How do diabetes management teams increase patient concordance among Dissertation

How do diabetes management teams increase patient concordance among type 2 diabetics - Dissertation Example How do diabetes management teams increase patient concordance among type 2 diabetics: a Literature Review Douglas M Vergne Dissertation submitted as part of the requirements for the award of MSc Advanced Practice University of Dundee, June, 2013. ... M Vergne 070017010, am declaring that I am the sole author of this dissertation; that the work has not previously been accepted as part of any other degree submission; that all references cited have been consulted; that I have conducted all the work of which this is a record, and that the finished work contains (21844) words with allowable exclusions. Date: 1-13-2012 LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Scoring System for Study Validity p. 21 Table 2: Results of the Review p. 57 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS To my family for giving me the support needed to see me through this challenge. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my mentors here at school, for their patience guidance, confidence and encouragement. I hope this will make you proud. Of course, I will never forget my friends, for being with me through thick and thin, through happiness and sadness, and to achievements and trials. PERMISSION TO COPY The School of Nursing & Midwifery keeps electronic copies of all Masters Dissertations. An impor tant reason for this is that the University library no longer stores hard bound copies of Masters Dissertations. This means that they are no longer available in the public domain for future students should they wish to access them. We would wish to make the Dissertations of Masters Graduates available to future students by placing a range of examples from previous students on My Dundee. We may elect to use your Dissertation as one of the examples. Note that your name will be removed from the dissertation should we choose to use it, so you will not be identifiable. However, you do not have to agree to this if you do not wish to, without giving a reason and without any negative consequence. It is for this reason that we are inviting you to choose one of the two following options. OPTION A: By

Dance is a sport Essay Example for Free

Dance is a sport Essay I. Introduction: a) Attention Getter: What is the definition of a sport? A game played with a ball? Is it people in tight pants running around? How about â€Å"an athletic activity requiring skill or physical prowess and often of a competitive nature†? That sounds more like it. Football, baseball, and track fit those definitions, but so does another recreational activity that is not typically considered a sport: dance. b) Personal Statement: I myself am a dancer and have been dancing my whole life. Being a dancer, one of the worst things anyone can say is that dance is not a sport and I want to prove them wrong. Transition: Dance fits all those requirements. An athletic activity? Oh yeah! Requiring skill or physical prowess? Definitely! Often of a competitive nature? You bet! Dance is even recognized as a sport by the International Olympic Committee. Then why is this â€Å"fine art† not considered a sport? II. Dance is an athletic activity. a) The sport of dance takes years of training and hard work to perfect. Yes, I said sport. Although some believe that dancing is nothing more than tutus and twirling, it is a mentally engaging and physically demanding activity. b) Dance is actually quite similar to one of the most popular sports in the United States: football. In both activities, athletes are assigned specific jobs, roles, or positions. Each follows choreographed plays. Both types of athletes travel using certain steps or passes. Similar, right? III. Dance requires skill or physical prowess. a) One difference between dance and most sports is the way the athletes present themselves. During a tennis match, the players grunt and groan when hitting the ball to show everyone how hard they are working. However, dancers must always look graceful and light as a feather. The best dancers can make the most difficult moves look effortless. It takes lots of practice to perfect those moves and make them look easy. This is why dance is a mental sport as well. b) Dr. Jill McNitt-Gray, a professor in kinesiology (the scientific study of movement) at the University of Southern California, has worked with national champions and Olympic gold medalists. Through her work with professional ballroom dancers, she found that a dancer doing the jive can reach foot speeds of 15 miles an hour. In addition, a dancer can spin up to 180 times in a minute – four times faster than a record player! c) Balance is a vital part of dance. Dancers must have strong core muscles. Men need strong shoulders for lifts, since they must not only support their own body weight but also their partners. â€Å"Dancers are some of the toughest athletes in the world,† claims Dr. McNitt-Gray. IV. Dance is a competitive nature. a) Many ask, â€Å"How can dance be a sport? You cant judge on time and the scoring is subjective! † Just like figure skaters, competitive dancers are judged on many criteria: technique, posture, timing, line, hold, poise, togetherness, expression, presentation, power, and foot or leg action. Dancers have a lot on their minds while performing. They are constantly asking themselves, am I extending correctly? Is my technique right? Is my head facing the right direction? b) Some people think dance involves less endurance than sports like cross-country running. However, these runners exert forces in only one direction but, as Dr. McNitt-Gray said, in dance, your hands, legs, and head are exerting forces in different directions all at the same time. c) Dance is a cardiovascular, aerobic, and challenging sport. Many professional athletes, including former Pittsburgh Steeler wide receiver Lynn Swann, dance to improve their flexibility. Dance fits all the requirements of a sport, and has the physical and mental challenges of a sport, as well. V. Conclusion: a) Main Points: Just like any other sport, dance is an athletic activity that requires skill or physical prowess and is often a competitive nature. b) Ending Statement: If you are shaking your head thinking, this girls crazy, get up off your chair and try it yourself. Meanwhile, I look forward to the day I might be able to stand on that Olympic platform and receive a gold medal for the sport of dance. Sources and References 1. Professor of Kinesiology, Jill McNitt-Gray. University of South California http://www.worlddancesport. org/About/All/Fit_Through_Dance 2. Pittsburgh Steeler wide receiver Lynn Swann, By Joe Horrigan. Courtesy of the Pro Football Hall of Fame http://www. profootballresearchers. org/Coffin_Corner/23-03-895. pdf 3. The Mayo Clinic, a published medical journal. The Health Benefits of Dancing Including Specific Benefits of Different Dances. http://www. sixwise. com/newsletters/05/11/02/the_health_benefits_of_dancing__including_specific_benefits_of_different_dances. htm 4. Santa Rosa High, The Press Democrat. The great debate: is dance a sport? http://teenlife. blogs. pressdemocrat. com/11749/the-great-debate-is-dance-a-sport/.

