The differences in competencies between nurses prepared at the Essay

The differences in competencies between nurses prepared at the associate degree level versus the baccalaureate degree level in n - Essay Example Mildred Montag, who published The Education of Nursing Technicians in 1951, proposed that there is a need for a â€Å"nurse technician, whose role would be broader than that of a practical nurse but narrower than that of the professional nurse,† (as cited in Zerwekh & Claborn, 2006, p. 144) and his or her duties includes providing supervised care, assisting in plan of care, and assisting evaluation of patient outcomes in the care received. On the other hand, baccalaureate degree nursing programs usually take four years to accomplish, and students receive a Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) upon completing the course. The first two years involve minor subjects in arts and sciences while the remaining years inculcate nursing knowledge, which focuses on critical-thinking enhancement, independent nursing judgment abilities, and research conduction.

Neocolonialism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Neocolonialism - Essay Example As a result, some guidance needs to be provided to the weaker nations in order for them to ultimately gain economic independence as well as political independence. One of the theories involving neocolonialsim is called the Dependency Theory. This theory discusses the relationship between less economically developed countries (LEDC's) and more economically developed countries (MEDC's). The theory maintains that the LEDC's are in the underdeveloped situation that they are in because they rely too heavily on the MEDC's. The LEDC's will remain LEDC's because any surplus production will be absorbed by the MEDC's multinational corporations leaving no profit for the LEDC's. Yet, the MEDC's are also dependent (Dependency Theory, 2003). Without the LEDC's, they would not be able to prosper to the level that they do economically. This neocolonialism is the source of multiple frustrations for several smaller nations. One example of this opposition comes from the Pacific Islands Association of Non-Government Organizations (PIANGO). They cite the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples which declares that indigenous peoples (who are usually members of these LEDCs) have the "right to self-determination and political independence (Blaisdell, 1998). ... They are the continued victims of US economic dependence and exploitation which keeps these countries at Third World status (Blaisdell, 1998) Similar tensions surround Jamaica, Brazil and Southeast China, to name a few. Although the MEDC's pat themselves on the back for bringing industry and paying jobs to poverty-stricken areas, the damage to the country and to the people themselves has been compared to the physical cruelties of Cortez as he ravaged Mexico for gold in the 16th century. The difference is that this type of attack is not condemned like physical, military invasions by world nations and leaders. In fact, it is often allowed by the LEDC's government, ignored by journalists and kept from the broader public. (Ayres, 2004). Indeed, the companies do hire uneducated indigenous people to work these sometimes dangerous jobs; they cannot quit because they are dependent on the income. Some companies have even been accused of paying bribes to some village leaders to publicly support the industry in spite of possible problems with the health or environment as a result (Koenig, 2004). Koenig, in World Watch, details an example in Romania. Heap-leach gold mining is a modern form of mining which makes use of literally millions of gallons of cyanide poured onto piles of ore. The cyanide helps to extract the gold. In Romania, at an Australian-owned min, a dam broke and polluted the Tisza River with 22 million gallons of the toxic substance. It has been six years since what environmentalists are calling the worst catastrophe since Chernobyl, but this mining process is still on the rise (Koenig, 2004). Of course, many international researchers place the

Expulsion from the Garden of Eden

Expulsion from the Garden of Eden The fall of mankind and the expulsion from the garden of Eden is one of many depictions on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. The Sistine Chapel was originally commissioned by Pope Sixtus IV and therefore is how it received its name (The Sistine Chapel). Sixtus then called a large variety of well-known painters, architects, and others to work on the inside walls and ceiling of the Chapel. However, in 1508 the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel was in the beginning stages of being repainted by Michelangelo Buonarroti at the request of Pope Julius II (Januszczak). The Sistine Chapel was and still is used for ceremonial services and ceremonies. Michelangelo reluctantly started the project in 1508 and finished in the year of 1512, four years later. Michelangelo was accredited for being a trained sculptor, architect, and poet, although he is most notorious for his work on the Sistine chapel. Although Michelangelo thought of himself as mainly a sculptor a painting project of this size and importance would have been a challenge for him. The Sistine chapels ceiling is 10,000 square feet or roughly 930 square meters (Michelangelo 20). Michelangelo constructed a scaffolding system that curved at its top, mimicking the curvature of the ceilings vault. Michelangelo often had to bend backwards and paint over his head still an awkward position; which mustve made his neck and back ache, his arms burn painfully and, according to him, permanently screwed up his vision (Merlo). Although the ceilings decorations were broken up into different parts there were nine depictions from the book of Genesis in the Bible (Michelangelo 23). The Focus of the rest of this paper is going to be on the Fall of Mankind and expulsion piece of the Sistine Chap els ceiling. This particular piece of the ceiling only took thirteen areas of plaster, which compared to the other areas on the ceiling this is one third the amount (King 192). The figures in this section of the ceiling were all substantially larger than those in the other paintings and only had six figures which compared to the number of tiny and abundant figures in The Flood are great. This section of the ceiling is a diptych (Blech and Doliner 202), a painting of two equally important parts, the first part on the left of the scene is Adam and Eve still innocent, yet about to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. On the right side of the scene we see both Adam and Eve being exiled from the Garden of Eden. In the center, a serpent spirals around the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil; it offers Eve the forbidden fruit. It is joined to a sword-wielding red cherub, whose arm seems to grow out of the serpent`s coils; these two figures are one. Parallel pairs of arms emerge on the right and on the left, combining the two scenes into this diptych. When Eve decided to eat the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil it resulted in the awareness of the passing of time, You will surely die means you will understand that time means death. Awareness of time and life in paradise are mutually exclusive. Having tasted the fruit on the left they are instantly out of Paradise and into history, on the right (Milgrom and Duman). If you look closely at the left side of the frame we can see that Adam is indeed picking from the tree, we can see that the tree is a fig tree and in the Holy Bible in Genesis 3 it says once they ate from the Tree of Knowledge they took figs and made clothing to cover themselves (Holy Bible).Now in scripture it does not say that Adam picked from the Tree it actually clearly states that the woman was deceived and took from the Tree and ate from it then gave it to her husband to eat as well(Joyce). It has been said that Michelangelo did this to show that man was just at fault because Adam did not faithfully pass on the true words of God and that is why the woman, Eve, was so easily deceived(King 193). You may also see Gods mercy in all this. The bases of why Michelangelo used the Tree of Knowledge to be a fig tree is for a purpose. It is said in 1 Corinthians chapter 13 verse 10 that God does not ever present us with a difficulty He will not give us a way out of or already knows the so lution to its problem. In this scene the fig tree is Michelangelos way of showing Gods way out. It shows Gods grace and mercy by using one simple visual affect (Blech and Doliner 204). If we decide to look at the fruit that Eve is tempted with in the Garden we notice that it is an apple in the scene. In most cultures and even in todays modern society we notice that the apple has a sense of mystery surrounding it, even in childrens movies such as Snow White when she eats a poisonous apple. If you look at the word apple, in Medieval Latin, the word apple is malum, malum is a most cases is the starting for male or mala, which is a synonym of evil (Blech and Doliner 203). Michelangelo was suggested to have joined both the serpent and the red cherub for two reasons. It is said in the book The Sistine Secrets that à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦the two inclinations of the serpent and the angel, are on both sides of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden, since it is at this very moment and spot that humanity learns the difference for the first time. In another interpretation of this scene is that the serpent and cherub are one because like good and evil, life and death are flip sides of reality, they reflect the nature of the divine (Milgrom and Duman). Both are valid and similar arguments but put into two different perspectives. On the right we go back to the expulsion part of this scene. We see that the cherub with the sword is banishing Adam and Eve from Paradise forever. Immediately we can see the signs of the natural aging process. Part of their punishment was to lose their immortality and eternal youthfulness (Blech and Doliner 203). You can see the difference in the characters features more than ever when being exiled. The young beautiful woman on the left was transformed into someone almost completely different. According to Michelangelo and the Popes ceiling the young woman turned into a hideous ugly old crone with tangled hair, wrinkled skin, and a hunched back, the same female who is cowering in shame and covering her breasts. The thing that I notice as I am viewing this piece of art is you can see in Adam and Eves faces the shame and guilt that is already evident in knowing they made a mistake. The thought that in todays society we have so many rules and laws that we cant do but looking at this picture it shows how easily we fall. Adam was commanded only one thing! In Genesis 2:16-17 And the Lord God commanded the man You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die. The Lord commanded Adam to do one thing and the shame he feels that the only rule God gave him he broke is on his face. Although like I mentioned earlier it was not the fault of Adam for the woman was the one deceived and gave some to Adam, he still plays a large role in this. My Interpretation For my interpretation of this piece of art I chose to make a short film of what the piece of art represents. In this film I go through daily scenarios of how in modern society we face the struggle of listening to what God tells us to do and actually following through with it. To start off the video I am talking giving the audience a foreshadowing of what is coming. Then the film starts off with Lizzie reading her bible on a set of couches. She talks to God and prays but during all of this she finds several distractions that keep her from hearing everything God is trying to tell her. She then has to make a decision as to which doorway she wants to enter. She chooses the right path after hearing Gods voice giving her guidance. The point of going down this path is to get to the other side, however, along the way she runs into six different struggles or different paths she can go down. She has to listen carefully and await Gods instruction on the right move to make for her. The second person she comes into contact with is trying to deceive her into thinking she is not cared about by her friends and family, the person tells Lizzie she is not worthy of love and her friends talk horribly about her. Lizzie then has the choice to fall into the trap Satan is feeding her (gossip). In other words take the apple and eat it or say no and go in the other direction. She makes the right choice and goes on down the path. Later down the path she runs into a third actor who is trying to convince her to go to a party. This person uses all the tactics to get someone to go to a party. He tells her that anybody who is anyone will be going and that it will be fun. Lizzie hears a soft whisper in the background telling her not to go and to make a left turn. Almost immediately down that hallway she runs into a man dressed in nice clothing trying to sell her fine clothes, house, car, and lots of luxurious items, this sin being love of money if she falls into it. The fact that almost immediately after saying no to the party another response shows up tells her she must be doing something right because the attacks are getting stronger and closer together which means Satan is getting nervous because she is doing something for God, and he does not want that. She tells him even though she would love to have all those things that is not how she wants them, that God provides what she needs and she has everything in Him. Then she walks away down another hallway. Towards the end of this hallway there is a three way stop. She looks and sees a handsome young man dressed nicely; she notices he is trying to get her attention. He starts to tell her how beautiful she is and how much she means to him. They start walking down the hallway together as he tells her of the life they can have together. This pathway is lust. As they are walking suddenly her friend appears behind her calling out to her telling her to come back. They stop and Lizzie realizes she made the wrong turn she ignored Gods voice and followed what she wanted. The three then bicker over Lizzie and her friend tries to convince Lizzie to go in her direction as well, giving the godly advice, it may still not be the right advice if you are looking for the answers in another human. They reach the crossroads of the three way stop again. They go into a tug-o-war over Lizzie and the camera widens and then you see all the sin that tried trapping her along the way tempting her again. Lizzie not ices what is happening but she strayed so far from Gods voice and into sin she cant tell what to do anymore. When all of a sudden Lizzie bursts out STOP! The whole frame is frozen except Lizzie and she pushes them all away. The frame moves into Lizzies face and back out again and when it moves out nobody is there except her. She sits on the floor and apologizes for everything and asks Gods forgiveness. Lizzie then hears Gods voice and goes through the middle doorway and into where God has led her. The rest of the movie is me explaining the circumstances of what just happened and the reasoning of the chosen film. In short my film is a modern version of disobedience to Gods voice or just the lack thereof knowledge. It is a depiction of how easily us as humans can fall and how quickly God is there to catch us.

