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At least 739 records · Page 41

Integrating decontamination strategies into a waste estimation support tool for radiological incidents - 15284

In the planning and preparedness stages for a response to a radiological incident, it is important to include waste management considerations when developing the decontamination/demolition/cleanup approach because waste management can be a driver for time and cost. An individualized type of strategy based on the occupancy of affected buildings may be an effective approach. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA's) Waste Estimation Support Tool (WEST) is a novel application of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Hazus-MH software. WEST enables users to estimate the characteristics, amount, and residual radioactivity of waste generated from remediation and cleanup activities after a radiological incident, including incidents caused by radiological dispersal devices and improvised nuclear devices, as well as nuclear power plant accidents. This paper will describe the recently released update to WEST, which includes the ability to export the waste estimate results back into ArcGIS for further visualization. (authors)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗

SU-F-19A-09: Propagation of Organ at Risk Contours for High Dose Rate Brachytherapy Planning for Cervical Cancer: A Deformable Image Registration Comparison

Purpose: To compare the performance of two deformable image registration (DIR) algorithms for contour propagation and to evaluate the accuracy of DIR for use with high dose rate (HDR) brachytherapy planning for cervical cancer. Methods: Five patients undergoing HDR ring and tandem brachytherapy were included in this retrospective study. All patients underwent CT simulation and replanning prior to each fraction (3–5 fractions total). CT-to-CT DIR was performed using two commercially available software platforms: SmartAdapt, Varian Medical Systems (Demons) and Velocity AI, Velocity Medical Solutions (B-spline). Fraction 1 contours were deformed and propagated to each subsequent image set and compared to contours manually drawn by an expert clinician. Dice similarity coefficients (DSC), defined as, DSC(A,B)=2(AandB)/(A+B) were calculated to quantify spatial overlap between manual (A) and deformed (B) contours. Additionally, clinician-assigned visual scores were used to describe and compare the performance of each DIR method and ultimately evaluate which was more clinically acceptable. Scoring was based on a 1–5 scale—with 1 meaning, “clinically acceptable with no contour changes” and 5 meaning, “clinically unacceptable”. Results: Statistically significant differences were not observed between the two DIR algorithms. The average DSC for the bladder, rectum and rectosigmoid were 0.82±0.08, 0.67±0.13 and 0.48±0.18, respectively. The poorest contour agreement was observed for the rectosigmoid due to limited soft tissue contrast and drastic anatomical changes, i.e., organ shape/filling. Two clinicians gave nearly equivalent average scores of 2.75±0.91 for SmartAdapt and 2.75±0.94 for Velocity AI—indicating that for a majority of the cases, more than one of the three contours evaluated required major modifications. Conclusion: Limitations of both DIR algorithms resulted in inaccuracies in contour propagation in the pelvic region, thus hampering the clinical utility of this technology. Further work is required to optimize these algorithms and take advantage of the potential of DIR for HDR brachytherapy planning.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗

Clinical introduction of image lag correction for a cone beam CT system

Purpose: Image lag in the flat-panel detector used for Linac integrated cone beam computed tomography (CBCT) has a degrading effect on CBCT image quality. The most prominent visible artifact is the presence of bright semicircular structure in the transverse view of the scans, known also as radar artifact. Several correction strategies have been proposed, but until now the clinical introduction of such corrections remains unreported. In November 2013, the authors have clinically implemented a previously proposed image lag correction on all of their machines at their main site in Amsterdam. The purpose of this study was to retrospectively evaluate the effect of the correction on the quality of CBCT images and evaluate the required calibration frequency. Methods: Image lag was measured in five clinical CBCT systems (Elekta Synergy 4.6) using an in-house developed beam interrupting device that stops the x-ray beam midway through the data acquisition of an unattenuated beam for calibration. A triple exponential falling edge response was fitted to the measured data and used to correct image lag from projection images with an infinite response. This filter, including an extrapolation for saturated pixels, was incorporated in the authors’ in-house developed clinical CBCT reconstruction software. To investigate the short-term stability of the lag and associated parameters, a series of five image lag measurement over a period of three months was performed. For quantitative analysis, the authors have retrospectively selected ten patients treated in the pelvic region. The apparent contrast was quantified in polar coordinates for scans reconstructed using the parameters obtained from different dates with and without saturation handling. Results: Visually, the radar artifact was minimal in scans reconstructed using image lag correction especially when saturation handling was used. In patient imaging, there was a significant reduction of the apparent contrast from 43 ± 16.7 to 15.5 ± 11.9 HU without the saturation handling and to 9.6 ± 12.1 HU with the saturation handling, depending on the date of the calibration. The image lag correction parameters were stable over a period of 3 months. The computational load was increased by approximately 10%, not endangering the fast in-line reconstruction. Conclusions: The lag correction was successfully implemented clinically and removed most image lag artifacts thus improving the image quality. Image lag correction parameters were stable for 3 months indicating low frequency of calibration requirements.