What Is the Point of the House of Lords?

What Is the Point of the House of Lords? The House of Lords is a fundamental part of the UKs bicameral legislative system, being an appropriate check and balance to the House of Commons in legislative matters. However, this has been brought into question after the Recent Welfare Reform Bill. This essay aims to examine ‘what is the point in the House of Lords?’ It will first look into its history, then its role in Parliament and how it has changed over time. It will focus on the welfare reform bill and the ban on hunting with hounds as its main examples. The House of Lords are also called the Upper Chamber and are a part of the legislature. Legislature is the part of government that discuss and pass laws (Jones, 2010). It is made up of the Commons, Lords and the Queen, only the Commons are elected. The executive is the party in power and is responsible for implementing the laws and policies made by legislature (Jones, 2010). The Houses of Parliament are divided up into two parts, the House of Lords and the House of Commons. The House of Lords is one of the two chambers of HM Parliament. The House of Lords is the second chamber of Parliament and is also called the Upper House (Jones, 2010). The House of Lords is separate to but works alongside the elected House of Commons. The House of Lords are made up of inherited Lords and Life peers. Modern Lords are appointed by the PM. The appointed peers tend to have a specialist area of knowledge, for example health or education. The House of Commons is made up of elected members (Budge, 2004). The House of Lords has 736 members, 86 more than the House of Commons. There are only 92 hereditary Lords left after they were thrown out by the Labour Government in 1999 as it was deemed undemocratic (Knight 2010). The first part of the House of Lords is the remaining hereditary members, the second part are appointed by the Prime Minister and they are given their titles, for example ‘Lady Margaret Thatcher’ so as she was given the title by the Prime Minister who took over from her she had a seat in the House of Lords. The third part is made up of the court system and the church and people in positions of expertise (Monroe, 2002). Before taking a seat in The House of Lords the peer has to swear an oath of allegiance to the monarch (Jones, 2010). The House of Lords is a combination of tradition and modern legislature (Monroe, 2002) Laws are only made if the Commons, Lords and the Monarch can agree. An unwritten constitution (a convention), states that the Monarch has always got to agree to new laws made by Parliament. The Lords can also only suggest amendments too legislation but does not actually have the power to make the changes, meaning the Commons hold the power (Budge, 2004). The legislative process starts with the draft papers, white and green papers. They are published to allow consultation from interested parties such as professional bodies and voluntary organisations before the bill is introduced into the House of Commons (Jones, 2010). They have their first reading in which it is just read out and then a second reading where there is a debate and a vote to move on to the committee stage which is pre-legislative scrutiny where the draft bill is considered by a departmental select committee this allows the MPs and members of Lords to have an early influence on the Bill (Jones, 2010). In the committee s tage they vote for amendments and send it to the report stage. In the report stage they discuss the amendments; they then go to the Third reading which in the House of Lords. The key purpose of The House of Lords is voting on whether to accept or reject legislation drawn up by The House of Commons (Jones, 2010). Suggesting amendments to legislation drawn up by The House of Commons and debating legislation drawn up by the House of Commons, they can also introduce new laws to be debated. Although the important laws start the legislative process with the Commons, the House of Lords do draw up some legislation, for example ensuring children with special needs and disabilities have access to mainstream education or protecting the right to legal aid in welfare cases and insisting on equality of the NHS treatment for physical and mental illness (www.parliament.uk). Members spend nearly half their time in the House considering draft laws. All bills have to be considered by both Houses of Parliament before they can become law (Jones, 2010). The House of Commons send legislation to the House of Lords, in the form of the white paper, but the 1911 Act has taken away the ability for The House of Lords to stop legislation sent down by The House of Commons. This started when the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Lloyd George, suggested in 1909 the introduction of the first old age pension and a majority of the Lords voted against (Knight, 2010). The main purposes of the Act was 1) The House of Lords can only delay a money bill for one month, and 2) Limiting the time the Lords can delay a bill, meaning if it was rejected three times the Bill could receive Royal Assent without approval from The House of Lords (Gillespie, 2013.) This has only been used four times in the last twenty five years. One of these was to pass The Parliament Act of 1949 which was an amendment of the 1911 Act making it so the Lords could only reject the bill two times rather than three before it could be passed with Royal Assent (Gillespie, 2013). These Acts t ook a lot of power away from the Lords. The current PM is allegedly preparing to use the Parliament Act for the first time in ten years to push through the EU