Macbeth Essay: The Witches Prophecy And WHat They COuld Mean

Macbeth Essay Macbeth is the story of a man who, finding himself faced with a moment of choice, lets the bad side of his nature dominate him. He considers his choices carefully, looks at the alternatives, and deliberately chooses the course he knows to be evil. From this time on he seems unable to turn back to the good side. In the beginning, he starts out at the height of his success and honor, but then follows a long dark path to despair. Macbeth did not make these choices on his own though, there were other supernatural forces swaying his decisions. These forces are three witches who make six prophecies†¦ There are two sets of prophecies, one with three predictions each. One set is in the beginning of the book, and the second set near the end. The first prediction of the first set is ...

Old Age

| Old Age as a Time of New Opportunities| | | | | | The article â€Å"Old Age as a Time of New Opportunities (from the Foundation of Age)† by Betty Friedan opened my eyes to a perspective that I had never really thought about. It was about how old age is usually perceived as another step closer to death. In this article we are able to understand the perspective of an elder female. The female is 59 years old almost 60. She wants to go to Outward Bound which will give her the extreme outdoor experience.She goes with her friend Cecelia Herwich. They have to leave their city clothes and forget about who they were in the past and have to leave behind their professional role. When they arrive at the first campsite they are given their gear. They are given a backpack, poncho, sleeping bag, ground cloth, tin cup, spoon, water bottle, and iodine to purify it. They begin with a three mile jog up and down the road. She turned out to be the slowest because she had problems catching up wit h everyone else.That night they spoke about why they went. A woman named Ruth said she went because she wanted to do something exciting before she settled into a rocking chair. Another that was there was Earl. He said he was drawn in by the simple fact that it was dangerous because he would have to be there for ten days away from what he is used to and not knowing who else would be there along with him. After wards they mention that there are usually more men and that their expedition is the first to have more women involved.They stated that there are usually young men but not young women. Then they ask if women get more adventurous with age. I think that it is true that women get more adventurous the older they get. I think that this is true because they are afraid of retreating to nothing without feeling they did something that they have never tried before. They are afraid because they feel the vicious cycle of cleaning the house, taking care of the children, keeping up with husba nd and kids, etc.They are basically getting tired of the daily routine that they always have to put up with as regular house wives. Women feel they have been put down for too long so they want to do a change in their life. They want to feel that they did something different for once. I think that this would be an excellent topic to discuss in Sociology class. It is a good topic because it can be viewed in various ways. The different ways of viewing this article is interesting because everyone will most likely have a different way of perceiving it by the way their brain is functioning.