61 RADIATION PROTECTION AND DOSIMETRY↗

Renewable Energy Atlas of the United States

The Renewable Energy Atlas (Atlas) of the United States is a compilation of geospatial data focused on renewable energy resources, federal land ownership, and base map reference information. This report explains how to add the Atlas to your computer and install the associated software. The report also includes: A description of each of the components of the Atlas; Lists of the Geographic Information System (GIS) database content and sources; and A brief introduction to the major renewable energy technologies. The Atlas includes the following: A GIS database organized as a set of Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI) ArcGIS Personal GeoDatabases, and ESRI ArcReader and ArcGIS project files providing an interactive map visualization and analysis interface.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗

A Simple Evacuation Modeling and Simulation Tool for First Responders

Although modeling and simulation of mass evacuations during a natural or man-made disaster is an on-going and vigorous area of study, tool adoption by front-line first responders is uneven. Some of the factors that account for this situation include cost and complexity of the software. For several years, Oak Ridge National Laboratory has been actively developing the free Incident Management Preparedness and Coordination Toolkit (IMPACT) to address these issues. One of the components of IMPACT is a multi-agent simulation module for area-based and path-based evacuations. The user interface is designed so that anyone familiar with typical computer drawing tools can quickly author a geospatially-correct evacuation visualization suitable for table-top exercises. Since IMPACT is designed for use in the field where network communications may not be available, quick on-site evacuation alternatives can be evaluated to keep pace with a fluid threat situation. Realism is enhanced by incorporating collision avoidance into the simulation. Statistics are gathered as the simulation unfolds, including most importantly time-to-evacuate, to help first responders choose the best course of action.

data fusion↗

R and DE Robotic Sensor Intern Team: Remote 3D Mapping Sensor Suite

The primary goal of the sensor suite is to provide an internal 3D map of the HCAEX tunnel. When looking for a sensor that would provide XYZ point cloud data for mapping the decision was between a stereo camera, a 3D Lidar, or a 2D Lidar that would need to be spun around. The issues with the stereo camera were that it does not have a large field-of-view and that its depth information was not nearly as accurate as even the baseline Lidars. The selection between Lidars is detailed. The Hokuyo UTM-30LX-EW shown provides a 270 deg. FOV with high accuracy and resolution while the largest FOV on a 3D Lidar is 40 deg.. This was the reason a 2D Lidar was chosen over the 3D Lidar. Even though the 2D Lidar requires additional components and software to generate a 3D map, its FOV advantage is too great given that the HCAEX tunnel is a relatively confined space. The rotating planar scan from the 2D Lidar can be stitched into a 3D scan as shown in the graphic below. Along with XYZ data, the Lidar provides return intensity data in color which can be used to distinguish between different materials within the tunnel. To provide visual feedback a camera system needed to be identified. The common solution for this is a high resolution camera with a small FOV mounted on a pan-tilt system. But, given the critical nature of the visual feedback we looked into solutions without the need for moving parts. Two panospheric cameras give a FOV large enough to get a full 360 deg. view.. Camera color data (RGB) can also be combined with the 3D mapping data from the Lidar and overlaid on the map to give the user the ability to see inside the entire length of the tunnel as if they were inside. Situational awareness is required for the crawler in the tunnel in order for it to be able to register the 3D scans to create a final map. For this we procured a Microstrain 3DM-GX5-25 Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU). To perform the Lidar rotation we have two servos driving the pan and tilt. The servo controls and most data processing will be performed via an onboard computer. The sensor components are to be packaged together using 3D printed mounts into a standalone unit.