Referendum Bill into Law before the next election (Holehouse, 2014). â€Å"The Act is sometimes described as the nuclear option of parliamentary to break stalemates between the Commons and the Lords† (Holehouse, 2014). An MP was quoted saying â€Å"It shows that they really, really want it to happen. It also shows the Lords that they can’t mess with it†. Although the Lords have been stripped of a lot of their power, there are advantages to the Lords. There can be a lot more individual expression in the House of Lords (Knight, 2010). Many of its members have a lot of experience in different areas of life; with this experience making an important contribution to the progress of legislation and serves to caution the government of the day (Jones, 2010). The House of Lords are also responsible for holding government to account. Members in the Upper Chamber scrutinise the work of the government during question time and debates in the chamber. â€Å"In the 2012-13 session, members held the government to account with 7,324 oral and written questions and 193 debates on issues ranging from child poverty to immigration† (www.parliament.uk). The Lords can also moderate the Commons using their expertise and making sure nothing too radical is put through (www.parliament.uk). Peers have less to lose, being free thinkers. If an MP was to go against their party leader then they could be ignored when looking for a job although some do still have party affiliation and will vote on side of their party (Knight, 2010). Some people however, would argue that having the House of Lords is healthy for our system as it means it isn’t led by political machines with party agendas (Knight, 2010). ‘Ping ponging’ is the toing and froing of amendments to Bills between the House of Commons and the House of Lords. A good example of this is The Hunting with Hounds Act which experienced seven years of ‘ping ponging’ between the two houses. Three private members Bills were introduced by Labour MPs between 1992 and 1995 to ban hunting with no success (Garnett, 2007). However, in a 1997 manifesto Labour offered a free vote on the subject. In 1998 the Bill got its second reading in the Commons and was ‘talked out’ by the third reading (Garnett, 2007). In 2000 a new bill was proposed with a compromise of hunting with a licence, this was rejected by the commons and thrown out by the Lords. The Bill had been introduced too late to meet the terms of the Parliament Act of 1949. After Blair was re-elected in 2001 the ‘ping pong’ effect still continued, with the Commons passing a new Bill and the Lords rejecting it, until 2004 when the conditions of the Parliament Act 1949 had been met and the Bill was given Royal Assent (Garnett, 2007). The House of Lords Reform draft bill was introduced in 2011. The Reform wants to outline the powers and responsibility of the relationships between the two houses. This would define the point of ‘financial privilege’. This could be hard to reach an agreement on when it could be rejected and what kind of amendments the House of Lords could make before they were ‘wrecking amendments’ and what circumstances the Lords would be able to reject secondary legislation (draft house of lords reform bill: report session 2010-12, Vol. 1: Report). Originally ‘Financial Privilege’ was seen as something dealing with Bills dealing with supply and taxation. However in the recent reform bill it was used to reject a lot of the amendments by the Lords and to prevent the bill ‘ping ponging’. The financial implications were seen as big enough by the Speaker to grant financial privilege (Crampton, 2012). Financial privilege is being used a lot more reducing the effect of the Lords scrutiny. Despite the fact the House of Lords do not appear to hold much in the way of power, the House are specialists in different fields offering expertise advice. Also, peers do not have a party agenda and therefore pose employability risk in going against their party. This is useful as these limitations can prevent any radical changes in law. But without any power to have their amendments noted there is really no point in the House of Lords if they can be over ruled completely. Budge etal (2004). The New British Politics. 3rd ed. Essex: Pearson Education Limited. Crampton, C. (2012). Whats the point in the house of Lords?. Available: www.totalpolitics.com/blog/293317/whats-the-pont-of-the-house-of-lords.thtml. Last accessed 6th Jan 2014 Egawhary E. (2010). What is the new face of the house of commons. Available: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/8672770.stm . Last accessed 6th Jan 2014. Garnett M (2007). Exploring British Poitics. Essex: Pearson Education Limited. Gillepie A (2013). The English Legal System. 4th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Jones etal (2010). Politics Uk. 7th ed. Essex: Pearson Education Limited. Knight, J (2010). British Politics for Dummies. West Sussex: John Wiley and sons Peele G (1995). Governing the UK. 3rd ed. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers Ltd. What the Lords does. Available: http://www.parliament.uk/business/lords/work-of-the-house-of-lords/what-the-lords-does/. Last accessed 6th Jan 2014. Munroe, T (2002). An Intoduction to Politics, Lectures for first year students. 3rd ed. Mona Kingston 7, Jamaica: Canoe Press. Holehouse, M. (2014). David Cameron prepares nuclear option on EU referendum. Available: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/david-cameron/10526825/Cameron-prepares-nuclear-option-on-EU-referendum.html. Last accessed 6th Jan 2014 Draft house of lords reform bill: report session 2010-12, Vol. 1: Report . Y8158485