Research Methods and Modeling Techniques Essay

Mergers and acquisitions (M&As) are important modes through which firms undertake their domestic and international strategies. M&As research is important because these transactions have significant implications for firms’ performance (Laamanen & Keil, 2008). When a firm carries out an international M&A it gains full control over the foreign unit (Arregle, Hebert & Beamish, 2006). In addition, once established, these transactions are difficult to change, because they have long-term consequences for the  firm (Capron & Pistre, 2002). Given its high relevance, numerous empirical studies have addressed the M&As research such as the overview by Noe & Rebello in 2006, as well as theoretical articles written by Chi in 2000 and Shaver in 2006. However, even after decades of research on this issue, the empirical research provides no clear consensus on the impact of these transactions on the firms’ performance. For instance, Child, Faulkner and Pitkethly (2001) found that cultural differences are likely to have a negative impact on the firms’ post-acquisition performance. According to Morosini, Shane and Singh (1998) international M&As have become major strategic tools for corporate growth of multinational corporations. M&As increase the efficiency and effectiveness of whole industries, and also affects individual companies’ competitive ability (Hitt, Ireland & Harrison, 2001). Most of the times M&As are the only way to acquire resources and knowledge that are not available in the market. A transaction is known as an acquisition when a buyer acquires all or part of the assets or businesses of a selling company. In case the target company is purchased despite its active resistance the transaction is also known as hostile takeover. A merger, in contrast, is the corporate combination of two or more independent business corporations into a single enterprise, usually the absorption of one or more firms by a dominant one. Most of transactions are considered as acquisitions. One possibility is to literally merge two companies, in which case one company automatically assumes all the assets and liabilities of the other. In this case, the merger must have the approval of at least 50 percent of the stockholders of each firm concerned. The alternative is to simply acquire the sellers stock by purchasing it on the stock market or in exchange for shares. This development usually takes place by increasing slowly, but surely revenues over time in the market the company has become part of. Knowing the clients needs products get adjusted, differentiated and new products get launched. Now it’s been a while since the acquisition and it is more than obvious that this kind of venture was a great idea from Adidas and now it is up to them to try to improve even more and pretty soon overcome Nike as global leader in department of sports equipment, and in unity with Reebok it will be much easier. The closing of the Reebok transaction on January 31, 2006 marks a new chapter in the history of the Adidas Group. By combining two of the most respected and well-known brands in the worldwide sporting goods industry, the new group will benefit from a more competitive worldwide platform, well-defined and complementary brand identities, a wider range of products, and a stronger presence across teams, athletes, events and leagues. The merged companies will maintain their individual brands yet, together, will cover a larger variety of sports and geographic regions, with Reebok’s strength in U.S. sports and Adidas’ more international presence. Their combined clout will also give them stronger bargaining power with retailers. The combination of Adidas and Reebok accelerates the Adidas Group’s strategic intent in the global athletic footwear, apparel and hardware markets. The new Group will benefit from a more competitive platform worldwide, well defined and complementary brand identities, a wider range of products, and an even stronger presence across teams, athletes, events and leagues. Adidas is a German company and has 14,217 employees with global sales of 81 million in 2004 (http://www.fashionbrandsonline.net/adidas-reebok-merger-and-what-the-real-motives/). Reebok was originally a British company, moved to the United States in 1979 and started production of Reebok products in 2004, global sales of 40 billion dollars. Through the merger of Reebok, Adidas will significantly increase market visibility, integrating the two companies complement each other’s consumer base and geographical advantages. This will allow them to be able to narrow Nike lead in the market share to a minimum. The main goal is to benefit from the best sides of each company and emphasize on it. In case of Adidas it is focus on producing sporting goods in all of the categories especially in area of soccer, basketball and tennis. Reebok is in charge of providing market share by emphasizing on their main feature and that is cricket and stylish products well promoted by the celebrities from the music world such as Nelly and Jay Z. PROBLEM STATEMENT Previous research offers no validation that there is a clear relationship of  an improvement of KPI for companies, which participate in M&A transactions, when comparing the figures of the newly merged company, with those of the involved companies separately in case the transaction never happened. The various purposes explained before shows why companies engage in mergers or acquisitions, however, give rise to the presumption that there are positive effects companies benefit from when combining their businesses with those of another carefully selected entity. The overall goal is to get all the necessary info related to the overall situation of the company after merger and to see how the transition went and if the situation at the company is better then before the merger. So the first question is will the new company get a rise in sales and is there a chance to overcome Nike as overall leader in sports brand industry? There’s no such thing as a merger of equals: one company always brings the dominant culture. Smart companies will go out of their way to be protectionist and preserve certain parts of the smaller entity. There may be certain aspects of the culture you want to preserve and value in the firm you’re merging with. Keeping the foundation that made the other company successful must be of essential value. Management absolutely has got to empower people to have a voice in defining what the new corporate culture is going to be. The goal is to find aspects of both cultures that can work in the new combined culture. So basically the second research question would be how the new formed company is going to deal with combining different management values and complexity of joining two corporate cultures? Both Adidas and Reebok went through big financial crises in 90’s so the third and final question would be to investigate what led up to that and what can newly merged company do to avoid that situation. Issues led to big debts to each of the companies involved in this merger and it is of high relevance to research this with big attention. LITERATURE REVIEW To develop a solid answer to the research question, literature review is  necessary and important. Academic literature will help in getting all necessary information to make sure that all the answers have been created properly and that will help in solving the stated problem. The area of Mergers and Acquisitions is a field of great interest to researchers. The will of companies to acquire or merge with another entity is not a new phenomenon as already clearly argued above. There are diverse reasons why a company looks for external opportunities of growth instead of concentrating on its own capabilities of growing organically. Over time, two different tracks of research have developed investigating different aspects and consequences of merger and acquisition transactions. One track is focusing on stock prizes and their fluctuations. This track usually investigates the short-term consequences of mergers and acquisitions around a certain event, which gives it its name: event study. The event can be the announcement of a transaction or the actual transaction date when the deal has not been announced publically before. After all, it does not matter which of the two events will be studied since it is actually the information, which is of importance and priced into the stock and not the event in time like announcement or the actual completion of the deal. The price of the stocks will change the moment investors do change their expectations and take respective actions like going short or long in the securities concerned. Generally, the results of these event studies are that the bidding firms stock prize does fall at the time of the announcement but then recovers shortly after. The stock price of the target firms, in contrast, usually does benefit from the takeover due to the premium, which is normally paid by the acquiring company. Jensen and Ruback (1983) investigate a dozen researches, which are examining event studies during 1956 and 1981. Their overall conclusion is that in those studies the bidding firm does loose while target firms benefit from takeovers. On average, targets do earn 20% when a merger has been announced and up to 30% in case of a tender offer (http://definitions.uslegal.com/m/mergers-and-acquisitions/). In contrast, the companies, which are to acquire do earn just 4% on average in abnormal returns on a tender offer and nothing from merger announcements. Using the cash flow as a measure of economic performance of the investigated companies, Sharma studies the performance of the post acquisition era of the fifty largest companies in the United States between 1979 and 1984. They compare the performance after the merger of the combined new entity with the addition of performance of the companies prior to the merger. Their result is that the more related the two companies prior to the merger have been, more likely it is to have significant performance improvement. Another similar study has been performed by Christian Tuch, which also uses cash flow as determining factor. According to him both acquirers and targets on average earn a lower operating margin on sales prior to the bid (Christian Tuch, International journal of management reviews, The impact of acquisitions, 2007) The intention of the companies is to differentiate their products (Li et al. p.74) from those of their competitors in order to sharpen the brands profile. This leads to the situation that products objectively are still comparable but subjectively for the clients become more difficult to substitute one against each other since it is not just any shoe you buy. Healy and Switzer focus on M&A undertaken in USA. Tuch limits his research on transaction and their consequences to the retail sector in UK. One thing is certain and it is that results vary from case to case. However there are no patterns weather this kind of transaction pay out or not. Switzer uses a larger sample than Healy et al. did and surveys 324 transactions in the US between 1967 and 1987. The performance of the companies involved is measured by the cash flow and it is adjusted by industries average. The author finds that targets and bidders are outperforming its industry benchmarks before and after the merger respectively. METHODOLOGY To generate a research strategy, to collect credible data, the paper will use existing theory to develop hypotheses. Consequently, my research paper will  be based on a deductive research approach. With this approach the theory of the research paper will be proved through collecting quantitative data and explaining the causal relationships between variables (Saunders, Lewis & Thornhill 2009). All the literature previously mentioned in chapter two, will represent the base for this research. It will include the research of all archive with the special attention to databases of New York Public Library, such as EBSCO. Next step would be creating a survey, through which I will have the opinions of the employees at Adidas. Taking this step allows to take in consideration opinions of the employees, which will be better explained in further text. The broader literature on survey methods suggests measures for assessing these response tendencies and some corrections of them. However, these measures and corrections are either not simple, or not adequately used or tested in the context of cross-national survey research. More importantly, there is not much clarity on how, if at all, response tendencies distort survey. This questionnaire will be looking for closed answers by providing different options of answers for people to choose from. First thing that I will do is to contact one of the top management at the Adidas, and get their opinion on the questions, which will be part of the survey. By doing this they will be included in the whole process and I could get their opinion on the matter. Since enough time has passed after the merger occurred the answers I get from the employees will enable me to get better understanding of how everything operates since then. The way I will be communicating with them will be via e-mail and the goal is to get as straight- forward and honest answer as possible. The simplest techniques to reduce socially desirable responding are to assure respondent anonymity, indirect questioning (Fisher, 1993), and to keep some distance between the respondent and the researcher (through a telephone or mail survey). However, even these techniques are unable to fully control socially  desirable responding. One reason might be the strength of the tendency among some respondents. Another reason might be the unintentional tendency to exaggerate the possession of socially desirable traits and behaviors among other respondents. (Chandrasekaran and Tellis, 2010) Good way to attract the attention of intended employees for survey is to before hand explain them the purpose of the research, and what I plan to make out of it. For higher number of responses this will be both on the questionnaire and in the e-mail. The number of participants should be at least 50 so I would have a proper picture of the overall situation. The whole survey will be designed based on the Likert scale, which basically consists of five possible answers. Those are: strongly agree, agree, not sure, disagree and strongly disagree. The questions I would like to ask at this stage would focus on information to the previous state, when the companies were separate entities and now whey they are merged company. Examples of the questions that would be part of the survey are if the company changed the policies related to handling their operations, how the company is performing under new management and how did the company transit from two big rivals to the teammates on the task. The whole proposed research would last for 3 months, because in my personal opinion that’s how long it takes to analyze all the aspects relevant to the matter. The first phase would be to analyze the literature that already exists on the matter so I can get a better understanding of the area. Next step would be designing a survey. This step is going to be easier because interviews stage will clarify the question that need to be answered, and this survey would consist of closed questions with few options to choose from. The whole survey will be in English. When we are talking about the resources there aren’t going to be any financial resources required and the only thing this project would demand is dedication and time. ETHICS Given that any changes that happen in an organization may be influenced by the behavior of the workforce in general, it is necessary for communication to be open open on all channels, thus ensuring that there is much confidence as sense of responsibility in each employee to the company. Having in mind that in every organization there is a supply chain that ends and begins with the client, for this reason it is imperative that any decision is made to ensure that there will be no negative impact to customers. And as it is the case in any chain if one link fails, the entire chain will fail. The client himself is not able identify which of the links failed. Therefore, if a company failed to meet any specific requirement of the customer, the whole chain fails. Eventually they may find another brand that will provide that  product. However this situation is not good for any either side. (Slack, Chambers, Johnston, 2007). The company needs to have a strong culture in order to transmit to all those who in one-way, or another are involved in it: shareholders, directors, employees, suppliers and customers. Although the supply chain helps accelerate to reducing costs, when they are managed with skill, the risks increase when they become more complex. The consequences of failure of a company have an impact when that error more quickly vibrates throughout the supply chain. By integrating commercial collaborations with other firms, one of the most difficult obstacles is to manage expectations and ensure that each of the companies reached. The supply chain is only as strong as its weakest link. REFERENCES Adidas Group: Yearly Report 2007: ‘MSCI World Textiles, Apparel & Luxury Goods’, p.39, Retrieved from www.adidas.com (Accessed January 6th) Arregle J, Hebert L, and Beamish P (2006); Mode of international entry: The advantages of multilevel methods. Management International Review 46(5): 597-618. Capron L, Mitchell W and Swaminathan A (2001); Asset divestiture following horizontal acquisitions: A dynamic view; Strategic Management Journal 22(9), 817-844. Chambers S., Johnston R., Slack N. (2007). Operations Management. 5th ed. Harlow: Pearson Education Ltd. 121-140. Chi, T., (2000); Option to acquire or divest a joint venture; Strategic Management Journal 21(6): 665-687. Child J, Faulkner D and Pitkethly R (2001) The management of international acquisitions: Realizing their potential value. New York: Oxford University Press. Divesh S., (2002); Journal of business finance and accounting, volume 29 Healy, P., Palepu, Krishna G.; Ruback, R., (1992); _Does Corporate Performance improve after Mergers?_ Journal of Financial Economics 31 (3), Jensen, Michael C., Ruback, Richard S.,(2003). _The Market for Corporate Control: The Scientific Evidence_; Journal of Financial Economics Laamanen, T., and Keil, T., (2008) Performance of serial acquirers: Toward an acquisition program perspective. Strategic Management Journal 29(6): 663- 672. Morosini P., Shane S., Singh H., (1998). National cultural distance and cross- border acquisition performance. Journal of International studies, 29(1): P.137-158 Noe T., and Rebello M., (2006) The role of debt purchases in takeovers: A tale of two retailers. Journal of Economics & Management Strategy 15(3): P.609-648 Shaver J (2006) A paradox of synergy: Contagion and capacity effects in mergers and acquisitions. Academy of Management Review, 31(4): P.962-976 Switzer, Jeannette A., (1996). _Evidence on real gains in corporate acquisitions_; Journal of Economics and Business 48 (5) Tuch C.,(2007); International journal of management reviews, The impact of acquisitions, Volume 9(2); P 141-170

William Penn essays

William Penn essays William Penn, founder of Pennsylvania, had many personal defeats but always found a way to be victorious. The thing that made him famous was the fact that he never let his disappointments get the better of himself. When he was down, he always found a way to get back up. Not only was William brave, but he was a true humanitarian. He believed that every person is a son of God, and should be treated like a brother. He wasn't only known for establishment Pennsylvania, he was a living example of true dignity. William Penn, father of the founder, was a lieutenant in the English Navy and played an important part in the sea trades with the Mediterranean. He learned all of his knowledge from his father, Giles Penn, who was a well-respected captain for the Royal Navy. "He served with his father, as a boy, in various mercantile voyages in the northern seas."# William married Margaret Jasper in winter of 1643 and to this conceived three children; William, Richard, and Margaret. William died on September 16, 1670. As he lay on his deathbed, William spoke to his son about having a truly Christian mind, and never be troubled at disappointments. Young William was always close to his father, and became very dedicated to achieving what his father expected of him. Born in London on October 24, 1644, William was the first of three children born into the Penn family. William was sent to a preparatory school in Chigwell at an early age. "He attended school there, it is said, until he was twelve years of age. It seems fairly certain that he acquired a good knowledge of Latin, and he may have also obtained the foundation of his knowledge of Greek there."# When his family moved to London, Penn stayed behind and received his education from a tutor. For four years, he received this education by tutors and this is when he first heard the Quaker preaching given by Thomas Loe. When William returned to London, he enrolled into Oxford C...