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗

Louisiana Immersive Technologies Enterprise (LITE): Enabling Coastal Stewardship and Reliable Energy

This project will focus on research and application development in the area of large scale data computing and visualization that are critical to the DoE BER program areas of climate change research, environmental sciences, life sciences, and medical sciences. Most commercial applications available today are unable to handle the sizes of data in these domains, usually in the order of terabytes and petabytes. This project will address this problem, by taking advantage of the advanced scientific computing infrastructure of the LITE and LONI to conduct research and develop software applications that run natively on these 64-bit supercomputing platforms. The project is consistent with the goals of Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing (SciDAC), a DoE initiative.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

ADVANCED SIMULATION CAPABILITY FOR ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT – CURRENT STATUS AND PHASE II DEMONSTRATION RESULTS

The U.S. Department of Energy (USDOE) Office of Environmental Management (EM), Office of Soil and Groundwater, is supporting development of the Advanced Simulation Capability for Environmental Management (ASCEM). ASCEM is a state-of-the-art scientific tool and approach for understanding and predicting contaminant fate and transport in natural and engineered systems. The modular and open source high-performance computing tool facilitates integrated approaches to modeling and site characterization that enable robust and standardized assessments of performance and risk for EM cleanup and closure activities. The ASCEM project continues to make significant progress in development of computer software capabilities with an emphasis on integration of capabilities in FY12. Capability development is occurring for both the Platform and Integrated Toolsets and High-Performance Computing (HPC) Multiprocess Simulator. The Platform capabilities provide the user interface and tools for end-to-end model development, starting with definition of the conceptual model, management of data for model input, model calibration and uncertainty analysis, and processing of model output, including visualization. The HPC capabilities target increased functionality of process model representations, toolsets for interaction with Platform, and verification and model confidence testing. The Platform and HPC capabilities are being tested and evaluated for EM applications in a set of demonstrations as part of Site Applications Thrust Area activities. The Phase I demonstration focusing on individual capabilities of the initial toolsets was completed in 2010. The Phase II demonstration completed in 2012 focused on showcasing integrated ASCEM capabilities. For Phase II, the Hanford Site deep vadose zone (BC Cribs) served as an application site for an end-to-end demonstration of capabilities, with emphasis on integration and linkages between the Platform and HPC components. Other demonstrations, addressing attenuation-based remedies at the Savannah River Site F Area and performance assessment for a representative waste tank, illustrate integration of linked ASCEM capabilities and initial integration efforts with tools from the Cementitious Barriers Partnership.

DOE Environmental Management, advanced simulation,↗

SU-E-T-300: Spatial Variations of Multiple Off-Axial Targets for a Single Isocenter SRS Treatment Plan in ExacTrac 6D Robotic Couch System

Purpose: To evaluate the spatial variations of multiple off-axial targets for a single isocenter stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) treatment plan in ExacTrac 6D robotic couch system (BrainLab AG). Methods: Five metallic ball bearing (BB) markers were placed sparsely in 3D off-axial locations (non-coplanar) inside a skull phantom as the representatives of multiple targets mimicking multiple brain metastases. The locations of the BB markers were carefully chosen to minimize overlapping of each other in a port imaging detector plane. The skull phantom was immobilized by a frameless mask and CT scanned with a BrainLab Head and Neck Localizer using a GE Optima MDCT scanner. The CT images were exported to iPlan software (BrainLab AG) and a multiple target PTV was drawn by combining all the contours of the BBs. The margin of the MLC opening was selected as 3 mm expansion outward. Two coplanar arc beams were placed to generate a single isocenter SRS plan to treat the PTV. The arc beams were delivered using Novalis Tx system with portal imaging acquisition mode per 10% temporal resolution. The locations of the BBs were visualized and analyzed with respect to the MLC aperture in the treatment plan similar to the Winston-Lutz test. Results: All the BBs were clearly identified inside the MLC openings. The positional errors for the BBs were overall less than 1 mm along the rotational path of the two arcs. Conclusion: This study verified that the spatial deviations of multiple off-axial targets for a single isocenter SRS treatment plan is within sub-millimeter range in ExacTrac 6D robotic couch system. Accompanied with the Winston-Lutz test, this test will quality-assure the spatial accuracies of the isocenter as well as the positions of multiple off-axial targets for the SRS treatment using a single isocenter multiple target treatment plan.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗

Integrated multi-wavelength microscope combining TIRFM and IRM modalities for imaging cellulases and other processive enzymes

