective in reducing gas and ion permeation, even for a gas as small as H 2 , while not noticeably increasing proton transport resistance. In electrode and membrane accelerated stability tests, we show that both electrode and membrane durability are improved by a factor of two. Microscopy and mathematic simulations confirm that the graphene oxide composite is effective in blocking transport of dissolved Pt 2+ . The improved durability and reduced H 2 fuel crossover are expected to substantially reduce initial and operating costs of the fuel cell system. How this technology may affect other membrane-based electrochemical devices is also discussed.

Ngo, Phuong Quynh [General Motors, Pontiac, MI (Un↗

GPU-Accelerated Machine Learning Inference as a Service for Computing in Neutrino Experiments

Machine learning algorithms are becoming increasingly prevalent and performant in the reconstruction of events in accelerator-based neutrino experiments. These sophisticated algorithms can be computationally expensive. At the same time, the data volumes of such experiments are rapidly increasing. The demand to process billions of neutrino events with many machine learning algorithm inferences creates a computing challenge. We explore a computing model in which heterogeneous computing with GPU coprocessors is made available as a web service. The coprocessors can be efficiently and elastically deployed to provide the right amount of computing for a given processing task. With our approach, Services for Optimized Network Inference on Coprocessors (SONIC), we integrate GPU acceleration specifically for the ProtoDUNE-SP reconstruction chain without disrupting the native computing workflow. With our integrated framework, we accelerate the most time-consuming task, track and particle shower hit identification, by a factor of 17. This results in a factor of 2.7 reduction in the total processing time when compared with CPU-only production. For this particular task, only 1 GPU is required for every 68 CPU threads, providing a cost-effective solution.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

A Hydro-based MCMC Analysis of SNR 0509–67.5: Revealing the Explosion Properties from Fluid Discontinuities Alone

Using Hubble Space Telescope/ACS Hα images of SNR 0509–67.5 taken ~10 yr apart, we measure the forward shock (FS) proper motions (PMs) at 231 rim locations. The average shock radius and velocity are 3.66 ± 0.036 pc and 6315 ± 310 km s –1 . Hydrodynamic simulations, recast as similarity solutions, provide models for the supernova remnant’s expansion into a uniform ambient medium. These are coupled to a Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) analysis to determine explosion parameters, constrained by the FS measurements. For our baseline model, the MCMC posteriors yield an age of 315.5 ± 1.8 yr, a dynamical explosion center at 5 h 09 m 31. s 16, $-67^\circ 31^{\prime} 17\buildrel{\prime\prime}\over{.} 1$ and ambient medium densities at each azimuth ranging over 3.7–8.0 × 10 –25 g cm –3 . The age uncertainty can be an order of magnitude larger when considering other models, or subsets of the data. We detect stellar PMs corresponding to speeds in the Large Magellanic Cloud ≥ 770 km s –1 . Five stars in the remnant show measurable PMs but none are moving radially from the dynamical center. There are four stars 1."4 from the center, including three faint, previously unidentified ones. Using coronal [Fe XIV ] λ5303 emission as a proxy for the reverse shock location, we constrain the explosion energy (for a compression factor of 4) to a value of E = (1.30 ± 0.41) × 10 51 erg for the first time from shock kinematics alone. Higher compression factors (7 or more) are strongly disfavored based on multiple criteria, arguing for inefficient particle acceleration in the Balmer shocks of SNR 0509–67.5.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

Bridging the Gap Between Modern UX Design and Particle Accelerator Control Room Interfaces

Accelerator control systems often represent relatively complex and safety-sensitive human-machine interfaces within process control industries. These systems are technically robust and reflect the cumulative integration of solutions built and adapted across decades. One of the regular, unfortunate casualties of provisional accelerator control system updates is their human-system interfaces (HSIs) which often lag behind modern usability and design standards. An additional challenge is that although there is a multitude of established human factors (HF), and user experience (UX) principles for everyday digital applications, there are very few (if any) established principles for complex and safety-critical applications for an accelerator. This paper argues for the importance of established HF and UX principles (herein referred to as human-centered design principles) into the development of accelerator HSIs, emphasizing the need for clarity, consistency, responsiveness, and cognitive accessibility. Drawing from HF/UX best practices and human-centered design, this paper discusses how these approaches can enhance operator performance, reduce human error, and improve accelerator personnel collaboration. Case studies from Accelerator Control Operations Research Network (ACORN) at Fermilab are explored to demonstrate how interfaces built with human-centered design principles can scale with system complexity while remaining intuitive and efficient for diverse user roles including operators, machine experts, and engineers. By bridging the gap between traditional control system design and modern human-centered design methods, this paper provides a roadmap for evolving accelerator HSIs into more usable, maintainable, and effective tools.

