Patents Assigned to The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development Administration
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Patent number: 4044457Abstract: An improvement in the method for preparing composite rods of superconducting alloy and normal metal from which multifilament composite superconducting wire is fabricated by bending longitudinally a strip of normal metal around a rod of superconductor alloy and welding the edges to form the composite rod. After the rods have preferably been provided with a hexagonal cross-sectional shape, a plurality of the rods are stacked into a normal metal extrusion can, sealed and worked to reduce the cross-sectional size and form multifilament wire. Diffusion barriers and high-electrical resistance barriers can easily be introduced into the wire by plating or otherwise coating the faces of the normal metal strip with appropriate materials.Type: GrantFiled: April 1, 1976Date of Patent: August 30, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventors: Bruce P. Strauss, Paul J. Reardon, Robert H. Remsbottom
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Patent number: 4044819Abstract: Method and apparatus for the use of hydrides to exhaust heat from one temperature source and deliver the thermal energy extracted for use at a higher temperature, thereby acting as a heat pump. For this purpose there are employed a pair of hydridable metal compounds having different characteristics working together in a closed pressure system employing a high temperature source to upgrade the heat supplied from a low temperature source.Type: GrantFiled: February 12, 1976Date of Patent: August 30, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventor: James G. Cottingham
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Patent number: 4044752Abstract: A device is provided for turning a solar collector about an east-west horizontal axis so that the collector is tilted toward the sun as the EWV altitude of the sun varies each day. It includes one or more heat responsive elements and a shading means aligned so that within a range of EWV altitudes of the sun during daylight hours the shading means shades the element or elements while during the rest of the daylight hours the elements or elements are heated by the sun to assume heated, stable states. Mechanical linkage between the collector and the element is responsive to the states of the element or elements to tilt the collector in accordance with variations in the EWV altitude of the sun.Type: GrantFiled: August 1, 1975Date of Patent: August 30, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventor: Amitzur Z. Barak
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Patent number: 4045673Abstract: Alpha emitters for low-level radiochemical analysis by measurement of alpha spectra are positioned precisely with respect to the location of a surface-barrier detector by means of a chamber having a removable threaded planchet holder. A pedestal on the planchet holder holds a specimen in fixed engagement close to the detector. Insertion of the planchet holder establishes an O-ring seal that permits the chamber to be pumped to a desired vacuum. The detector is protected against accidental contact and resulting damage.Type: GrantFiled: May 12, 1976Date of Patent: August 30, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventor: Robert P. Larsen
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Patent number: 4043890Abstract: This invention provides a CO equilibrium in a device for measuring the total concentration of oxygen impurities in a fluid stream. To this end, the CO equilibrium is produced in an electrochemical measuring cell by the interaction of a carbon element in the cell with the chemically combined and uncombined oxygen in the fluid stream at an elevated temperature.Type: GrantFiled: June 14, 1976Date of Patent: August 23, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventors: Hugh S. Isaacs, Anthony J. Romano
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Patent number: 4043671Abstract: An electronic circuit is provided which may be used to preset a digital display unit of a Zeeman-effect layer interferometer system which derives distance measurements by comparing a reference signal to a Doppler signal generated at the output of the interferometer laser head. The circuit presets dimensional offsets in the interferometer digital display by electronically inducing a variation in either the Doppler signal or the reference signal, depending upon the direction of the offset, to achieve the desired display preset.Type: GrantFiled: July 13, 1976Date of Patent: August 23, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventor: William L. Goodwin
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Patent number: 4043936Abstract: Biological denitrification of nitrate solutions at concentrations of greater than one kilogram nitrate per cubic meter is accomplished anaerobically in an upflow column having as a packing material a support for denitrifying bacteria.Type: GrantFiled: February 24, 1976Date of Patent: August 23, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventors: Chester W. Francis, Frank S. Brinkley
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Patent number: 4043192Abstract: Directional permeability measurements are provided in a subterranean earth formation by injecting a high-pressure gas from a wellbore into the earth formation in various azimuthal directions with the direction having the largest pressure drop being indicative of the maximum permeability direction. These measurements are provided by employing an inflatable boot containing a plurality of conduits in registry with a like plurality of apertures penetrating the housing at circumferentially spaced-apart locations. These conduits are, in turn, coupled through a valved manifold to a source of pressurized gas so that the high-pressure gas may be selectively directed through any conduit into the earth formation defining the bore with the resulting difference in the pressure drop through the various conduits providing the permeability measurements.Type: GrantFiled: June 8, 1976Date of Patent: August 23, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventor: Lowell Z. Shuck
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Patent number: 4042876Abstract: A proximity detection system for non-contact displacement and proximity measurement of static or dynamic metallic or conductive surfaces is provided wherein the measurement is obtained by monitoring the change in impedance of a flat, generally spiral-wound, printed circuit coil which is excited by a constant current, constant frequency source. The change in impedance, which is detected as a corresponding change in voltage across the coil, is related to the eddy current losses in the distant conductive material target. The arrangement provides for considerable linear displacement range with increased accuracies, stability, and sensitivity over the entire range.Type: GrantFiled: April 29, 1976Date of Patent: August 16, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventor: Armando J. Visioli, Jr.
