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At least 649 records · Page 36

A Feasibility Study on the Integration of Human Performance Data From Diverse Sources Based on the Complexity of a Proceduralized Task

Securing the safety of socio-technical systems including nuclear facilities is the upmost goal to ensure their sustainability because historical records demonstrate that the performance degradation of human operators (e.g., human errors) is one of the crucial contributors to the occurrence of unexpected events resulting in extensive casualties and financial losses. This implies that the collection of human performance data in diverse conditions with which they could be faced during the operation of nuclear facilities. As this collection requires significant resources, it is necessary to resolve how to accomplish it with limited resources. To address this challenge, as suggested in the SHEEP framework, it is indispensable to extract valuable insights after integrating various kinds of human performance data obtained from different sources. However, a practical method to soundly integrate them seems to be still incomplete. Accordingly, the applicability of TACOM (Task Complexity) measure is investigated as a tool to identify useful information based on the integration of human performance data observed from different simulation conditions. As a result, it is expected that the TACOM measure would play an important role in addressing the technical challenge in securing human performance data.

99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS↗

Methods of Securing Chemical and Pharmaceutical Knowledge and Recommendations for International Institutions to Enhance Research Integrity

Here, this paper examines strategies for securing chemical and pharmaceutical expertise in a globalized research environment, focusing on safeguarding intellectual property and preventing the misuse of sensitive and potentially dual-use information. The product of collective efforts between Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Carol Davila University of Medicine and Pharmacy, and New Bulgarian University, highlights the challenges and opportunities posed by cross-border research collaborations, particularly in the context of differing regulatory frameworks and research cultures. It explores current mechanisms to prevent data loss and unauthorized access to sensitive information while assessing the effectiveness of existing security measures, frameworks, and international export control regimes. The approach examines the differing methodologies for promoting transparency, trust-building, and mutual accountability in joint research projects to cultivate secure data-sharing practices and intellectual property. It provides recommendations for international institutions to implement security guidelines in framing research priorities, encourages continual training and education programs, and the integration of processes for monitoring research compliance. This partnership aims to advance scientific innovation while maintaining global stability, ensuring compliance with international norms, and safeguarding valuable intellectual property as measures in chemical and pharmaceutical research security practices continue to expand due to international collaboration and knowledge exchange.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

Nevada National Security Site 2015 Waste Management Monitoring Report Area 3 and Area 5 Radioactive Waste Management Sites

Environmental monitoring data are collected at and around the Area 3 and Area 5 Radioactive Waste Management Sites (RWMSs) within the Nevada National Security Site (NNSS). These data include direct radiation exposure, as well as radiation from the air, groundwater, meteorology, and vadose zone. This report summarizes the 2015 environmental data to provide an overall evaluation of RWMS performance and to support environmental compliance and performance assessment (PA) activities. Some of these data (e.g., radiation exposure, air, and groundwater) are presented in other reports developed by National Security Technologies, LLC. Direct radiation monitoring data indicate exposure levels at the RWMSs are within the range of background levels measured at the NNSS. Slightly elevated exposure levels outside the Area 3 RWMS are attributed to nearby historical aboveground nuclear weapons tests. Air monitoring data show that tritium concentrations in water vapor and americium and plutonium concentrations in air particles are below Derived Concentration Standards for these radionuclides. Groundwater monitoring data indicate the groundwater in the uppermost aquifer beneath the Area 5 RWMS is not impacted by RWMS operations. Results of groundwater analysis from wells around the Area 5 RWMS were all below established investigation levels. Leachate samples collected from the leachate collection system at the mixed low-level waste cell were below established contaminant regulatory limits. During 2015, precipitation at the Area 3 RWMS was 0.9% above average, and precipitation at the Area 5 RWMS was 25% above average. Water balance measurements indicate that evapotranspiration from the vegetated weighing lysimeter dries the soil and prevents downward percolation of precipitation more effectively than evaporation as measured from the bare-soil weighing lysimeter. The 1.8 inches of precipitation in September reached the lowest sensors at 180 cm on the Cell 5S and 5N covers, however the sensors on the floor do not indicate any signs of the precipitation percolating thru the waste to the floor. Moisture from precipitation did not percolate below 150 centimeters (cm) (5 feet [ft]) in the vegetated final cover on the U-3ax/bl disposal unit at the Area 3 RWMS. A second remedial revegetation trial was done on the southern portion of the North Cover. In March 2015 it was determined that germination occurred on both the mulched and non-mulched treatments that were irrigated, but that no germination occurred on the non-irrigated treatments. By June the seedlings observed in March were gone, possibly grazed by rabbits which were observed inside the rabbit-proof fence. In August the entire area was sprayed with the herbicide glyphosate in an attempt to minimize weed seed production. During 2015, there was no drainage through 2.4 meters (8 ft) of soil as indicated from the Area 3 drainage lysimeters that received only natural precipitation. Thirty-one percent of the applied precipitation and irrigation drained from the bare-soil drainage lysimeter, which received 3 times the natural precipitation. All 2015 monitoring data indicate that the Area 3 and Area 5 RWMSs are performing within expectations of the model and parameter assumptions for the facilities’ PAs.