North American Slavery vs. Latin American Slavery: A Comparative Look a

North American Slavery vs. Latin American Slavery: A Comparative Look at Frederick Douglass and Juan Francisco Manzano When we assess the evils of slavery, we typically think of the North American slaves plight. We think of the beatings, murders, hangings and mistreatment of the Southern slave. But what about the slaves of Latin America? Who hears their cries of woe because of their evil slave masters? Is their treatment the same of their brethren under slave rule in North America? In order to answer these questions, it is necessary to look into the lives of both North and Latin American slaves. For our purposes, we will utilize two slave narratives. One account will come from the North American slave, Frederick Douglass, and his Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. The other account will come from the narrative Autobiography of a Slave by the Cuban slave Juan Francisco Manzano. In analyzing these two slave narratives, we will compare the childhood, slave communities, slave/master relations, and literature of both Douglass and Manzano. By taking a comparative look at Frederick Douglass and Ju an Francisco Manzano we will be able to hear the voices of the slaves and understand their plight. Childhood Childhood is a period of maturation when our personalities begin to develop into the type of individuals we will eventually become. This is a crucial time where our identities are forming based upon how we are treated by those around us. +If a child is often handled as a burden that individual will take on a negative persona. In the case of children living under the dark hands of slavery, it was impossible to have a normal childhood. A slave's parents were always off conducting laborious tasks, or they were sold away... ...at to the Slave of the Fourth of July?", thus positioning himself as an activist and a spokesperson. Douglass went on to publish two more narratives, My Bondage and My Freedom in 1855, and The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass in 1881. In between the time when he was writing his other autobiographies, Douglass worked for the New National Era, a weekly newspaper in Washington D.C. Aside from his writing accomplishments, Douglass became a key figure in the abolitionist and the equal rights movements. He was revered as a speaker, author and statesman. Works Cited Douglass, Frederick. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. New York: Penguin Group, 1987. Manzano, Juan Francisco. Autobiography of a Slave. Detroit: Wayn State University Press, 1996. Wilson, Ruth. "Latin America Speaks." http://130.132.143.21/ynhti/curriculum/units/1990/1/90.01.04.x.html

The Qualities of a Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli

In The Qualities of a Prince, Niccolo Machiavelli discusses the attributes that he believes make for a good leader. Although Machiavelli wrote The Qualities of a Prince centuries ago, some of the qualities he advises a prince to have can be adapted to the leaders of today. Some of these qualities include being generous and being feared by the public. Machiavelli claims that if â€Å"generosity is used in such a manner as to give you a reputation for it will harm you. † Today, this advice is completely useless.Pope Francis of the Catholic Church is a prime example of how being generous is, in fact, a good quality of a leader. Recently, the pope has been venturing out of the Vatican at night to help the homeless men and women. Due to his generosity, people have grown fonder of Pope Francis, making him a better leader with loyal followers. Pope Francis breaks bread with the homeless and sits with them to show them that they are loved. These generous acts make him more of a lovabl e leader, and show the people of the Catholic Church that they are in good hands.Machiavelli also states that â€Å"it is much safer to be feared than to be loved when one of the two must be lacking. † This advice, on the other hand, is reliable today. A recent leader who is feared by the public is Kim Jong-Il of North Korea. Kim Jong-Il is known for being a totalitarian dictator, giving his people little to no political rights or civil liberties. He has also forced women into marriage, mandated abortions, tortured his people, executed citizens publicly, and used forced labor in prison camps.The fear of Kim Jong-Il and his incredibly strict and derogatory regulations allowed him to rule over North Korea without being assassinated by his people. Kim Jong-Il proves that being feared can be more effective than being loved by the people. Today, there must be an equal balance between generosity and being feared. Pope Francis and Kim Jong-Il prove that both tactics are effective in leading, but the situations in which they are effective vary. Therefore, Machiavelli was correct in that being feared is a quality of a good leader, but was mistaken in believing that being generous did not make for an effective leader.