Hill, Rachael [Idaho Natl. Lab.]↗

UV + Damp Heat Induced Power Losses in Fielded Utility N-Type Si PV Modules

A recent trend in commercial PV modules is a transition to n-type silicon cells, including passivated emitter rear totally diffused (n-PERT), tunnel oxide passivated contact (TOPCon), and silicon heterojunction (SHJ). There is evidence via lab studies that some of these cells are more susceptible to UV induced degradation (UVID), yet there is a lack of confirmation that such degradation occurs in the field. Current IEC standards designed to screen for early module failures require only minimal UV exposure (15 kWh/m2 280-400 nm, ~2-3 months equivalent outdoor exposure). Here, we investigate fielded n-PERT silicon (Si) modules from a commercial utility that show power losses of ~2%/year. We present a comprehensive picture of the physics and chemistry of degradation supported by both module and cell electronic characterization (EL, PL, IV, EQE, and DLIT) and materials-level morphological and chemical analysis (SEM, EDS, XPS, FTIR, and HPLC). All sampled site modules show short circuit current (Isc) and open circuit voltage (Voc) losses when compared to unfielded spares, with the most severely degraded also having losses in fill factor (FF). We identify two different degradation modes contributing to overall power loss: (1) external quantum efficiency (EQE) measurements show losses in the blue range of the spectra, indicative of cell surface recombination losses, and (2) variations in high series resistance (Rs) at the cell level that are correlated with compositional differences in cell metallization. Using unfielded spares, we were able to reproduce Voc, Isc, and EQE losses via a minimum UV stress of 67.5 kWh/m2 (280-400 nm), 4.5x the exposure currently required in IEC 61215-2 (MQT 10). Degradation continued with additional UV dosage equivalent to the fielded modules (405 kWh/m2 total), with power loss leveling out at an average of 6.1%. Subsequent 1000 h of 85% RH/85degrees C damp heat testing showed that cells exposed to UV underwent additional severe series resistance degradation, even those without the susceptible paste composition seen in the field, whereas non-UV exposed cells saw little change. We attribute this to higher concentrations of acetic acid generated on the UV exposed area of the module, leading to degradation of the gridline/cell interface and high Rs. This study is unique in that it reproduces field observed utility scale UVID with an accelerated test and supports the need for standards development for longer UV exposure combined with other stress factors to catch materials interplay within a module package.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

Machine-learning-accelerated multimodal characterization and multiobjective design optimization of natural porous materials

Natural porous materials such as nanoporous clays are used as green and low-cost adsorbents and catalysts. The key factors determining their performance in these applications are the pore morphology and surface activity, which are typically represented by properties such as specific surface area, pore volume, micropore content and pH. The latter may be modified and tuned to specific applications through material processing and/or chemical treatment. Characterization of the material, raw or processed, is typically performed experimentally, which can become costly especially in the context of tuning of the properties towards specific application requirements and needing numerous experiments. In this work, we present an application of tree-based machine learning methods trained on experimental datasets to accelerate the characterization of natural porous materials. The resulting models allow reliable prediction of the outcomes of experimental characterization of processed materials (R2 from 0.78 to 0.99) as well as identification of key factors contributing to those properties through feature importance analysis. Furthermore, the high throughput of the models enables exploration of processing parameter–property correlations and multiobjective optimization of prototype materials towards specific applications. We have applied these methodologies to pinpoint and rationalize optimal processing conditions for clays exploitable in acid catalysis. One of such identified materials was synthesized and tested revealing appreciable acid character improvement with respect to the pristine material. Specifically, it achieved 79% removal of chlorophyll-a in acid catalyzed degradation.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

A Comprehensive Analysis of Real-World Accelerometer Data Quality in a Global Smartphone-based Seismic Network

The proliferation of low-cost sensors in smartphones has facilitated numerous applications; however, large-scale deployments often encounter performance issues. Sensing heterogeneity, which refers to varying data quality due to factors such as device differences and user behaviors, presents a significant challenge. In this research, we perform an extensive analysis of 3-axis accelerometer data from the MyShake system, a global seismic network utilizing smartphones. We systematically evaluate the quality of approximately 22 million 3-axis acceleration waveforms from over 81 thousand smartphone devices worldwide, using metrics that represent sampling rate and noise level. We explore a broad range of factors influencing accelerometer data quality, including smartphone and accelerometer manufacturers, phone specifications (release year, RAM, battery), geolocation, and time. Our findings indicate that multiple factors affect data quality, with accelerometer model and smartphone specifications being the most critical. In addition, we examine the influence of data quality on earthquake parameter estimation and show that removing low-quality accelerometer data enhances the accuracy of earthquake magnitude estimation.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗

