Ridges, Mounds, and valleys : glacial-interglacial history of the Kaskaskia Basin, Southwestern Illinois, 55th Midwest Friends of the Pleistocene 2011 Field Conference

Geophysical surveys: two-dimensional resistivity imaging; Field trip stops: 1. Keyesport Sand and Gravel Pit; 2. Terrapin Ridge: Cores and Geophysics; 3. Ogles Creek Section; 4. Emerald Mound: Archaeology and History; 5. Pleasant Ridge Area: Cores and Geophysics; 6. Highbanks Road Section; 7. Vandalia Sand and Gravel Pit; 8. Central Illinois Materials Sand and Gravel Pit: Catfish Pond Paleoecology; 9. Pittsburg Basin: Paleoenvironmental History from Fossil Pollen and Ostracode Records in South-Central Illinois; 10. Sodium-Affected Soils in South-Central Illinois: Relationships with Relict Patterned GroundOpe

FIELD TESTING OF REMOTE SENSOR GAS LEAK DETECTION SYSTEMS FINAL REPORT

The natural gas pipeline industry routinely checks their pipeline right-of-ways to ensure that leaks are detected. Pipeline companies use various processes to detect signs of leaking pipes, including using vehicles or low-flying aircraft. The leak detection methods range from directly sensing the gas to looking for indirect signs of leakage. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Office of Pipeline Safety (OPS) have provided funding to several commercial companies and research laboratories to develop advanced remote sensor systems to provide high quality, cost-effective leak detection information. To aid in the development and availability of these remote detection systems, the DOE funded a project to conduct field testing of five remote sensor leak detection systems. OPS provided co-funding for this project. The five systems chosen to be included in the field test were being developed by En’Urga Inc., ITT Industries, Inc., LaSen, Inc., Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories, and Physical Sciences Inc. The technologies included passive infrared multi-spectral scanning, laser-based differential absorption LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging), hyperspectral imaging, and tunable diode laser absorption spectroscopy. The sensor systems were mounted in an unmodified automobile, a helicopter, or a fixed-wing aircraft. A “virtual pipeline,” that simulated conditions of an actual pipeline was created at the Rocky Mountain Oilfield Testing Center field site at NPR-3, north of Casper, Wyoming. The pipeline route was approximately 7.5 miles long and was marked by 14 direction change markers and 22 sets of road crossing markers. Fifteen leak sites, which included three types of gas releases, were established along the route, with natural gas leak rates ranging from 1 scfh to 5,000 scfh. One leak site was designated as a “calibration” site, and the location and leak rate for this site were provided to the equipment providers. Leak sites that were designed to cause plant stress were on continuously from August 30, 2004 through September 17, 2004. The remaining leak sites were set daily during the test week of September 13 to 17, 2004. Four equipment providers were scheduled to collect data along the pipeline path twice each test day. One equipment provider, at their request, was scheduled to collect data once each day for one of their platforms and twice during the entire week for their other platform. Reports of the findings for the individual equipment providers were due to Southwest Research Institute® (SwRI®) within two weeks after the testing period and are included in this report as Appendix I. Based on the data provided, leaks at many of the leak sites were successfully detected. Leak rates of 500 scfh or higher were detected at least 50% of the time. Leak rates of 100 scfh were only detected 15% of the time. Leak rates of 15 scfh and 10 scfh were only detected about 5% of the time. The 1-scfh leak was never detected. There were also a large number of “false positive” leak sites identified by the equipment providers. Some of the equipment providers made system improvements during the week including repairing malfunctioning equipment, mechanical modifications to improve performance in field applications, and developing improved data handling schemes. Other modifications have been defined for future work by some of the equipment providers. Improvements for potential future testing efforts have been identified and include improving the pipeline route and adding more leak sites

The (1RS,2RS,7RS,8RS)- and (1RS,2SR,7SR,8RS)-diastereoisomers of 8,9,11,12-tetrachloro-N-ethyltricyclo[6.2.2.0²,⁷]dodeca-9,11-diene-1,10-dicarboximide