Free Essays on James Garfield

James Garfield was a Jane Austin fan with an attractive nose, Frank Sinatra eyes, and a ready arm to throw about a friend's shoulders. (www.eisenhower.utexas.edu/20.htm) President Garfield enjoyed the hobbies of fishing, chess, and card playing. He was a 'dark horse' President who served only 199 days in office before he was shot by Charles J. Guiteau in a Washington, DC train station. James started his career in the political arena as a lawyer. From 1859 – 1861 he was a member of the Ohio State Senate. During the Civil War he was a General in the Union army. He became a U.S. Representative from Ohio in and obtained re-election every two years until 1878. During the Civil War and Reconstruction Era, he was one of the most hawkish Republicans who sought to defeat and weaken the South with every opportunity. Garfield became the Republican floor leader of the House in 1876 when James G. Blaine moved to the Senate. In 1880 Garfield was the choice for Senator of Ohio; however , before he could ever sit in the Senate, he was nominated for President by the Republican Party. Thus, James Garfield became the 20th President of the United States when he took office in 1881. James Abram Garfield was born on November 19, 1831 in Orange, Ohio to Abram Garfield and Eliza Ballou Garfield. His father died when he was 18 months old and was subsequently raised by his mother and an uncle. After transferring from Western Reserve Eclectic Institute to Williams College, he graduated in 1856 and continued on to teach at the Eclectic Institute in classical languages. In 1858, he married Lucretia Rudolph and together they had seven children. In 1860 he was admitted to the bar in Ohio and became an Ohio state senator in 1859. He had a promising career during the Civil war and rose to major general of volunteers; however, he resigned in 1863, having been elected to the House of Representatives, where he served until 1880. He was elected to the Senate in ... Free Essays on James Garfield Free Essays on James Garfield James Garfield was a Jane Austin fan with an attractive nose, Frank Sinatra eyes, and a ready arm to throw about a friend's shoulders. (www.eisenhower.utexas.edu/20.htm) President Garfield enjoyed the hobbies of fishing, chess, and card playing. He was a 'dark horse' President who served only 199 days in office before he was shot by Charles J. Guiteau in a Washington, DC train station. James started his career in the political arena as a lawyer. From 1859 – 1861 he was a member of the Ohio State Senate. During the Civil War he was a General in the Union army. He became a U.S. Representative from Ohio in and obtained re-election every two years until 1878. During the Civil War and Reconstruction Era, he was one of the most hawkish Republicans who sought to defeat and weaken the South with every opportunity. Garfield became the Republican floor leader of the House in 1876 when James G. Blaine moved to the Senate. In 1880 Garfield was the choice for Senator of Ohio; however , before he could ever sit in the Senate, he was nominated for President by the Republican Party. Thus, James Garfield became the 20th President of the United States when he took office in 1881. James Abram Garfield was born on November 19, 1831 in Orange, Ohio to Abram Garfield and Eliza Ballou Garfield. His father died when he was 18 months old and was subsequently raised by his mother and an uncle. After transferring from Western Reserve Eclectic Institute to Williams College, he graduated in 1856 and continued on to teach at the Eclectic Institute in classical languages. In 1858, he married Lucretia Rudolph and together they had seven children. In 1860 he was admitted to the bar in Ohio and became an Ohio state senator in 1859. He had a promising career during the Civil war and rose to major general of volunteers; however, he resigned in 1863, having been elected to the House of Representatives, where he served until 1880. He was elected to the Senate in ...

The eNotes Blog Scholarship Spotlight April2015

Scholarship Spotlight April2015 Every month, scours the web for  some of the best scholarships with upcoming deadlines. When you are ready to apply, check out our tips on How to Write a Scholarship Essay. Find even more scholarships and resources  here. Dr. W. Wes Eckenfelder Jr. Scholarship Amount: $5,000 Eligibility: Must be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident, enrolled as a full time student or as a junior or senior, or be enrolled in a graduate program at an accredited college or university. Must also have declared a major in civil, chemical or environmental engineering or one of the environmental sciences (e.g. geology, hydrogeology, ecology). Requirements: Essay, two letters of recommendation Due Date: April 15, 2015 Mary Macey Scholarship Amount: Two $1,500 awards Eligibility: Applicants must currently work in the independent grocery industry, and be entering sophomores or continuing students in an associate degree program or four year university. Must also have a GPA of 2.0 or higher. Requirements: Essay, letter of recommendation, transcripts Due Date: April 19, 2015 Endowment Fund For Education (EFFE) Amount: Two $500 awards Eligibility: Must be enrolled in an accredited college or technical school program as a 2nd, 3rd, or 4th year student, or returning for graduate study. Requirements: Essay, transcripts, resume, portfolio, two references Due Date: April 30, 2015 HENAAC Scholars Program Amount: $1,000-10,000 Eligibility: Must be involved in the Hispanic community and/or be of hispanic origin, and able to demonstrate leadership through academic achievements and campus activites. Must be in a science, technology, engineering, or math related major with a GPA of 3.0 or higher. Requirements: Essay, two letters of recommendation, official transcripts, resume, photo Due Date: April 30, 2015