Mci Worldcom Essays - Verizon Communications, MCI Communications

Mci Worldcom Essays - Verizon Communications, MCI Communications Mci Worldcom Introduction MCI Worldcom new CEO Bernard Ebbers is changing MCI's old ways. The problem is that MCI before merging spent too much money on accommodations for senior management. The second problem is that MCI Worldcom is ignoring the wireless industry boom. Recommendation I recommend that MCI Worldcom should try to acquire a wireless company like Nextel or Airtouch to gain entry to the booming market. The company would become a better telecommunications business and establish significant market presence that would generate profitability. If MCI Worldcom doesn't acquire a wireless company, they should consolidate. Consolidating with GSM would provide MCI Worldcom with an almost nationwide wireless network. It would also give MCI Worldcom a clear advantage since it is a year and a half ahead than other companies in digital standards. MCI Worldcom must also reduce high costs. To cut costs, the company must first identify where costs can be eliminated or replaced with more economical substitutions. I would also recommend that if the company wants to reduce costs that the CEO should demonstrate his commitment to lowering costs by making himself as an example. I would not invest on MCI Worldcom stock. The company's market price has been trickling down lately. I think that if MCI Worldcom were part of the wireless market then it would improve revenues. Since they have ignored this opportunity, I feel that the company will fall behind because of failure to remain responsive to its customers and to changing market conditions. Current Strategy MCI Worldcom's new CEO Bernard Ebbers philosophy of slashing expenses and consolidating all traffic on a single network has been proved 67 times after buying 67 phone companies. He is now trying to do the same after merging with MCI by reducing carefree spending and avoiding leasing links from other companies for their phone and internet networks. He has reduced the company's workforce by laying off 2215 workers and plans to continue. He also has downgraded luxuries for executives such as corporate jets, first class seating and stays at expensive hotels. These luxurious accommodations have been substituted with low cost carriers, coach class and staying at Inns. Mr. Ebbers has also eliminated company cars for all executives except for himself and Chairman Bert C. Roberts Jr. He is also trying to change the organizational structure of MCI Worldcom by using the appropriate control and incentive systems to motivate employee behavior. The new CEO has offered all employees stock options. Stock options give employees the incentive to help improve company performance and to share in the profits that result. He is also implementing a control system that monitors spending by asking executives to submit monthly revenue statements. Bernard Ebbers personal lifestyle and down to earth attitude has also helped project the company's new culture by popping in employee offices to say hello, and wearing jeans and cowboy boots has made him popular among workers. Mr. Ebbers likes to eat in casual restaurants and currently lives in a double wide trailer home on his soybean farm. Ebbers ways of doing business have given results, MCI Worldcom reported fourth quarter revenues surged 14 %, to $8 billion for the combined companies, while net earnings hit $428 million after a loss in the year earlier period. The stock soared to 5.5 % that day, to $80.44. Ebber believes he can bring more results like this in the future and that this is only the beginning. MCI Worldcom currently wants to focus on the data and international services segments. MCI Worldcom's data business is expected to triple to $23.2 billion, by 2002. The company also plans to build its own communication networks overseas and boost international sales by 40 % to take market share. ANALYSIS OF MCI WORLDCOM The benefit of MCI Worldcom joining the wireless business segment is that it would become a stronger competitor for AT&T. The number of U.S. wireless customers has risen 25% in the past year to 69 million. By 2003 wireless will account for 15% of total communication minutes in the U.S. AT&T is planning to introduce a new bundle of services for corporate customers designed strategically to take advantage of MCI Worldcom's weak point in the wireless segment. The head of AT&T's corporate unit says that under the new plan they would be able

How to Display Menu Item Hints in Delphi Applications

How to Display Menu Item Hints in Delphi Applications Use specific coding language to program Delphi applications to display a hint, or tooltip, when the mouse hovers over a menu component. If the ShowHint property is set to true and you add text to the hint property, this message will be displayed when the mouse is placed over the component (a TButton, for example). Enable Hints for Menu Items Because of the way Windows is designed, even if you set the value for the hint property to a menu item, the popup hint will not get displayed. However, the Windows start menu items do display hints. The favorites menu in Internet Explorer also displays menu item hints. It is possible to use the OnHint event of the global application variable in Delphi applications to display menu item hints in a status bar. Windows does not expose the messages needed to support a traditional OnMouseEnter event. However, the WM_MENUSELECT message is sent when the user selects a menu item. The WM_MENUSELECT implementation of the TCustomForm (ancestor of the TForm) sets the menu item hint to Application.Hint so it can be used in the Application.OnHint event. If you want to add menu item popup hints (tooltips) to your Delphi application menus, focus on the WM_MenuSelect message. Popup Hints Since you cannot rely on the Application.ActivateHint method to display the hint window for menu items (as menu handling is completely done by Windows), to get the hint window displayed you must create your own version of the hint window by deriving a new class from the THintWindow. Heres how to create a TMenuItemHint class. This is a hint widow that actually gets displayed for menu items! First, you need to handle the WM_MENUSELECT Windows message: type TForm1 class(TForm) ... private procedure WMMenuSelect(var Msg: TWMMenuSelect) ; message WM_MENUSELECT; end...implementation...procedure TForm1.WMMenuSelect(var Msg: TWMMenuSelect) ;var  Ã‚  menuItem : TMenuItem;  Ã‚  hSubMenu : HMENU;begin inherited; // from TCustomForm (so that Application.Hint is assigned) menuItem : nil; if (Msg.MenuFlag $FFFF) or (Msg.IDItem 0) then begin if Msg.MenuFlag and MF_POPUP MF_POPUP then begin hSubMenu : GetSubMenu(Msg.Menu, Msg.IDItem) ; menuItem : Self.Menu.FindItem(hSubMenu, fkHandle) ; end else begin menuItem : Self.Menu.FindItem(Msg.IDItem, fkCommand) ; end; end;  Ã‚  miHint.DoActivateHint(menuItem) ;end; (*WMMenuSelect*) Quick info: the WM_MENUSELECT message is sent to a menus owner window when the user selects (but does not click) a menu item. Using the FindItem method of the TMenu class, you can get the menu item currently selected. Parameters of the FindItem function relate to the properties of the message received. Once we know what menu item the mouse is over, we call the DoActivateHint method of the TMenuItemHint class. The miHint variable is defined as var miHint : TMenuItemHint and is created in the Forms OnCreate event handler. Now, whats left is the implementation of the TMenuItemHint class. Heres the interface part: TMenuItemHint class(THintWindow)private activeMenuItem : TMenuItem; showTimer : TTimer; hideTimer : TTimer; procedure HideTime(Sender : TObject) ; procedure ShowTime(Sender : TObject) ;public constructor Create(AOwner : TComponent) ; override; procedure DoActivateHint(menuItem : TMenuItem) ; destructor Destroy; override;end; Basically, the DoActivateHint function calls the ActivateHint method of the THintWindow using the TMenuItems Hint property (if it is assigned). The showTimer is used to ensure that the HintPause of the Application elapses before the hint is displayed. The hideTimer uses Application.HintHidePause to hide the hint window after a specified interval. Using Menu Item Hints While some might say that it is not a good design to display hints for menu items, there are situations where actually displaying menu item hints is much better than using a status bar. A most recently used (MRU) menu item list is one such case. A custom taskbar menu is another.

Globalization in economie Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 5750 words

Globalization in economie - Essay Example Globalization, however, is also an ideology with multiple meanings and lineages. Sometimes it appears loosely associated with neoliberalism and with technocratic solutions to economic development and reform. The term also appears linked to cross-border advocacy networks and organizations defending human rights, the environment, women's rights, or world peace. The environmental movement, in particular, has raised the banner of globalism in its struggle for a clean planet, as in its Think Global, Act Local" slogan. Thus, globalization is often constructed as an impersonal and inevitable force in order to justify certain policies or behaviors, however praiseworthy some of them might be. Not only capitalism or advocacy movements but also Christianity, Islam, and Marxism have made global claims and harbored global pretensions. The term "globalization" in the press appears associated with multiple ideological frames of reference, including "financial market," "economic efficiency," "negati ve effect," and "culture." The start of globalization is also a contested issue. One could argue that globalization begins with the dawn of history. The literature, however, has tended to date the start of globalization more recently in the experience of the West. The word "globalization" has attained significant affecting strength. Several inspect it as a technique that is helpful-a means to prospect global financial improvement-and also predictable and unalterable. Others consider it with antagonism, even terror, thinking that it enhances disparity in and between states, intimidates service and living principles and prevents societal advancement in other words, one of the ways by which the rich get richer (and the poor are made poorer) is through increased globalization. Globalization has been defined as the collapse of time and space, but more detailed explanations distinguish between "interdependence of markets and production in different countries;" "(perception of) living and working in a world-wide context;" and a "process that affects every aspect in the life of a person, community or nation. (Aart, 2005) There are also sources that use "modernization" as a synonym for globalization, and it is sometimes subsumed under "liberalization, " "Neoliberalism," and "post-modernism." Globalization may be seen as a structure, a process, an ideology, or a combination of these. Proponents of globalization see it as, "A force which is beneficial to all, individuals and states, in all parts of the world" (George& Wilding, 2002). Opponents of globalization see it "as of benefit to the upper groups in society, to the multinational companies and the affluent world; and as detrimental to the satisfaction of public needs," and as a "force for the perpetuation and accentuation of inequalities within and between groups of countries for the benefit of multinationals and the upper classes. Its constant emphasis on increased competitiveness involves a race to the bottom". Conversely, the term globalization should be used to refer to a set of social processes that are thought to transform our present social condition into one of globality. At its core, then, globalization is about shifting forms of human contact. Indeed, the popular phrase 'globalization is happening' contains three important pieces of information: first, we are slowly leaving behind the