We describe a multimodal microscope for visualizing processive enzymes moving on immobilized substrates. The instrument combines interference reflection microscopy (IRM) with multi-wavelength total internal reflectance fluorescence microscopy (TIRFM). The microscope can localize quantum dots with a precision of 2.8 nm at 100 frames/s, and was used to image the dynamics of the cellulase, Cel7a interacting with surface-immobilized cellulose. The instrument, which was built with off-the-shelf components and is controlled by custom software, is suitable for tracking other degradative enzymes such as collagenases, as well as motor proteins moving along immobilized tracks.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗

PixelStorm: A Remote Display for Remote Sensing Ground Stations

PixelStorm is a software application for displaying native high-performance applications from remote cloud environments. It is tailored for remote sensing missions that require high framerates, high resolutions, and minimal loss of quality. PixelStorm utilizes hardware-accelerated video compression on graphics processing units and a Sandia-developed streaming network protocol. Using our architecture, we can demonstrate interactive native applications running across two 4K monitors at 60 frames per second while maintaining the visual fidelity required by our missions. This technology allows for the migration of mission critical desktop applications to cloud environments.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

Uncovering I/O demands on HPC platforms: Peeking under the hood of Santos Dumont

High-Performance Computing (HPC) platforms are required to solve the most diverse large-scale scientific problems in various research areas, such as biology, chemistry, physics, and health sciences. Researchers use a multitude of scientific softwares, which have different requirements. These include input and output operations, which directly impact performance due to the existing difference in processing and data access speeds. Thus, supercomputers must efficiently handle mixed workload when storing data from the applications. Understanding the set of applications and their performance running in a supercomputer is paramount to understanding the storage system's usage, pinpointing possible bottlenecks, and guiding optimization techniques. This research proposes a methodology and visualization tool to evaluate a supercomputer's data storage infrastructure's performance, taking into account the diverse workload and demands of the system over a long period of operation. As a study case, we focus on the Santos Dumont supercomputer, identifying inefficient usage, problematic performance factors, and providing guidelines on how to tackle those issues.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

Development of output user interface software to support analysis

Data processing software packages such as VSOP and MCNPX are softwares that has been scientifically proven and complete. The result of VSOP and MCNPX are huge and complex text files. In the analyze process, user need additional processing like Microsoft Excel to show informative result. This research develop an user interface software for output of VSOP and MCNPX. VSOP program output is used to support neutronic analysis and MCNPX program output is used to support burn-up analysis. Software development using iterative development methods which allow for revision and addition of features according to user needs. Processing time with this software 500 times faster than with conventional methods using Microsoft Excel. PYTHON is used as a programming language, because Python is available for all major operating systems: Windows, Linux/Unix, OS/2, Mac, Amiga, among others. Values that support neutronic analysis are k-eff, burn-up and mass Pu{sup 239} and Pu{sup 241}. Burn-up analysis used the mass inventory values of actinide (Thorium, Plutonium, Neptunium and Uranium). Values are visualized in graphical shape to support analysis.

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗

TU-CD-BRA-11: Application of Bone Suppression Technique to Inspiratory/expiratory Chest Radiography

Purpose: The bone suppression technique based on advanced image processing can suppress the conspicuity of bones on chest radiographs, creating soft tissue images normally obtained by the dual-energy subtraction technique. This study was performed to investigate the usefulness of bone suppression technique in quantitative analysis of pulmonary function in inspiratory/expiratory chest radiography. Methods: Commercial bone suppression image processing software (ClearRead; Riverain Technologies) was applied to paired inspiratory/expiratory chest radiographs of 107 patients (normal, 33; abnormal, 74) to create corresponding bone suppression images. The abnormal subjects had been diagnosed with pulmonary diseases, such as pneumothorax, pneumonia, emphysema, asthma, and lung cancer. After recognition of the lung area, the vectors of respiratory displacement were measured in all local lung areas using a cross-correlation technique. The measured displacement in each area was visualized as displacement color maps. The distribution pattern of respiratory displacement was assessed by comparison with the findings of lung scintigraphy. Results: Respiratory displacement of pulmonary markings (soft tissues) was able to be quantified separately from the rib movements on bone suppression images. The resulting displacement map showed a left-right symmetric distribution increasing from the lung apex to the bottom region of the lung in many cases. However, patients with ventilatory impairments showed a nonuniform distribution caused by decreased displacement of pulmonary markings, which were confirmed to correspond to area with ventilatory impairments found on the lung scintigrams. Conclusion: The bone suppression technique was useful for quantitative analysis of respiratory displacement of pulmonary markings without any interruption of the rib shadows. Abnormal areas could be detected as decreased displacement of pulmonary markings. Inspiratory/expiratory chest radiography combined with the bone suppression technique has potential for predicting local lung function on the basis of dynamic analysis of pulmonary markings. This work was partially supported by Nakatani Foundation, Grant-in-aid for Scientific Research (C) of Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, JAPAN (Grant number : 24601007), and Nakatani Foundation, Mitsubishi Foundation, and the he Mitani Foundation for Research and Development. Yasushi Kishitani is a staff of TOYO corporation.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗

FTP 100: An Ultra-High Speed Data Transfer Service Over Next Generation 100 Gigabit Per Second Network

Data-intensive applications, including high energy and nuclear physics, astrophysics, climate modeling, nano-scale materials science, genomics, and financing, are expected to generate exabytes of data over the coming years, which must be transferred, visualized, and analyzed by geographically distributed teams of users. High-performance network capabilities must be available to these users at the application level in a transparent, virtualized manner. Moreover, the application users must have the capability to move large datasets from local and remote locations across network environments to their home institutions. To solve these challenges, the main goal of our project is to design and evaluate high-performance data transfer software to support various data-intensive applications. First, we have designed a middleware software that provides access to Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA) functionalities. This middleware integrates network access, memory management and multitasking in its core design. We address a number of issues related to its efficient implementation, for instance, explicit buffer management and memory registration, and parallelization of RDMA operations, which are vital to delivering the benefit of RDMA to the applications. Built on top of this middleware, an implementation and experimental evaluation of the RDMA-based FTP software, RFTP, is described and evaluated. This application has been implemented by our team to exploit the full capabilities of advanced RDMA mechanisms for ultra-high speed bulk data transfer applications on Energy Sciences Network (ESnet). Second, we designed our data transfer software to optimize TCP/IP based data transfer performance such that RFTP can be fully compatible with today’s Internet. Our kernel optimization techniques with Linux system calls sendfile and splice, can reduce data copy cost. In this report, we summarize the technical challenges of our project, the primary software design methods, the major project milestones achieved, as well as the testbed evaluation work and demonstrations during our project life time.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

PyFLEXTRKR: a flexible feature tracking Python software for convective cloud analysis

Abstract. This paper describes the new open-source framework PyFLEXTRKR (Python FLEXible object TRacKeR), a flexible atmospheric feature tracking software package with specific capabilities to track convective clouds from a variety of observations and model simulations. This software can track any atmospheric 2D objects and handle merging and splitting explicitly. The package has a collection of multi-object identification algorithms, scalable parallelization options, and has been optimized for large datasets including global high-resolution data. We demonstrate applications of PyFLEXTRKR on tracking individual deep convective cells and mesoscale convective systems from observations and model simulations ranging from large-eddy resolving (∼100s m) to mesoscale (∼10s km) resolutions. Visualization, post-processing, and statistical analysis tools are included in the package. New Lagrangian analyses of convective clouds produced by PyFLEXTRKR applicable to a wide range of datasets and scales facilitate advanced model evaluation and development efforts as well as scientific discovery.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

Human Factors Design for Particle Accelerator Control Room Interfaces

Fermilab, the birthplace of many scientific discoveries in physics and particle accelerator sciences, is in the midst of a widescale modernization effort. The Accelerator Control Operations Research Network (ACORN project’s goal is to modernize the accelerator control system by replacing end-of-life power supplies and enhance future operations of the Fermilab accelerator complex with megawatt particle beams. Within ACORN, opportunities for process improvement concerning software development, human-system interface design, and task performance are also being considered. Human factors researchers from Idaho National Laboratory in collaboration with usability experts from Fermilab, are currently investigating human-centered design improvements for the accelerator control system. For example, substantial tribal knowledge and memory recall are required to effectively operate the accelerator system. This contributes to high cognitive workload and potential burnout of accelerator operators. Developing guidance for consistent visual and functional design enables a more intuitive interaction and relieves operators of cognitive burden. Additionally, developing more intuitive and integrated interfaces can also lead to improved accelerator efficacy by empowering operators with greater understanding and control of the systems. The challenge in developing such interfaces is in designing for a wide variety of user goals, system specifications, and level of experience in users. The challenges need to be met while e also considering the maintainability of the control system. The purpose of this paper is to detail the human factors process and design within the ACORN project, describe results gathered thus far, and discuss the larger implications for this work.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