Downloading German Songs from iTunes

Downloading German Songs from iTunes iTunes auf Deutsch! Downloading German music- legally Would you like to explore the world of modern German music? Would you like to download rock, pop, or rap songs in German? How about watching a German music video online? Well, I just did all that, and boy was it fun! Apple must have been listening to the complaints of U.S. fans of German music, who for a long time could only get a tantalizing look at, and even listen to, songs and albums by German (and Austrian) artists, but could not buy any of it from Apples American iTunes Music Store. This frustration has now lessened for Mac and Windows users, but not entirely. A recent visit to the U.S. iTunes Music Store was a pleasant surprise. I found music and songs in German by many contemporary and traditional bands and artists from Austria, Germany, and German Switzerland. And I could buy what I saw/heard! There were albums and songs by DIE PRINZEN, FALCO, HERBERT GRÃâ€"NEMEYER, the PUHDYS, MÃÅ"NCHNER FREIHEIT, and even HEINO. (Youll also find audiobooks in German, language courses, and German comedy recordings available for download.) I discovered just about every type of music in German- from classical to rap, from Christmas to country-western- ready for listening and purchase. Soon I had downloaded (and paid for) an eclectic mix ranging from Deutschland by DIE PRINZEN to Ring aus Feuer (think Johnny Cash) by the Austrian WOLFGANG AMBROS. As I type these words, my computer is playing music by RAMMSTEIN (Amerika), UDO LINDENBERG (Ich habe noch einen Koffer in Berlin), and the interesting Belgian group SCALA KOLACNY BROTHERS (Schrei nach Liebe)- all downloaded from the American iTunes Music Store. Mac or Windows users can then create CDs with the downloaded German songs or any mix they want. If I had an iPod, I could also transfer these songs to it and listen anywhere I go. A Few More Surprises - Good and BadAlthough residents of Germany and Austria can download iTunes music from just about any German recording artist there is, we U.S. residents have to be content with slimmer pickings. If you want to download songs by Die Fantastischen Vier, Rosenstolz, or Die Ärzte, (Die beste Band der Welt) youll have to be in Germany. You can easily switch to the German iTunes Music Store and listen to songs by those artists, but when you try to download a song or album, U.S. residents get this unwelcome message: Your account is only valid for songs from the U.S. iTunes Store. But at least you can listen to 30-second samples of the German songs. Even for artists in German that are found in the U.S. store, not all of the albums or songs by that artist may be offered. Some albums are partial, with only a few selected songs available from iTunes, but that is also true of the normal American or British recording artists. However, what IS there is a lot better than what was available earlier (pretty much nothing). There is no German Songs menu section in the U.S. iTunes store (there is a German Pop category, but youll need help finding it; see Tips Part 2), so I started with a search by the artists name or a song title. Sometimes I just typed in a common German word (liebe, freiheit) to see what results would pop up. As I explored the German offerings with this method in the U.S. store, I stumbled onto interesting things I may not have found otherwise. Schrei nach Liebe is a good example. Turns out the iTunes version I downloaded is a cover version by a Belgian girls choir of that Ärzte song, and the Germans are raving about how the ladies took a metallic song (they also did Engel by Rammstein) and turned it into something very different but still cool. After downloading Amerika by Rammstein, I discovered that its in the German Top 10 charts (Oct. 2004) and that iTunes has a music video version! (Free and in stunning quality with a high-speed connection!) Tips and TricksIn the next section Ill offer some tips and tricks for finding German songs at the U.S. iTunes Music Store, with screen shots, artists lists, links, and other neat stuff- including music videos in German. Note: iTunes also works great for subscribing and listening to podcasts in German!

Intro to business Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Intro to business - Research Paper Example spending i.e., food and beverages, and recorded a steady growth; in a way it invented a new market structure through its monopolistic structure, a thorough competitive activity, industry costs and capital structure, all achieved through a systematic approach and healthy business practices. Its journey from Seattle to other parts of the United States and then rest of the world is said to have begun in the 1990s (Starbucks Coffee Company, par.1). Although Starbucks’ main products include a variety of coffee, they also provide food services within the same outlets. Their main business objectives include production of high quality product, aim for customer delight, ensuring utmost employee satisfaction and strategic business performance. Operating in multiple locations across the globe requires a great deal of effort, excellent team of executives and an effective leadership. Starbucks’ leaders infused this culture into every employee through healthy management practices such as team working, training, empowerment of employees, alignment to the mission and vision of Starbucks, appropriate performance measurement and feedback system. From a business perspective, their supply chain network is highly established and well managed through practices such as Coffee and Farmer Equity (C.A.F.E ) program, supplier certification, and robust product evaluation mechanisms. It also abides by all the social, legal, ethical responsibilities towards environment and State through appropriate practices (Starbucks Corporation, p.22). Starbucks has laid much stress on continuous improvement, which includes a continuous identification of areas of improvement; taking up these areas as opportunities to perform better and has successfully implemented Total Quality Management (TQM) system in all sectors (Starbucks Corporation, p.11). The advantages of such business include potential to attract more customers, continuous revenue generation, increasing popularity and can attract best