Do European Works Councils represent a major advance in employee Essay

Do European Works Councils represent a major advance in employee representation - Essay Example countries with central management of large multinational companies to discuss issues as complex as worker rights and any plans the company may be considering that would affect workers. Meetings also allow employees of one country to share information and experiences with colleagues from other nations. â€Å"Employee participation at a European level became a reality with the introduction of the European Works Council Directive† (Fitzgerald, 2004: 1). The purpose of the Councils: to provide workers within large multinational corporations, through their designated representatives, a direct line of communication to top management. With communication as key, various national councils insure that workers in all countries are provided accurate information about plans and policies of the transnational companies who employ them, and ensure worker representatives of established unions and national works councils the opportunity to consult amongst each other and develop a common response before policies and plans are implemented. Beyond these goals, three main views about why works councils primarily exist include benign goals as stated to improve communication and less benign goals of worker control over bargaining and negotiations and input into company policy when market failures occur that may negatively impact their employment. Based purely on description of purpose, the formation of the councils appear a valid and reasonable response to the advent and power of multinational corporations—impersonal behemoths larger than life with little sense of employee conditions or problems experienced at lower management levels. The success of the councils as regards employee representation is, as might be expected, mixed. This paper examines the reality of the success or failure of the councils, and to what degree they have advanced the cause of worker representation. Fitzgerald (2004) points out that the EWC Directive in its final form was viewed as a watered-down version of

Effective Leadership Styles for an Educational or Training Institution Essay

Effective Leadership Styles for an Educational or Training Institution - Essay Example A general definition would be that â€Å"a leader is someone who influences a group of people towards the achievement of a goal†. There are 3Ps that are related to the term â€Å"leader† and these are People, Purpose, and Person. A leader is a person that is deeply committed to the goal and s/he will try to achieve it even if nobody follows him/her. A leader is someone who has a personal vision and in order to achieve needs the help of others. The leader should communicate his/her vision in such a way that the followers will share it and the goal will become a common goal. The leader needs the trust of the followers. Some people are more effective than others at influencing people. This effectiveness has been attributed to leadership styles, persuasion skills and the personal attributes of the leader. A leader is someone that brings big changes and innovations, someone who has handled effectively big crises whereas a manager is someone who improves the effectiveness of an organization at a given place and at a controlled course. Coercive. This is the least effective since it erodes employees’ pride. The leader here creates terrifies and demeans the employees at the slightest misstep. As a style it can be used in emergency situations. Authoritative. The leader has a vision, s/he motivates people by showing them how their work fits in the vision of the organization. This approach fails when the leader has a team of experts but it is a style which is effective in most business situations. Affiliative. The leader focuses on strong emotional relations and then he receives the benefits i.e. employees loyalty. S/he offers positive feedback. As a style it is positive but it should be better used when the leader wants to improve communication and increase morale. Democratic.  

Classic Airlines marketing Solution Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Classic Airlines marketing Solution - Essay Example As per the case study, the firm is losing its profitability and faring really poorly against its competitors. Customer retention rate is poor and the service is very inadequate. Root Cause Analysis Model The Root Cause Analysis (RCA) model is used in internal audits and other problem detection fields. It is â€Å"a research-based approach to identify the bottom-line reason of a problem with root cause representing the problem† (Mainardi, 2011: p180). It involves a structured investigation into a given problem to ascertain the true and real cause of a given problem (Anderson et al, 2009). This is done to ensure the continuous improvement in the quality and systems of a given organization. Root Cause Analysis is a practical transition from the apparent cause analysis to the examination and critique of the root cause of a given problem. This involves the identification of the actual causes in order to find the intermediate causes and from there, detect the root causes (Lorenzo an d Hanson, 2008). Issues in Classic Airline's Marketing Unit From the case study, some apparent causes and issues are identifiable in Classic Airline's marketing unit. In order to identify it and critique it better, it will be worthwhile to identify the apparent issues, the intermediate issues in order to identify the root cause. A. ... The deregulation of the markets and the integration of small carriers and other overseas investors has led to price wars and other competitive restructuring. Classic Airline's extremely low margins give a strong indication that the airline is really losing out in the competition presented by the other airline companies in the industry. Market Share Issues The failure to compete on the markets have led to a sharp fall in the market share that Classic Airline controls. There customer retention of the company has been weakened by the competition posed by other companies. This is because their current reward program has lost as much as 19% of its members, which has culminated in the reducing the flights of the company by as much as 21%. B. Intermediate Issues Areas of Interest: Marketing Alliances & Restructuring of Marketing It has become almost apparent that the firm needs to restructure its marketing units, the marketing structures and the marketing alliance programs. This is meant to correct the wrongs in the company and also retain some degree of stability. This has created two issues which also needs to be examined and resolved from the root-cause approach. Cost Structure Issues The quick and aggressive growth of the firm has been identified as a major cause of issues with the company. The reduction of the cost budget by a whopping 21.5% and the reduction of budgets in other departments is one of the apparent issues. It will therefore be worthwhile to identify the impact of this reduction and the best way of soothing its effects and correcting its issues. This include amongst other things, infighting amongst the executive managers, and the reduction in important units

My Gift of Authenticity as a Lead Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 13

My Gift of Authenticity as a Lead - Essay Example Hutchison claims that living theory is an embodiment in researching for authenticity leader. In this method, Hutchison has made use of autobiographical narrative to develop real-life experiences. Hutchison says that one of the most important exercises in his research was to write his autobiography. Through this, he says he wrote himself out of all explanatory stories in his life and how he became a leader. In addition, he says that it is the values more than anything else that made him rise as a leader. In his project, Hutchison says that he uses multimedia because it makes him use words as well as other aspects that embody his values. The use of multimedia ensures that leaders are relational and do not get fixed to formal representation. Hutchison also claims that the use of multimedia helps in developing an epistemology that is relevant to authentic leadership. Moreover, he argues that multimedia increases his learning capabilities as well as improving his practice of leadership. Hutchison says that everyone has his gift. He says that his gift is an authentic leader and that why he devotes his time researching and finding ways in which he can help other develop the gift of authentic leadership. He started working not knowing that he will be an authentic leader, but he passionately loved his career. Hutchison worked as a community caregiver to young people out of employment and who had addiction problems. For this reason, it is through this journey of his career up being the leader of a Carer’s Centre that he narrates to demonstrate that each and every person has his or her gift and talent. Hutchison says that his practice as an authentic leader help improves the culture of Carer’s Centre organization. Through authentic leadership, he has developed a living theory of learning and mindfulness (Hutchison, 2012). However, Hutchison attests that his journey has not been easy and in time he felt as if he was contradicting himself.  

The Use of PlayTherapy in Treating Toddlers by The Health Care Essay

The Use of PlayTherapy in Treating Toddlers by The Health Care Profession - Essay Example Therefore, play therapy is considered as an important part of physiotherapy when treating toddlers as well as young children. For this study, the researcher will gather appropriate journals for the literature review. To give the researcher a better understanding of play therapy, the researcher will first provide the different types of play that can be used within the different health care settings. Eventually, the researcher will discuss the importance of play therapy on the mental, physical and social developmental growth of toddlers. Since children naturally express their thoughts and feelings through play, the researcher will discuss the impact of play therapy in treating toddlers during the physiotherapy treatment sessions. Prior to the main discussion and recommendation for the use of play therapy within the physiotherapy units, the researcher will discuss the role of physical therapists in the application of play therapy in assessing and treating the toddlers. Upon discussion the scope and limitations of the research study, the researcher will discuss the implications for future research study. treating the toddlers with physiological problems during the child’s physiotherapy treatment sessions. Another goal of the study is to determine the role of physical therapists in the application of play therapy in assessing and treating toddlers. Exercise Physiology – â€Å"the scientific discipline involving the examination of how acute and chronic physical activity influences the structure and function of the human body.† (Birch, McLaren, & George, 2005: 1 – 2) Play Therapy – â€Å"a developmentally sensitive therapeutic modality wherein a trained play therapist apply the therapeutic effects of play to enable the children to prevent or resolve their psychosocial difficulties to achieve their optimal growth and development.† (Bratton et al., 2003) In gathering peer-reviewed evidences regarding the impact and importance of play

My Gift of Authenticity as a Lead Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 13

My Gift of Authenticity as a Lead - Essay Example Hutchison claims that living theory is an embodiment in researching for authenticity leader. In this method, Hutchison has made use of autobiographical narrative to develop real-life experiences. Hutchison says that one of the most important exercises in his research was to write his autobiography. Through this, he says he wrote himself out of all explanatory stories in his life and how he became a leader. In addition, he says that it is the values more than anything else that made him rise as a leader. In his project, Hutchison says that he uses multimedia because it makes him use words as well as other aspects that embody his values. The use of multimedia ensures that leaders are relational and do not get fixed to formal representation. Hutchison also claims that the use of multimedia helps in developing an epistemology that is relevant to authentic leadership. Moreover, he argues that multimedia increases his learning capabilities as well as improving his practice of leadership. Hutchison says that everyone has his gift. He says that his gift is an authentic leader and that why he devotes his time researching and finding ways in which he can help other develop the gift of authentic leadership. He started working not knowing that he will be an authentic leader, but he passionately loved his career. Hutchison worked as a community caregiver to young people out of employment and who had addiction problems. For this reason, it is through this journey of his career up being the leader of a Carer’s Centre that he narrates to demonstrate that each and every person has his or her gift and talent. Hutchison says that his practice as an authentic leader help improves the culture of Carer’s Centre organization. Through authentic leadership, he has developed a living theory of learning and mindfulness (Hutchison, 2012). However, Hutchison attests that his journey has not been easy and in time he felt as if he was contradicting himself.  