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗

How to implement security controls for an information security program at CBRN facilities

This document was prepared by PNNL within the framework of Project 19 of the European Union Chemical Biological Radiological and Nuclear Risk Mitigation Centres of Excellence Initiative entitled, ''Development of procedures and guidelines to create and improve secure information management systems and data exchange mechanisms for CBRN materials under regulatory control.'' It provides management and workers at CBRN facilities, parent organization managers responsible for those facilities, and regulatory agencies (governmental and nongovernmental) with guidance on the best practices for protecting information security. The security mitigation approaches presented in this document were chosen because they present generally accepted guidance in an easy-to-understand manner, making it easier for facility personnel to grasp key concepts and envision how security controls could be implemented by the facility. This guidance is presented from a risk management perspective.

96 KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT AND PRESERVATION↗

EVALUATING NUCLEAR SECURITY IMPLICATIONS OF THE SPLINTERNET

The internet, which for years has been viewed as a global online commons with standardized protocols but few regulations is, according to some experts, starting to mirror the contentious political and commercial contours of the physical world. Contributing to this is the rise in data breaches, cyber-enabled attacks on critical infrastructure, government surveillance operations, theft of intellectual property, manipulation of electoral processes, and perceived erosion of privacy, all of which are resulting in a growing skepticism that an open internet will naturally serve the best interests of users, communities, countries, and the global economy. In addition, the rapidly emerging and increasingly lucrative power of data has global superpowers scrambling to protect their informational sovereignty as an urgent matter of national security. Underscoring this urgency is the fact that, despite its global reach and cosmopolitan contributor base, internet infrastructure and governance of the World Wide Web remain largely under U.S. corporate auspices, which reinforces the perception of U.S. control. Whether fragmentation is politically, economically, or socially motivated, there appears to be a growing appetite for an internet that is partitioned and controlled at the national level. From “the Great Firewall of China” to the “Halal” internet of Iran, the trend towards a “Splinternet” has courts and governments embarking on what some call a "legal arms race" to impose a maze of national or regional rules, often conflicting, in the digital realm. The paper explores the emerging Splinternet phenomenon, analyses the implications of this trend on nuclear security, and identifies questions that present opportunities for future research.

Internet, Data Security, Cyber Security, Nuclear S↗

Cyber-Resilient Automatic Generation Control for Systems of AC Microgrids

In this paper we propose a co-design of the secondary frequency regulation in systems of AC microgrids and its cyber security solutions. We term the secondary frequency regulator a Micro-Automatic Generation Control (μ AGC) for highlighting its same functionality as the AGC in bulk power systems. We identify sensory challenges and cyber threats facing the μ AGC. To address the sensory challenges, we introduce a new microgrid model by exploiting the rank-one deficiency property of microgrid dynamics. This model is used to pose an optimal μ AGC control problem that is easily implemented, because it does not require fast frequency measurements. An end-to-end cyber security solution to the False Data Injection (FDI) attack detection and mitigation is developed for the proposed μ AGC. The front-end barrier of applying off-the-shelf algorithms for cyber attack detection is removed by introducing a data-driven modeling approach. Finally, we propose an observer-based corrective control for an islanded microgrid and a collaborative mitigation scheme in systems of AC microgrids. We demonstrate a collaborative role of systems of microgrids during cyber attacks. Furthermore, the performance of the proposed cyber-resilient μ AGC is tested in a system of two networked microgrids.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

Universal Utility Data Exchange Workflow Design

This workflow design document describes the process of establishing a Universal Utility Data Exchange (UUDEX) Connection between two or more UUDEX Endpoints. The existing processes required to establish a data link using Inter Control Center Communications Protocol (ICCP) are very time consuming, from both the perspectives of effort and calendar time. The intent of UUDEX is to provide a more streamlined alternative. The UUDEX Workflow is also used to establish UUDEX Connections to exchange data other than that found in traditional ICCP data exchanges such as exchanges of power system model files, security events and mitigations, disturbance reports, and market data.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

Universal Utility Data Exchange (UUDEX) - Workflow Design - Rev 1

This workflow design document describes the process of establishing a Universal Utility Data Exchange (UUDEX) Connection between two or more UUDEX Endpoints. The existing processes required to establish a data link using Inter Control Center Communications Protocol (ICCP) are very time consuming, from both the perspectives of effort and calendar time. The intent of UUDEX is to provide a more streamlined alternative. The UUDEX Workflow is also used to establish UUDEX Connections to exchange data other than that found in traditional ICCP data exchanges such as exchanges of power system model files, security events and mitigations, disturbance reports, and market data.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