Poverty ( Global Issue) Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Poverty ( Global Issue) - Research Paper Example Now how does it affect the world in large? It creates a chaos, in the form of increased number of immigrants (legal and illegal both) in developed countries, increases crime rate, hinders globalization process due to instable situation of the underdeveloped country, produces inflation which reduces buying power and consequently encourages corruption, becomes an active cause of decline in literacy rate due to the need of every individual to earn living, increases disease due to inadequate health care facilities and above of all increases the death rate, which is a communal aspect of concern for all the nations to ponder over and work towards its elimination. Poverty means people living their life in very low conditions lacking basic necessities and services for quality life; for example: proper housing, clothing, food, water, education and health care facilities. Poverty is inevitable to any country, but third world countries or under developed countries like Congo, Liberia, Uganda, Z imbabwe, Malawi, Ethiopia, Afghanistan and Mali are extreme poverty stricken, where people lack basic needs like food, water, shelter and struggle throughout their life to make the ends meet ("20 Poorest Countries In The World"). However, developed countries like UK, Canada and Australia have also faced poverty to some extent after the global economic recession. Even the wealthiest country has areas where people live low standard of life, but they are secluded; like ghetto areas. Where, they are seen as nomadic homeless, deprived suburbs, street children, jobless people or as aboriginals. Thus, it’s a relatively mild type of poverty, where they receive aid for their basic necessities from the government or from social services at some point. People suffer from poverty either due to unfortunate incidents like loss of financial means, un-payable debts and due to incurable diseases or due to their pre-existed environment of paucity of basic needs (Lu?sted, p.12). Hence, every hu man requires four basic requirements like food, hygienic water, shelter and health care facility as his basic right to life, which if lack then he/ she is bound to be struck with poverty. Facts on Poverty: Approximately 3 billion people around the globe live on $2.50 per day and almost 1.3 billion spend their life in intense poverty and live on $1.25 per day. Due to the abovementioned ratio of earning and consumption of poverty stricken people, 1 billion children live in poverty and around 22,000 die every day due to it (Shah). Among other causes, scarcity of food, sanitation and clean water is a major cause for increased death rate among children around the world. Lack of drinking water and food shortage has been described as a major cause for increased death rate in the world by World Food Programme, which has increased death rate among children more than malaria, HIV, and tuberculoses. About 870 million people do not receive sufficient food and around 165 million children growth is affected due to continual malnutrition. Due to unhygienic condition of water diarrhea and pneumonia prevail especially; among young children, taking the lives of 2 million children each year, who also lack basic services to health care facility due to poverty (Shah). Outcomes or consequences of Poverty: Poverty causes drastic consequences in any society. Hence, these can comprise of hunger, prevalence of diseases, increase in population, overcrowding and undernourishment.

United States Automobile Industry Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3500 words

United States Automobile Industry - Essay Example Automobiles are durable experience goods that sell for a fairly high price. Consequently, as the purchase of a car constitutes a large investment for the average household, the demand for cars is fairly price and income elastic and strongly affected by macroeconomic conditions, including income trends, employment, and interest rates (Adams and Brock, 1995: 68). Because we look at competitive performance within the industry, however, we do not consider the industry's overall performance and its impact on the national economy. The US automobile industry is highly concentrated, with domestic production dominated by a tight triopoly. The top three firms, General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler (the 'Big Three'), account for 98% of domestic production. This high concentration started mainly in the 1930s. In the first three decades after the automobile was invented in the 1890s, more than 80 firms existed in the industry, with a number of companies entering and leaving the market every year. The number of companies that managed to stay efficient and profitable, and that survived the Depression in the 1930s, shrank to eight firms in the 1940s (White, 1982: 143). Since then, the Big Three have merged with or bought the remaining domestic firms. In the 1970s, however, US auto makers first began to face significant foreign competition. German and especially Japanese car markers, which were already established in their home markets, entered the US market with small, efficient cars that provided stiff competition for domestic producers. Today, imports account for about a quarter of the existing US market share (as opposed to 0.4% market share immediately after World-War II). This trend is reflected in Figure 1, which shows the market shares of the Big Three over our sample period. This considerable gain in market share for the foreign companies resulted mainly from the oil crisis of 1979, after which US consumers began to value fuel efficiency over size and style. The importance of barriers to entry in this industry is widely debated. In general, a long-run barrier is any cost or factor that permits market incumbents to earn supernormal returns while deterring entry. Examples include absolute (capital) costs, economies of scale, product differentiation, sunk exit costs, strategic behavior, special resources or licenses, and other legal restrictions. Because both incumbents and new entrants appears to enjoy the same benefits of economies of scale, these do not appear to constitute a major entry barrier in the US auto industry. White (1971: 38-53) estimates the minimum efficient scale of production in automobiles to be about 400,000 vehicles per year, which amounts to only an 8-10% market share. Absolute capital requirements, however, may be more important. New entrants in the automobile market must build a variety of plants, such as engine and final assembly plants, that require significant sunk costs, and establish a distribution and a dealers hip network to sell 400,000 units. According to the Department of Transportation this can easily cost over a billion dollars (Adams and Brock, 1990: 110). This large investment for the new entrant, along with the uncertainty of future success, provides a relatively high barrier to entry. Auto Industry and US Economics The automobile industry has long been viewed