The Coming of Age in the Jewish Tradition Essay Example for Free

The Coming of Age in the Jewish Tradition Essay My Bar Mitzvah will be taking place on my 13th Birthday, 27th of January 2002. I would like to invite you to the ceremony in my local Synagogue. The ceremony is held on the first Shabbat after my birthday, this will be the 2nd of February. Shabbat starts on Friday evening at sunset and it finishes on Saturday night when the stars appear, we rest on Shabbat we devote ourselves to prayer at the Torah study, it is a family time. Bar Mitzvah means son of the commandments. I will be exactly Bar Mitzvah on the 27th as soon as I wake up. From then on I will be an adult in the Jewish community, I will take responsibility for my own actions where my Father used to, and I make a commitment to my faith. I will enter a covenant relationship with God, both as an individual and as a part of the Jewish community. When we are Bar Mitzvah we will be able to form a minyan, which is the required 10 men needed present in a Synagogue before prayers can be read. In preparation for the ceremony I will have to: Go to classes to learn to read and chant the Torah in Hebrew, what it says and why it is important. Hebrew is especially hard to learn because it is written from right to left and there are no spaces, punctuation or vowels! I will learn how to put on my tefillin and tallit. The tefillin are special boxes Jews wear when praying they contain pieces of parchment with prayers written on them. They are worn on the head and arm because the arm is close to the heart and the head is closer to my thoughts and feelings. And the tallit is a prayer robe worm during morning prayers. It is a four-cornered square of white cloth worn over the head and shoulders and has tassels called tizits, although they will not be worn at Bar Mitzvah as it is a Shabbat and they arent worn then. I have to learn what the mitzvot are and how they are to be kept. They are the 613 commandments; the 10 commandments known in Christianity are included also. I also have to learn to observe the fast says and festivals of my religion and what they mean. I learn these things because they are necessary to teach me about my religion and to make me understand its origins correctly. I learn them from my parents, not only from direct teaching but also from example, they create an environment for Jewish living for me to learn everything. During the ceremony held in the Synagogue I will recite a blessing from the Torah. My Rabbi is testing me on it. I have to practice the blessing and pass my test before I can recite it at the ceremony. I am also going to read all of the Sidra for that Shabbat, this means a portion of the Torah that would have been read at that Shabbat. My Father will recite Baruch Shepatarani. This reads: Blessed be he who has freed me from the responsibility for this child. And also, my Rabbit will then give a sermon, he speaks to me about the new obligations I will have and I will then give a speech. I have invited many people to my Bar Mitzvah, friends and family, including my little sister Marie, who is very excited, as she will be Bat Mitzvah in two years. Bat Mitzvah is the same as Bar Mitzvah except it is on her 12th birthday as girls mature earlier than boys do. It has not always been marked as a ceremony and is always sometimes on Shabbat. She will receive Jewish books and gifts and will recite a section of the Torah, as I will. Some Jews are unhappy with making any difference between the Jewish responsibilities of boys and girls. They hold Bat Mitzvah ceremony much like the boys Bar Mitzvah, usually when the girl is 13 as well. Order of the Service The service will be held in a special order, I thought you should know what will happen. * The Rabbi will read first * A relative or a friend will read (we havent decided who yet!) * Everyone recites the Shema. * The Amidah prayer is said silently by everyone * The Torah scroll is brought out of the Ark and placed on the Bimah. * A blessing is recited over it by me, I will be wearing my Tallit and Yarmulke * Then I will chant the days section from the Torah. * I might chant a section from the Prophets. * My Father says the Baruch Shepataraini. * All say prayers for the Queen of Israel, while scrolls are replaced in the Ark. * The Amidah prayer is said again. * The Kaddish prayer is said (for the recently bereaved) * The Aleynu (prayer of adoration) * Last is the Hymn of Glory The Shema is the most important Jewish prayer. The Ark is the most important part of the Synagogue; the Torah scrolls (Sefer Torah) are kept inside. They have to be read with a tool called a Yad, so the Torah is not touched with hands. After the ceremony n the Synagogue hall straight after the service there is a small celebration, tea and biscuits will be served. Later on there is a large banquet, some people think there is too much emphasis put on the banquet and that more should be put on the Synagogue ceremony, Rabbis think this especially. During the banquet I will deliver another speech to my friends and relatives. The Rabbi will choose the topic of my speech. I will receive presents off my friends and family, but the most important will be the Jewish holy books, because I will keep them forever and pray and worship off them. I hope you can come to my ceremony, I would love to see you there.