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Patent number: 4040903Abstract: A thermionic device for converting nuclear energy into electrical energy comprising a tubular anode spaced from and surrounding a cylindrical cathode, the cathode having an outer emitting surface of ruthenium, and nuclear fuel on the inner cylindrical surface. The nuclear fuel is a ceramic composition of fissionable material in a metal matrix. An axial void is provided to collect and contain fission product gases.Type: GrantFiled: September 3, 1974Date of Patent: August 9, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventor: James E. Monroe, Jr.
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Patent number: 4040801Abstract: This invention relates to an improved method and system for making relatively large and rapid adjustments in the process gas inventory of an electrically powered gaseous diffusion cascade in order to accommodate scheduled changes in the electrical power available for cascade operation. In the preferred form of the invention, the cascade is readied for a decrease in electrical input by simultaneously withdrawing substreams of the cascade B stream into respective process-gas-freezing and storage zones while decreasing the datum-pressure inputs to the positioning systems for the cascade control valves in proportion to the weight of process gas so removed. Consequently, the control valve positions are substantially unchanged by the reduction in invention, and there is minimal disturbance of the cascade isotopic gradient.Type: GrantFiled: June 14, 1976Date of Patent: August 9, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventors: Robert H. Dyer, Andrew H. Fowler, Paul R. Vanstrum
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Patent number: 4039378Abstract: A nuclear reactor fuel alloy consists essentially of from slightly greater than 7 to about 4 w/o zirconium, balance plutonium, and is characterized in that the alloy is castable and is rollable to thin foils. A preferred embodiment of about 7 w/o zirconium, balance plutonium, has a melting point substantially above the melting point of plutonium, is rollable to foils as thin as 0.0005 inch thick, and is compatible with cladding material when repeatedly cycled to temperatures above 650.degree. C. Neutron flux densities across a reactor core can be determined with a high-temperature activation-measurement foil which consists of a fuel alloy foil core sandwiched and sealed between two cladding material jackets, the fuel alloy foil core being a 7 w/o zirconium, plutonium foil which is from 0.005 to 0.0005 inch thick.Type: GrantFiled: October 26, 1976Date of Patent: August 2, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventor: Franklin D. McCuaig
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Patent number: 4038369Abstract: The present invention provides a method for reducing the amount of hydrogen chloride contained in a gas stream by reacting the hydrogen chloride with ammonia in the gas phase so as to produce ammonium chloride. The combined gas stream is passed into a condensation and collection vessel and a cyclonic flow is created in the combined gas stream as it passes through the vessel. The temperature of the gas stream is reduced in the vessel to below the condensation temperature of ammonium chloride in order to crystallize the ammonium chloride on the walls of the vessel. The cyclonic flow creates a turbulence which breaks off the larger particles of ammonium chloride which are, in turn, driven to the bottom of the vessel where the solid ammonium chloride can be removed from the vessel. The gas stream exiting from the condensation and collection vessel is further cleaned and additional ammonium chloride is removed by passing through additional filters.Type: GrantFiled: November 14, 1975Date of Patent: July 26, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventors: Steven J. Winston, Thomas R. Thomas
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Patent number: 4037496Abstract: A combination spindle-drive is provided for fabrication of optical quality surface finishes. Both the spindle-and-drive utilize the spindle bearings for support, thereby removing the conventional drive-means bearings as a source of vibration. An airbearing spindle is modified to carry at the drive end a highly conductive cup-shaped rotor which is aligned with a stationary stator to produce torque in the cup-shaped rotor through the reaction of eddy currents induced in the rotor. This arrangement eliminates magnetic attraction forces and all force is in the form of torque on the cup-shaped rotor.Type: GrantFiled: September 1, 1976Date of Patent: July 26, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventor: Howard L. Gerth