Two racemic diastereoisomers, C₁₆H₁₅Cl₄NO₂, of the title 1,4-photoadduct of N-ethyltetrachlorophthalimide with cyclohexene have been isolated and their stereostructures determined

Surficial geology of Marine Quadrangle, Madison County, Illinois

Relief shown by contours and spot heightsIncludes text and 1 location map with indexData sheet includes text, 1 table, 2 colored ancillary maps and 2 colored cross sectionsIncludes bibliographical references (data sheet

Surficial Geology of Grantfork Quadrangle, Madison County, Illinois

Relief shown by contours and spot heights"Geology based on field work and data compilation by D. Grimley and A. Phillips, 2004-2005.""Digital cartography by J. Carrell and J. Domier, Illinois State Geological Survey."Includes text and 1 location map with index diagramData sheet includes text, 2 colored cross sections, 2 ancillary maps and 1 tableIncludes bibliographical references (data sheet

Radiocarbon dating loess deposits in the Mississippi Valley using terrestrial gastropod shells (Polygyridae, Helicinidae, and Discidae)

Small terrestrial gastropod shells (mainly Succineidae) have been used successfully to date late Quaternary loess deposits in Alaska and the Great Plains. However, Succineidae shells are less common in loess deposits in the Mississippi Valley compared to those of the Polygyridae, Helicinidae, and Discidae families. In this study, we conducted several tests to determine whether shells of these gastropods could provide reliable ages for loess deposits in the Mississippi Valley. Our results show that most of the taxa that we investigated incorporate small amounts (1–5%) of old carbon from limestone in their shells, meaning that they should yield ages that are accurate to within a few hundred years. In contrast, shells of the genus Mesodon (Mesodon elevatus and Mesodon zaletus) contain significant and variable amounts of old carbon, yielding ages that are up to a couple thousand 14C years too old. Although terrestrial gastropod shells have tremendous potential for 14C dating loess deposits throughout North America,weacknowledge that accuracy to within a few hundred years may not be sufficient for those interested in developing high-resolution loess chronologies. Even with this limitation, however, 14C dating of terrestrial gastropod shells present in Mississippi Valley loess deposits may prove useful for researchers interested in processes that took place over multi-millennial timescales or in differentiating stratigraphic units that have significantly different ages but similar physical and geochemical properties. The results presented here may also be useful to researchers studying loess deposits outside North America that contain similar gastropod taxa

Surficial geology of Madison County, Illinois

Relief shown by contours and spot heights"Geology based on field work and data compilation by D. Grimley and A. Phillips, 1997-2006.""Digital cartography by J. Carrell and J. Domier, Illinois State Geological Survey."Includes text, location map, and 2 cross sectionsIncludes bibliographical reference

Genome engineering of isogenic human ES cells to model autism disorders.

Isogenic pluripotent stem cells are critical tools for studying human neurological diseases by allowing one to study the effects of a mutation in a fixed genetic background. Of particular interest are the spectrum of autism disorders, some of which are monogenic such as Timothy syndrome (TS); others are multigenic such as the microdeletion and microduplication syndromes of the 16p11.2 chromosomal locus. Here, we report engineered human embryonic stem cell (hESC) lines for modeling these two disorders using locus-specific endonucleases to increase the efficiency of homology-directed repair (HDR). We developed a system to: (1) computationally identify unique transcription activator-like effector nuclease (TALEN) binding sites in the genome using a new software program, TALENSeek, (2) assemble the TALEN genes by combining golden gate cloning with modified constructs from the FLASH protocol, and (3) test the TALEN pairs in an amplification-based HDR assay that is more sensitive than the typical non-homologous end joining assay. We applied these methods to identify, construct, and test TALENs that were used with HDR donors in hESCs to generate an isogenic TS cell line in a scarless manner and to model the 16p11.2 copy number disorder without modifying genomic loci with high sequence similarity