Traveling wakefield tube: THz source powered by nonrelativistic electron beam

High peak power, tunable, narrowband terahertz emitters are becoming sought after given their portability, efficiency, and ability to be deployed in the field for industrial, medical, and military applications. The use of accelerator systems producing THz frequencies via Cherenkov radiation, generated by passing an electron beam through a slow-wave wakefield structure, is a promising method to meet future THz requirements. To date, efforts have been dedicated to analysis and design of sources utilizing laser seeded bunched electron beam drivers with relativistic energies beyond 5 MeV. Presented here is a wakefield THz generation scheme based on passing a long quasi-dc nonrelativistic beam (200 keV) through a dielectric loaded travelling wave structure. Reduced energy allows for compactness and portability of the accelerator as the size and weight of the dielectric slow wave structure is vanishingly small compared to the accelerator unit. The presented scheme can serve as a tunable high peak power THz source operated between 0.4-1.6 THz and produces power gain by a factor of five with an average efficiency of 6.8%

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗

The effect of reducing dietary lipid and food availability on precocious male maturation in Chinook Salmon: A production-scale hatchery experiment

Abstract Objective Age of maturation in Chinook Salmon Oncorhynchus tshawytscha is phenotypically plastic, influenced by both genotype and environmental factors, including the availability and composition of the diet. Salmon hatchery programs often rear fish under accelerated growth regimes using high-lipid diets that can result in earlier age at maturity, including increased prevalence of age-2 males (minijacks). The goal of this investigation was to compare alternative dietary regimes to mitigate for this shift in age at maturity in hatchery-reared Umatilla River fall Chinook Salmon. Methods Juvenile fish were reared at Bonneville Hatchery, Oregon, under four dietary treatments across four replicate brood years. Dietary treatments included two feeding frequencies (standard [fed 7 days/week] and reduced [fed 4 days/week]) and two dietary lipid levels (standard [18%] and reduced [12%]) in a 2 × 2 factorial design. Dietary treatments were applied for approximately 9 months, beginning in March (a month after fry emergence) and lasting until December of the first year, after which all fish were reared on the standard feeding regime (7 days–18%) until the time of release the following spring as yearlings. Result We observed significant interannual variation in the proportion of minijacks produced among dietary treatments. For all brood years, decreasing the feeding frequency from 7 to 4 days/week reduced the proportion minijacks by 35.9%, and lowering dietary lipid from 18% to 12% reduced the proportion minijacks by 30%. The combined effects of reducing the feeding frequency and lowering dietary lipid were additive, reducing the proportion minijacks by 65.5% compared to the standard rearing regime. Growth and energetic indices were monitored throughout and confirmed findings from previous laboratory-based studies indicating that physiological status 10–12 months prior to spawn timing is important for the “decision” to mature. Conclusion Results of this investigation provide useful insights for optimizing rearing regimes for the Umatilla River program and other Chinook Salmon hatchery programs.

Harstad, Deborah L. (ORCID:0000000202676085)↗

Reflections on bubble walls

We discuss the dynamics of expanding bubble walls in the presence of massive dark photons whose mass changes as they cross the wall. For sufficiently thin walls, we show that there exists a transient kinematic regime characterized by a constant reflection probability of longitudinal — but not transverse — modes. This effect can have important implications for the dynamics of expanding vacuum bubbles in the early Universe. Most notably, it leads to a new source of pressure on the expanding interface, featuring a non-monotonic dependence on the γ-factor of the bubble walls and reaching a peak at intermediate γ-factors that we dub Maximum Dynamic Pressure. When this pressure is large enough to halt the acceleration of the bubble walls, the difference in vacuum energy densities goes into making a fraction of the dark photons relativistic, turning them into dark radiation. If the dark radiation remains relativistic until late times, an observable contribution to ΔNeff is possible for phase transitions with strength α ~ 10 -2 - 10 -1 .