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Patent number: 4037465Abstract: A probe system is provided for the bore-side inspection of tube-to-header welds and the like for small diameter tubes. The probe head of the system includes an ultrasonic transmitter-receiver transducer, a separate ultrasonic receiver, a reflector associated with the transducer to properly orient the ultrasonic signal with respect to a tube wall, a baffle to isolate the receiver from the transducer, and means for maintaining the probe head against the tube wall under investigation. Since the probe head must rotate to inspect along a helical path, special ultrasonic signal connections are employed. Through the use of the probe, flaws at either the inner or outer surfaces may be detected.Type: GrantFiled: November 19, 1976Date of Patent: July 26, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventors: K. Von Cook, Dan W. Koerner, Robert A. Cunningham, Jr., Horace T. Murrin, Jr.
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Patent number: 4038125Abstract: Methods for preparing laser fusion targets of the ball-and-disk type are disclosed. Such targets are suitable for irradiation with one or two laser beams to produce the requisite uniform compression of the fuel material.Type: GrantFiled: June 18, 1975Date of Patent: July 26, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventors: R. Jay Fries, Eugene H. Farnum, Gene H. McCall
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Patent number: 4038622Abstract: A dipole electromagnet of especial use for bending beams in particle accelerators is wound to have high uniformity of magnetic field across a cross section and to decrease evenly to zero as the ends of the electromagnet are approached by disposing the superconducting filaments of the coil in the crescent-shaped nonoverlapping portions of two intersecting circles. Uniform decrease at the ends is achieved by causing the circles to overlap increasingly in the direction of the ends of the coil until the overlap is complete and the coil is terminated.Type: GrantFiled: April 13, 1976Date of Patent: July 26, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventor: John R. Purcell
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Patent number: 4036688Abstract: Apparatus for containing, cooling, diluting, dispersing and maintaining subcritical the molten core debris assumed to melt through the bottom of a nuclear reactor pressure vessel in the unlikely event of a core meltdown. The apparatus is basically a sacrificial bed system which includes an inverted conical funnel, a core debris receptacle including a spherical dome, a spherically layered bed of primarily magnesia bricks, a cooling system of zig-zag piping in graphite blocks about and below the bed and a cylindrical liner surrounding the graphite blocks including a steel shell surrounded by firebrick. Tantalum absorber rods are used in the receptacle and bed.Type: GrantFiled: April 9, 1975Date of Patent: July 19, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventors: Martin P. Golden, Roger W. Tilbrook, Neal F. Heylmun
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Patent number: 4035156Abstract: A filter type rotor for a multistation photometer is provided. The rotor design combines the principle of cross-flow filtration with centrifugal sedimentation so that these occur simultaneously as a first stage of processing for suspension type fluids in an analytical type instrument. The rotor is particularly useful in whole-blood analysis.Type: GrantFiled: January 21, 1977Date of Patent: July 12, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventor: Starling E. Shumate, II
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Patent number: 4035152Abstract: A distribution plate for a recirculating fluidized bed has a centrally disposed opening and a plurality of apertures adjacent the periphery to eliminate dead spots within the bed.Type: GrantFiled: May 24, 1976Date of Patent: July 12, 1977Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the United States Energy Research and Development AdministrationInventors: Wen-ching Yang, Edward J. Vidt, Dale L. Keairns