Studying The Future Prospective Of Nanotechnology Computer Science Essay

Studying The Future Prospective Of Nanotechnology Computer Science Essay This paper explores the present impact of nanotechnology on the consumer market. It situates the technical aspects of nanotechnology and describes some early successes of nanomaterials embraced. It includes a description of technology developments in the area of automotive industry, biomedicine, household appliances, nanowires, nanotubes, nanobubble, nanochips, healthcare and numerous other nanostructured materials with a brief description of the number of research and development activities that are in various stages of testing and qualification. II. INTRODUCTION Nanotechnology is derived from the combination of two words Nano and Technology. Nano means very small or miniature. So, Nanotechnology is the technology in miniature form. It is the combination of Bio- technology, Chemistry, Physics and Bio-informatics, et Nanotechnology is a generic term used to describe the applications that work with matter so small that it exists in the molecular and atomic realm. As the name indicates, the fundamental unit in any nanotechnology system is a nanometer, nm, which is one billionth part of a meter. Nanotechnology research shows that at such micro level, the physical, chemical and biological properties of materials are different from what they were at large scale. Nanotechnology originated in India around 16 years back. This new sphere of scientific innovation has a broader scope. Several Indian institutes have introduced degree courses in Nanotechnology at both the UG and PG levels. The areas covered in the Nanotech are Food and Beverage, Bio- Techn ology, Forensic Sciences, Genetics, Space Research, Environment industry, Medicine, Agriculture and Teaching. The fundamental idea is to harness these altered and often improved properties to develop materials, devices and systems that are superior to the existing products. For instance, breaking a material down into nanoparticles allows it to be rebuilt atom by atom, often improving material strength and decreasing weight and dimensions. Based on this concept, researchers have been able to develop a myriad of nanomaterials with amazing properties. The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, also known as CSIR has set up 38 laboratories in India dedicated to research in Nanotechnology. This technology will be used in diagnostic kits, improved water filters and sensors and drug delivery. The research is being conducted on using it to reduce pollution emitted by the vehicles .Looking at the progressive prospects of Nanotechnology in India, Nanobiosym Inc., a US-based leading nanotechnology firm is planning to set up Indias first integrated nanotechnology and biomedicine technology park in Himachal Pradesh. Nanotechnology has certainly acquired. In the long term scenario, nanotechnology promises to make revolutionary advances in a variety of fields. Possible uses of nanomaterials may include the cleaning of heavily polluted sites, more effective diagnosis and treatment of cancer, cleaner manufacturing methods and much smaller and more powerful computers. III CORE CHAPTERS A. History The first use of the concepts found in nano-technology (but pre-dating use of that name) was in Theres Plenty of Room at the Bottom, a talk given by physicist Richard Feynman at an American Physical Society meeting at Caltech on December 29, 1959. Feynman described a process by which the ability to manipulate individual atoms and molecules might be developed, using one set of precise tools to build and operate another proportionally smaller set, and so on down to the needed scale. In the course of this, he noted, scaling issues would arise from the changing magnitude of various physical phenomena: gravity would become less important, surface tension and vander waals attraction would become increasingly more significant, etc. This basic idea appeared plausible, and exponential assembly enhances it with parallelism to produce a useful quantity of end products. The term nanotechnology was defined by Tokyo Science University Professor Norio Taniguchi in a 1974 paper as follows Nano-technology mainly consists of the processing of, separation, consolidation, and deformation of materials by one atom or by one molecule. In the 1980s the basic idea of this definition was explored in much more depth by Dr. K. Eric Drexler, who promoted the technological significance of nano-scale phenomena and devices through speeches and the books Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of Nanotechnology (1986) and Nanosystems: Molecular Machinery, Manufacturing, and Computation, and so the term acquired its current sense. Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of Nanotechnology is considered the first book on the topic of nanotechnology. Nanotechnology and nanoscience got started in the early 1980s with two major developments; the birth of cluster science and the invention of the scanning tunneling microscope (STM). This development led to the discovery of fullerenes i n 1985 and carbon nanotubes a few years later. In another development, the synthesis and properties of semiconductor nanocrystals was studied; this led to a fast increasing number of metal and metal oxide nanoparticles and quantum dots. The atomic force microscope (AFM or SFM) was invented six years after the STM was invented. In 2000, the United States National Nanotechnology Initiative was founded to coordinate Federal nanotechnology research and development and is evaluated. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/41/C60a.png/175px-C60a.png Fig.1. Buckminsterfullerene C60, also known as the buckyball, is a representative member of the carbon structures known as fullerenes and is a major subject of research in nanotechnology. B. Current Research Nanomaterials field includes subfields which develop or study materials having unique properties arising from their nanoscale dimensions. Interface and colloid science has given rise to many materials which may be useful in nanotechnology, such as carbon nanotubes and other fullerenes, and various nanoparticles and nanorods. Nanomaterials with fast ion transport are related also to nanoionics and nanoelectronics. Nanoscale materials can also be used for bulk applications; most present commercial applications of nanotechnology are of this flavor. Progress has been made in using these materials for medical applications; see Nanomedicine. Nanoscale materials are sometimes used in solar cells which combats the cost of traditional Silicon solar cell. Development of applications incorporating semiconductor nanoparticles to be used in the next generation of products, such as display technology, lighting, solar cells and biological imaging; see quantum dots. 1) Top-down Approaches: These seek to create smaller devices by using larger ones to direct their assembly.Many technologies that descended from conventional solid-state silicon methods for fabricating microprocessors are now capable of creating features smaller than 100  nm, falling under the definition of nanotechnology. Giant magnetoresistance-based hard drives already on the market fit this description, as do atomic layer deposition 2) Bottom-up Approaches: These seek to arrange smaller components into more complex assemblies.DNA nanotechnology utilizes the specificity of Watson-Crick basepairing to construct well-defined structures out of DNA and other nucleic acids. Approaches from the field of classical chemical synthesis also aim at designing molecules with well-defined shape (e.g. bis -peptides). More generally, molecular self-assembly seeks to use concepts of supramolecular chemistry, and molecular recognitionin particular, to cause single-molecule components to automatically arrange themselves into some useful conformation. Peter Grà ¼nberg and Albert Fert received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2007 for their discovery of Giant magnetoresistance and contributions to the field of spintronics. Solid-state techniques can also be used to create devices known as nanoelectromechanical systems or NEMS, which are related to microelectromechanical systems or MEMS. Atomic force microscope tips can be used as a nan oscale write head to deposit a chemical upon a surface in a desired pattern in a process called dip pen nanolithography. This fits into the larger subfield of nanolithography. Focused ion beams can directly remove material, or even deposit material when suitable pre-cursor gasses are applied at the same time. For example, this technique is used routinely to create sub-100  nm sections of material for analysis in Transmission electron microscopy. 3) Functional Approaches: These seek to develop components of a desired functionality without regard to how they might be assembled.Molecular electronics seeks to develop molecules with useful electronic properties. These could then be used as single-molecule components in a nanoelectronic device. For an example see rotaxane. Synthetic chemical methods can also be used to create synthetic molecular motors, such as in a so-called nanocar. 4) Biomimetic Approaches: Bionics or biomimicry seeks to apply biological methods and systems found in nature, to the study and design of engineering systems and modern technology. Biomineralization is one example of the systems studied.Bionanotechnology the use of biomolecules for applications in nanotechnology, including use of viruses. C. Tools and Techniques A microfabricated cantilever with a sharp tip is deflected by features on a sample surface, much like in a phonograph but on a much smaller scale. A laser beam reflects off the backside of the cantilever into a set of photodetectors, allowing the deflection to be measured and assembled into an image of the surface. There are several important modern developments. The atomic force microscope (AFM) and the Scanning Tunneling Microscope (STM) are two early versions of scanning probes that launched nanotechnology. There are other types of scanning probe microscopy, all flowing from the ideas of the scanning confocal microscope developed by Marvin Minsky in 1961 and the eloped by Calvin Quate and coworkers in the 1970s, that made it possible to see structures at the nanoscale. The tip of a scanning probe can also be used to manipulate nanostructures (a process called positional assembly). Feature-oriented scanning-positioning mescanning acoustic microscope (SAM) dev thodology suggested by Rostislav Lapshin appears to be a promising way to implement these nanomanipulations in automatic mode. However, this is still a slow process because of low scanning velocity of the microscope. Various techniques of nanolithography such as optical lithography, X-ray lithography dip pen nanolithography, electron bea m lithography or nanoimprint lithography were also developed. Lithography is a top-down fabrication technique where a bulk material is reduced in size to nanoscale pattern. The top-down approach anticipates nanodevices that must be built piece by piece in stages, much as manufactured items are made. Scanning probe microscopy is an important technique both for characterization and synthesis of nanomaterials. Atomic force microscopes and scanning tunneling microscopes can be used to look at surfaces and to move atoms around. By designing different tips for these microscopes, they can be used for carving out structures on surfaces and to help guide self-assembling structures. By using, for example, feature-oriented scanning-positioning approach, atoms can be moved around on a surface with scanning probe microscopy techniques. At present, it is expensive and time-consuming for mass production but very suitable for laboratory experimentation. D. Nanotechnologys Future Over the next two decades, this new field for controlling the properties of matter will rise to prominence through four evolutionary stages. Today nanotechnology is still in a formative phasenot unlike the condition of computer science in the 1960s or biotechnology in the 1980s. Yet it is maturing rapidly. Between 1997 and 2005, investment in nanotech research and development by governments around the world soared from $432 million to about $4.1 billion, and corresponding industry investment exceeded that of governments by 2005. By 2015, products incorporating nanotech will contribute approximately $1 trillion to the global economy. About two million workers will be employed in nanotech industries, and three times that many will have supporting jobs. Descriptions of nanotech typically characterize it purely in terms of the minute size of the physical features with which it is concernedassemblies between the size of an atom and about 100 molecular diameters. That depiction makes it sound as though nanotech is merely looking to use infinitely smaller parts than conventional engineering. But at this scale, rearranging the atoms and molecules leads to new properties. One sees a transition between the fixed behavior of individual atoms and molecules and the adjustable behavior of collectives. Thus, nanotechnology might better be viewed as the application of quantum theory and other nano-specific phenomena to fundamentally control the properties and behavior of matter. Over the next couple of decades, nanotech will evolve through four overlapping stages of industrial prototyping and early commercialization. The first one, which began after 2000, involves the development of passive nanostructures: materials with steady structures and functions, often used as parts of a product. These can be as modest as the particles of zinc oxide in sunscreens, but they can also be reinforcing fibers in new composites or carbon nanotube wires in ultra miniaturized electronics. The second stage, which began in 2005, focuses on active nanostructures that change their size, shape, conductivity or other properties during use. New drug-delivery particles could release therapeutic molecules in the body only after they reached their targeted diseased tissues. Electronic components such as transistors and amplifiers with adaptive functions could be reduced to single, complex molecules. Starting around 2010, workers will cultivate expertise with systems of nanostructures, directing large numbers of intricate components to specified ends. One application could involve the guided self-assembly of nanoelectronic components into three-dimensional circuits and whole devices. Medicine could employ such systems to improve the tissue compatibility of implants, or to create scaffolds for tissue regeneration, or perhaps even to build artificial organs. After 2015-2020, the field will expand to include molecular nanosystemsheterogeneous networks in which molecules and supramolecular structures serve as distinct devices. The proteins inside cells work together this way, but whereas biological systems are water-based and markedly temperature-sensitive, these molecular nanosystems will be able to operate in a far wider range of environments and should be much faster. Computers and robots could be reduced to extraordinarily small sizes. Medical applications might be as ambitious as new types of genetic therapies and antiaging treatments. New interfaces linking people directly to electronics could change telecommunications. Over time, therefore, nanotechnology should benefit every industrial sector and health care field. It should also help the environment through more efficient use of resources and better methods of pollution control. Nanotech does, however, pose new challenges to risk governance as well. Internationally, more needs to be done to collect the scientific information needed to resolve the ambiguities and to install the proper regulatory oversight. Helping the public to perceive nanotech soberly in a big picture that retains human values and quality of life will also be essential for this powerful new discipline to live up to its astonishing potential. Drastic advancements have been encountered in the fields of electronics, medicines, science, fabrication and computational related to nanotechnology. The details are as below. 