Empirical Analysis and Automated Classification of Security Bug Reports

With the ever expanding amount of sensitive data being placed into computer systems, the need for effective cybersecurity is of utmost importance. However, there is a shortage of detailed empirical studies of security vulnerabilities from which cybersecurity metrics and best practices could be determined. This thesis has two main research goals: (1) to explore the distribution and characteristics of security vulnerabilities based on the information provided in bug tracking systems and (2) to develop data analytics approaches for automatic classification of bug reports as security or non-security related. This work is based on using three NASA datasets as case studies. The empirical analysis showed that the majority of software vulnerabilities belong only to a small number of types. Addressing these types of vulnerabilities will consequently lead to cost efficient improvement of software security. Since this analysis requires labeling of each bug report in the bug tracking system, we explored using machine learning to automate the classification of each bug report as a security or non-security related (two-class classification), as well as each security related bug report as specific security type (multiclass classification). In addition to using supervised machine learning algorithms, a novel unsupervised machine learning approach is proposed. An ac- curacy of 92%, recall of 96%, precision of 92%, probability of false alarm of 4%, F-Score of 81% and G-Score of 90% were the best results achieved during two-class classification. Furthermore, an accuracy of 80%, recall of 80%, precision of 94%, and F-score of 85% were the best results achieved during multiclass classification.

Cybersecurity↗

Detecting False Data Injection Attacks in Smart Grids: A Semi-Supervised Deep Learning Approach

The dependence on advanced information and communication technology increases the vulnerability in smart grids under cyber-attacks. Recent research on unobservable false data injection attacks (FDIAs) reveals the high risk of secure system operation, since these attacks can bypass current bad data detection mechanisms. To mitigate this risk, this paper proposes a data-driven learning-based algorithm for detecting unobservable FDIAs in distribution systems. We use autoencoders for efficient dimension reduction and feature extraction of measurement datasets. Further, we integrate the autoencoders into an advanced generative adversarial network (GAN) framework, which successfully detects anomalies under FDIAs by capturing the unconformity between abnormal and secure measurements. Also, considering that the datasets collected from practical power systems are partially labeled due to expensive labeling costs and missing labels, the proposed method only requires a few labeled measurement data in addition to unlabeled data for training. Numerical simulations in three-phase unbalanced IEEE 13-bus and 123-bus distribution systems validate the detection accuracy and efficiency of this method.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

An Offload NIC for NASA, NLR, and Grid Computing

This work addresses distributed data management and access dynamically configurable high-speed access to data distributed and shared over wide-area high-speed network environments. An offload engine NIC (network interface card) is proposed that scales at nX10-Gbps increments through 100-Gbps full duplex. The Globus de facto standard was used in projects requiring secure, robust, high-speed bulk data transport. Novel extension mechanisms were derived that will combine these technologies for use by GridFTP, bandwidth management resources, and host CPU (central processing unit) acceleration. The result will be wire-rate encrypted Globus grid data transactions through offload for splintering, encryption, and compression. As the need for greater network bandwidth increases, there is an inherent need for faster CPUs. The best way to accelerate CPUs is through a network acceleration engine. Grid computing data transfers for the Globus tool set did not have wire-rate encryption or compression. Existing technology cannot keep pace with the greater bandwidths of backplane and network connections. Present offload engines with ports to Ethernet are 32 to 40 Gbps f-d at best. The best of ultra-high-speed offload engines use expensive ASICs (application specific integrated circuits) or NPUs (network processing units). The present state of the art also includes bonding and the use of multiple NICs that are also in the planning stages for future portability to ASICs and software to accommodate data rates at 100 Gbps. The remaining industry solutions are for carrier-grade equipment manufacturers, with costly line cards having multiples of 10-Gbps ports, or 100-Gbps ports such as CFP modules that interface to costly ASICs and related circuitry. All of the existing solutions vary in configuration based on requirements of the host, motherboard, or carriergrade equipment. The purpose of the innovation is to eliminate data bottlenecks within cluster, grid, and cloud computing systems, and to add several more capabilities while reducing space consumption and cost. Provisions were designed for interoperability with systems used in the NASA HEC (High-End Computing) program. The new acceleration engine consists of state-ofthe- art FPGA (field-programmable gate array) core IP, C, and Verilog code; novel communication protocol; and extensions to the Globus structure. The engine provides the functions of network acceleration, encryption, compression, packet-ordering, and security added to Globus grid or for cloud data transfer. This system is scalable in nX10-Gbps increments through 100-Gbps f-d. It can be interfaced to industry-standard system-side or network-side devices or core IP in increments of 10 GigE, scaling to provide IEEE 40/100 GigE compliance.