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

ESnet/JLab FPGA Accelerated Transport

To increase the science rate for high data rates/volumes, Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility (JLab) has partnered with Energy Sciences Network (ESnet) to define an edge to data center traffic shaping / steering transport capability featuring data event aware network shaping and forwarding. The keystone of this ESnet+JLab FPGA Accelerated Transport (EJFAT) is the joint development of an AI/ML directed dynamic compute work Load Balancer (LB) of UDP streamed data. The LB is a suite consisting of a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) executing the dynamically configurable, low fixed latency LB data plane featuring real-time packet redirection and high throughput, and a control plane running on the FPGA host computer that monitors network and compute farm telemetry in order to make dynamic AI/ML guided decisions for destination compute host redirection/load balancing and destination resource provisioning. The LB provides for three-tier horizontal scaling across LB suites, core compute hosts, and CPUs within a host. The LB effectively provides seamless integration of edge/core computing to support direct experimental data processing for immediate use by JLab science programs and others such as the EIC as well as data centers of the future requiring high throughput and low latency for both hot and cooled data for both running experiment data acquisition systems and data center use cases.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

Enhancing CO 2 Mineralization Rate and Extent of Iron and Steel Slag via Grinding

Roughly 10% of the CO 2 emissions from iron and steel making are attributable to the direct release of CO 2 from the thermal decomposition of carbonates to produce flux, mainly CaO, used for impurity removal. Notably, these direct emissions remain even if carbon-based steelmaking is replaced by hydrogen-based steelmaking. After removing impurities from the molten metal, this flux becomes the solid waste product called ‘slag’, a primarily Ca-silicate material. The transformation of slag back into carbonates is thermodynamically spontaneous with negative ΔG in the ambient environment, meaning that ~10% of the CO 2 emissions from iron and steel making could be negated if equipment and methods were developed to support CO 2 mineralization. However, the rate of CO 2 mineralization using slag is slowed by several environmental, geometric, and processing factors. We leverage an experimentally verified model of CO 2 mineralization to determine how to efficiently accelerate the process. Increasing the crystallinity of slag, increasing the relative humidity, and reducing the grain size of slag particles provide the greatest increase in CO 2 mineralization rate at the lowest energy penalty. Increasing the concentration of CO 2 and the temperature provide only modest increases in the CO 2 mineralization rate while incurring a substantial energy penalty. For steelmaking slags, CO 2 mineralization represents low-hanging fruit as the current reuse pathways are low value. For ironmaking slag, replacing the production of amorphous slag for the cement industry with the production of crystalline slag for CO 2 mineralization becomes financially preferable when a carbon price/tax exceeds 67.40 USD/t-CO 2 .

42 ENGINEERING↗

Lepton–Nucleus Interactions within Microscopic Approaches

This review paper emphasizes the significance of microscopic calculations with quantified theoretical error estimates in studying lepton–nucleus interactions and their implications for electron scattering and accelerator neutrino oscillation measurements. We investigate two approaches: Green’s Function Monte Carlo and the extended factorization scheme, utilizing realistic nuclear target spectral functions. In our study, we include relativistic effects in Green’s Function Monte Carlo and validate the inclusive electron scattering cross section on carbon using available data. We compare the flux-folded cross sections for neutrino-carbon scattering with T2K and MINER$v$ A experiments, noting the substantial impact of relativistic effects in reducing the theoretical curve strength when compared to MINER$v$ A data. Additionally, we demonstrate that quantum Monte Carlo-based spectral functions accurately reproduce the quasi-elastic region in electron scattering data and T2K flux-folded cross sections. By comparing results from Green’s Function Monte Carlo and the spectral function approach, which share a similar initial target state description, we quantify errors associated with approximations in the factorization scheme and the relativistic treatment of kinematics in Green’s Function Monte Carlo.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

Emission-line Data Cubes of the HH 32 Stellar Jet

We analyze data cubes of over 60 emission lines in the HH 32 stellar jet acquired with the Keck Cosmic Web Imager (KCWI). The data cover the less explored blue portion of the spectrum between 3586 and 6351 Å and have both high spectral (R ∼ 10,000) and spatial (≲1″) resolution. The study includes all three major ionization states of oxygen, three Balmer lines, multiple lines of Fe ii and Fe iii, and the first data cubes ever acquired for important unblended diagnostic lines such as He ii λ4686, Ca i λ3933, and Mg i] λ4571. The data cubes generally sort according to excitation and have a relatively continuous progression from the highest-excitation ions (He ii, O iii) through the intermediate-excitation ions (O i and H i) to the lowest-excitation ions (Ca ii and Mg i). Merging the KCWI cubes with Hubble Space Telescope images leads to several new insights about the flow, including evidence for bow shocks, partial bow shocks, spur shocks, Mach disks, jet deflection shocks, a wiggling jet, and potential shock precursors. The most surprising result is that one of the velocity components of Fe ii in the Mach disk suddenly increases in flux relative to other lines by a factor of two, implying that the Mach disk vaporizes dust in the jet. Hence, jets must accelerate or entrain dust to speeds of over 300 km s{sup −1} without destroying the grains.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