1)Future of Nanoelectronics: The recent progress of nanoelectronic devices has revealed many novel devices under consideration. Even though some devices have achieved experimental results comparable with some of the best silicon FETs, these devices have yet to show electrical characteristics beyond the basic, functional level. In several years from now, the planar MOSFET, combined with high-k dielectric and coupled with strained layer technology, is expected to maintain its domination the market, due to the fact that the manufacturers still attempt to exploit their existing manufacturing capabilities and seem reluctant to adopt new technology. However, the double- and multi-gate MOSFET scaling is superior to recent planar MOSFET and also to UTB FD MOSFET scaling, thus the double and multi-gate device is projected as the ultimate MOSFET. The role of double gate MOSFET and non-planar will take greater share, as this technology become mature and the risk are more understandable in near future. On the other hand, several issues on fabrication in adoption route to standard fabrication have to be solved for every other technology. Figure indicates the projection for the first year of full scale production for future nanoelectronic devices by ITRS, which reflect the degree of complexity in fabrication for each technology. New MOSFET structures, starting with UTB-SOI MOSFETs and followed by multi-gate MOSFETs, will be implemented soon. The next generation devices, e.g. carbon nanotubes, graphene, spin transistor etc are promising, due to their performances shown by many researches. However, the processing issues force them to take longer step to be main devices for nanoelectronics. . http://docsdrive.com/images/ansinet/jas/2010/fig8-2k10-2136-2146.gif Fig.2. Projection for the first year of full scale production for future nanoelectronic devices. Nanochips: Currently available microprocessors use resolutions as small as 32 nm. Houses up to a billion transistors in a single chip. MEMS based nanochips have future capability of 2 nm cell leading to 1TB memory per chip. C:UserssudshresDesktopnanochip.jpg Fig.3 A MEMS based nanochip Nanoelectromechanical (NEMS) Sensor in Nanophotonic systems work with light signals vs. electrical signals in electronic systems. Enable parallel processing that means higher computing capability in a smaller chip. Enable realization of optical systems on semiconductor chip. Fig.4. A silicon processor featuring on-chip nanophotonic network Fuel cells use hydrogen and air as fuels and produce water as by product. The technology uses a nanomaterial membrane to produce electricity. C:UserssudshresDesktoppem fuel cell energysolutioncenter.org.jpg Fig.5. Schematic of a fuel cell C:UserssudshresDesktopfuel cell fuel cell economy-com.gif Fig.6. 500W fuel cell Nanoscale materials have feature size less than 100 nm utilized in nanoscale structures, devices and systems. Nanoparticles and Structures C:UserssudshresDesktopgold nano particle 1 nano.gov.uk.jpg Fig.7. Gold nanoparticles C:UserssudshresDesktopNano picturesNSF silver nanoparticles.tif Fig.8. Silver Nanoparticles C:UserssudshresDesktopstm2.jpg Fig.9. A stadium shaped quantum corral made by positioning iron atoms on a copper surface C:UserssudshresDesktopnanoboquet nsf.gov.jpg Fig.10. A 3-dimensional nanostructure grown by controlled nucleation of Silicon-carbide nanowires on Gallium catalyst particles. C:UserssudshresDesktopflexible nano wire solar cell.jpg Fig.11. Nanowire Solar Cell: The nanowires create a  surface that is able to absorb more sunlight than a flat surface. 2) Nanotubes: Carbon nanotubes since their discovery are used as the building blocks in various nanotechnology applications. Although many applications are at preliminary stages of experimentation, carbon nanotubes has many future prospects in almost all spheres of electronics applications. Highly integrated circuit is one of the areas, where many researchers are focusing the research and electronic properties of carbon nanotubes are being exploited. Researchers have identified and fabricated the electronic devices having densities ten thousand times greater than the present day microelectronics. These technologies will either complement or replace the CMOS. Further the electronic devices based on carbon nanotubes have additional and advance features such as conductivity, current carrying capacity and electromigration. Semi conducting carbon nanotubes having excellent nobilities and semiconductancies have been prepared and these are far better than the conventional semi conductors. Actually there are some major barriers for developing highly integrated circuits such as present fabrication methods produces the mixture of metallic and semiconductor nanotubes and exact electronic arrangements within a semiconductor nanoube is poorly understood. These are therefore the hurdles in manufacturing and fabricating highly integrating circuits, however continuous research in this area will lead to new and much more advance technology that will not only able to overcome from these barriers but will also open the door for new electronic applications also. C:UserssudshresDesktopmr340083.f7-SnO2-TiO2 composite nanoribbon.jpeg Fig.12 Nanotube 3) Future of Nanomedicine: Nanomedicine is the application of nanotechnology in medicine, including to cure diseases and repair damaged tissues such as bone, muscle, and nerve. To develop cure for traditionally incurable diseases (e.g. cancer) through the utilization of nanotechnology and provide more effective cure with fewer side effects by means of targeted drug delivery systems.Nanotechnology is beginning to change the scaleand methods of vascular imaging and drug delivery. NanomedicineInitiatives envisage that nanoscale technologies willbegin yielding more medical benefits within the next10 years. This includes the development of nanoscalelaboratory-based diagnostic and drug discovery platform devices such as nanoscale cantilevers for chemicalforce microscopes, microchip devices, nanopore sequencing, etc. The National Cancer Institute has related programs too,with the goal of producing nanometer scale multifunctionalentities that can diagnose, deliver therapeuticagents, and monitor cancer treatment progress. These include design and engineering of targeted contrast agents that improve the resolution of cancer cells to the single cell level, and nanodevices capable of addressing the biological and evolutionary diversity of the multiple cancer cells that make up a tumor within an individual. Thus, for the full in vivo potential of nanotechnology in targeted imaging and drug delivery to be realized, nanocarriers have to get smarter. Pertinent to realizing this promise is a clear understanding of both physicochemical and physiological processes. These form the basis of complex interactions inherent to the fingerprint of a nanovehicle and its microenvironment. extracellular and intracellular drug release rates in different pathologies, interaction with biological milieu, such as opsonizati on, and other barriers enroute to the target site, be it anatomical, physiological, immunological or biochemical, and exploitation of opportunities offered by disease states (e.g., tissuespecific receptor expression and escape routes from the vasculature). There are numerous examples of disease-fighting strategies in the literature, using nanoparticles. Often, particularly in the case of cancer therapies, drug delivery properties are combined with imaging technologies, so that cancer cells can be visually located while undergoing treatment. The predominant strategy is to target specific cells by linking antigens or other biosensors (e.g. RNA strands) to the surface of the nanoparticles that detect specialized properties of the cell walls. Once the target cell has been identified, the nanoparticles will adhere to the cell surface, or enter the cell, via a specially designed mechanism, and deliver its payload. One the drug is delivered, if the nanoparticle is also an imaging agent, doctors can follow its progress and the distribution of the cancer cell is known. Such specific targeting and detection will aid in treating late-phase metastasized cancers and hard-to-reach tumors and give indications of the spread of those and other diseases. It also prolongs the life of certain drugs that have been found to last longer inside a nanoparticle than when the tumor was directly injected, since often drugs that have been injected into a tumor diffuse away before effectively killing the tumor cells. 4) Future of Nanoscience: Without carbon, life cannot exist, the saying goes, and not only life. For technological development, carbon was the ultimate material of the 19th century. It allowed the beginnings of the industrial revolution, enabling the rise of the steel and chemical industries, it made the railways run, and it played a major role in the development of naval transportation. Silicon, another very interesting material which makes up a quarter of the earths crust, became the material of the 20th century in its turn. It gave us the development of high performance electronics and photovoltaics with large fields of applications and played a pivotal role in the evolution of computer technology. The increased device performance of information and data processing systems is changing our lives on a daily basis, producing scientific innovations for a new industrial era. However, success breeds its own problems, and there is ever more data to be handled-which requires a nanoscience approach. This cluster aims to address various aspects, prospects and challenges in this area of great interest for all our futures. Carbon exists in various allotropic forms that are intensively investigated for their unusual and fascinating properties, from both fundamental and applied points of view. Among them, the sp2 (fullerenes, nanotubes and graphene) and sp3 (diamond) bonding configurations are of special interest since they have outstanding and, in some cases, unsurpassed properties compared to other materials. These properties include very high mechanical resistance, very high hardness, high resistance to radiation damage, high thermal conductivity, biocompatibility and superconductivity. Graphene, for example, possesses very uncommon electronic structure and a high carrier mobility, with charge carriers of zero mass moving at constant velocity, just like photons. All these characteristics have put carbon and carbon-related nanomaterials in the spotlight of science and technology research. The main challenges for future understanding include i) material growth, ii) fundamental properties, and iii) devel oping advanced applications. Carbon nanoparticles and nanotubes, graphene, nano-diamond and films address the most current aspects and issues related to their fundamental and outstanding properties, and describe various classes of high-tech applications based on these promising materials. Future prospects, difficulties and challenges are addressed. Important issues include growth, morphology, atomic and electronic structure, transport properties, superconductivity, doping, nanochemistry using hydrogen, chemical and bio-sensors, and bio-imaging, allowing readers to evalate this very interesting topic and draw perspectives for the future. E. Foreign Prospect of Nanotechnology Nanotechnology provides a significant opportunity to address global challenges. This is leading to intense global competition to commercialise different products enabled by nanotechnology. However, UK industry is well placed to capitalise on this opportunity and participate in the development of many new products and services by operating alone or in collaboration with international partners. Success in this area will lead to growth in employment and wealth creation. Today, nanotechnology is evolving with some mature products and many in the growth and developmental stage. This is not unlike the condition of computer science in the 1960s or biotechnology in the 1980s. Nanotechnology has been applied to the development of products and processes across many industries particularly over the past ten years. Products are now available in markets ranging from consumer products through medical products to plastics and coatings and electronics products. There have been various market reports estimating the scale of potential future value for products that are nanotechnology enabled. A report from Lux Research published in 2006 entitled The Nanotech Report 4th Edition, notes that nanotechnology was incorporated into more than $30 billion in manufactured goods in 2005. The projection is that in 2014, $2.6 trillion in manufactured goods will incorporate nanotechnology. Even if this is an over-estimate, it is clear that there is a vast market available for nanotechnology based products. It is extremely important to the UK economy that UK companies engaged in nanotechnology participate at each stage of the supply chain. While companies are moving speedily to develop further and more advanced products based on nanotechnology, they are becoming increasingly aware that there are many challenges to address. It was with this background that a Mini Innovation and Growth Team (Mini-IGT) was formed comprising members of the NanoKTN and the Materials KTN as the secretariat, together with members of the Chemistry Innovation KTN and the Sensors and Instrumentation KTN, to prepare a report on nanotechnology on behalf of UK industry. A questionnaire was sent to the members of the various KTNs to solicit feedback on their views on nanotechnology focussing on their commercial position and also their concerns and issues. While the UK Government has commissioned reports and provided responses over the past decade, in the field of nanotechnology, the UK has not articulated an overarching national strategy on nanotechnology that can rank alongside those from the likes of the US and Germany. It is intended that this report, with its unique industry led views on nanotechnology, together with other strategic documents, including the Nanoscale Technologies Strategy 2009-2012 produced by the Technology Str ategy Board, will provide a significant contribution to a future UK Government Strategy on Nanotechnology. Nanotechnology is the basis for many products that are in common use and is providing the capability to produce a very wide range of new products that will become commonplace in the near future. The UK, like many other countries, has invested heavily in nanotechnology and has considered, through a series of reports and Government responses, how to manage and fund nanotechnology developments. At the third meeting of the Ministerial Group on Nanotechnology it was agreed that a nanotechnology strategy should be developed for the UK. As part of the strategy development process, Lord Drayson launched an evidence gathering website on 7th July 2009. Alongside this, four Knowledge Transfer Networks (Nanotechnology, Materials, Chemistry Innovation and Sensors Instrumentation) with significant industrial interest in nanotechnology agreed that it was necessary for industry to contribute to policy development using the bottom up approach. It is intended that this report with its unique industry led views on nanotechnology will provide a significant contribution to a future overarching UK Government Strategy on Nanotechnology, alongside other input from inter alia the Technology Strategy Board and the Research Councils. In addition to the questionnaire, feedback was sought from industry at workshop discussions with invited industry leaders and others in the field of nanote