Awrach, James↗

Investigating Wireless Quantum Key Distribution for Advanced Reactor Communications

Remote operation of small modular reactor (SMR) facilities is an appealing prospect for streamlined operation costs, safety concerns, and user convenience. The ability to guarantee security of communication channels between offsite users and nuclear reactor facilities is critical to enabling remote operations, given the sensitive nature of reactor state data. This report proposes a configuration implementing quantum key distribution (QKD) and advanced encryption standard (AES) protocols to establish secure reactor data feeds. The model outlined, which utilizes the Argonne-developed SeQUeNCe software package and custom MATLAB code, determines free-space channel losses for microwave-band communications in a variety of weather conditions and simulates QKD via ground-satellite links. This report demonstrates the feasibility of repeatable, real-time key generation and distribution for this configuration towards enabling secure wireless reactor communications.

22 GENERAL STUDIES OF NUCLEAR REACTORS↗

Data Quality Objective Scoping Package In Support of a Remedial Action at Exposure Unit 5 Attachment C, Rev 0 to the Upper East Fork Poplar Creek Soils Remedial Action Work Plan DOE/OR/01-2423&D1

The Department of Energy (DOE), Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM), intends to perform characterization of Exposure Unit 5 (EU-5) slabs and soils at the Y-12 National Security Complex (Y-12). This Data Quality Objective (DQO) Scoping Package has been prepared as part of the Upper East Fork Poplar Creek (UEFPC) Soils Remedial Action Work Plan (RAWP) (DOE 2010a) as the planning document for the Dynamic Characterization Strategy (DCS) for soils in EU-5. Y-12 is located at the southeastern boundary of the Oak Ridge Reservation (ORR) and the industrialized area of Y-12 consists of approximately 600 acres located within the UEFPC watershed characterization area. The UEFPC RAWP and this DQO Scoping Package were developed in order to address the remedial action objectives of the Record of Decision for Phase II Interim Remedial Actions for Contaminated Soils and Scrapyard in UEFPC, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, DOE/OR/01-2229&D3 (Soils ROD) (DOE 2006).

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

Vulnerabilities in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning Applications and Data

Artificial intelligence (AI) applications driven by machine learning (ML) are transformational technologies within the international nuclear security regime. Advancements realized by AI—faster and improved data insights, more efficient and automated processes, reductions in human error—enable nuclear security applications such as behavior analysis for insider threat mitigation, source tracking of stolen nuclear material, and facial recognition software for physical protection. In addition to the advantages, however, there are also inherent vulnerabilities and threats associated with its use and risk mitigations must be built into any AI/ML-enabled systems. This work provides a background on AI and ML and different data types used in the field, including open-source intelligence information (OSINT) that is discoverable by AI tools and application data that are used by AI tools for decision-making and automation. Current and potential AI applications and vulnerabilities related to their use within the nuclear security regime are also discussed.

45 MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, WEAPONRY, AND NATIONAL DEF↗

A Nonrelational Data Warehouse for the Analysis of Field and Laboratory Data From Multiple Heterogeneous Photovoltaic Test Sites

A nonrelational, distributed computing, data warehouse, and analytics environment (Energy-CRADLE) was developed for the analysis of field and laboratory data from multiple heterogeneous photovoltaic (PV) test sites. This data informatics and analytics infrastructure was designed to process diverse formats of PV performance data and climatic telemetry time-series data collected from a PV outdoor test network, i.e., the Solar Durability and Lifetime Extension global SunFarm network, as well as point-in-time laboratory spectral and image measurements of PV material samples. Using Hadoop/HBase for the distributed data warehouse, Energy-CRADLE does not have a predefined data table schema, which enables ingestion of data in diverse and changing formats. For easy data ingestion and data retrieval, Energy-CRADLE utilizes Hadoop streaming to enable Python MapReduce and provides a graphical user interface, i.e., py-CRADLE. By developing the Hadoop distributed computing platform and the HBase NoSQL database schema for solar energy, Energy-CRADLE exemplifies an integrated, scalable, secure, and user-friendly data informatics and analytics system for PV researchers. Furthermore, an example of Energy-CRADLE enabled scalable, data-driven, analytics is presented, where machine learning is used for anomaly detection across 2.2 million real-world current-voltage (I–V) curves of PV modules in three distinct Koppen–Geiger climatic zones.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

Nucleus: A pilot project

The proposal is to provide institutional infrastructure that facilitates management of research projects, research collaboration, and management, preservation, and discovery of data. Deploying such infrastructure will amplify the effectiveness, efficiency, and impact of research, as well as assist researchers in regards to compliance with both data management mandates and LANL security policy. This will facilitate discoverability of LANL research both within the lab and external to LANL.

96 KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT AND PRESERVATION↗