The impact of leadership or Entrepreneurship Literature Review Essay

The impact of leadership or Entrepreneurship Literature Review - Essay Example A series of studies published in regard to this issue has been reviewed in order to identify the key aspects of the involvement of leadership in organization. It has been proved that leadership can highly impact modern organizations; still, the level at which leadership affects organizations is not standardized. Rather, differences seem to exist under the influence of internal and external organizational environment. In addition, the impact of leadership in organizations can have many aspects; reference can be made, as an example, to the influence of leadership on organizational strategy (Fairholm 2009). The literature review is presented in section 2 of this study. The particular section, which is the study’s main body, has been divided into two parts. The first one presents the literature that addresses the potentials of leadership to impact organizational performance. Then, in the second part of section 2, the various aspects of impact of leadership in organizations are ana lytically presented using relevant academic studies. 2. Impact of leadership in organizational performance – literature review 2.1 Can leadership impact organizational performance? Udoh and Agu (2012) have investigated the potential influence of two specific types of leadership, the transformational and the transactional leadership, in organizations operating in the manufacturing industry of Nigeria. The workers of three organizations operating in the particular industry have been asked to participate in the survey. A total of 286 workers have accepted to state their view in regard to the issues explored through the particular study. It should be noted that workers at different level of the organizational hierarchy have participated in the study, aiming to secure the study’s credibility. The responses of the participants indicated a close relationship between the two leadership styles, i.e. the transformational and the transactional leadership, and organizational perfo rmance (Udoh and Agu 2012). The importance of the above study can be identified at this point: the study of Udoh and Agu (2012) shows that, even if based on different approaches for enhancing employee performance, the transformational and the transactional leadership are equally powerful in securing high employee performance. On the other hand, for Boerner, Eisenbeiss and Griesser (2007) transformational leadership is more likely to boost organizational performance, compared to transactional leadership. The above researchers used both the literature review and the empirical research in order to check the impact of transformational leadership and organizational performance. The review of the literature related to this issue revealed that transformational leadership can enhance employee performance by focusing on the relationship between the leader and employees (Boerner, Eisenbeiss and Griesser 2007). Indeed, it seems that through transformational leadership ‘trust, agreement o n values and self efficacy’ (Boerner, Eisenbeiss and Griesser 2007, p.15) help employees to keep their performance at high levels, a fact that positively affects organizational performance. When the effectiveness of transactional lea

Thank You For Smoking Movie Review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Thank You For Smoking - Movie Review Example There is a fundamental belief in the free enterprise system that when it comes to marketing product, an organization must hold steadfast to the idea that it must be completely forthright about their product rather than spinning the truth about the flaws, or even dangers, of its merchandise for the sake of driving the firm’s profits. While all of the rhetoric thus far may seem rudimentary in an age where we are inundated with marketing campaigns and gimmicks, all designed to drive consumers to purchase goods and services from these entities at an alarming pace, one industry seems to have slipped through the proverbial cracks when it comes to corporate ethics, accountability, and general morality: big tobacco. Tobacco, while banned from producing TV commercials to push their particular brands, are still using highly effective marketing ploys to encourage consumers to purchase their goods, despite the lethally addictive nature of their products. Quite simply, the industry deceive s its customer base to increase its profit margin by minimizing the effects of nicotine use and, in a rather brazen way, seems to pontificate that no studies have completely proven that regular tobacco consumption is ultimately fatal.

How Does The Outdoor Environment Support Children's Personal, Social Essay

How Does The Outdoor Environment Support Children's Personal, Social And Emotion Development - Essay Example Concentration, an important constituent for the development of child, declines following prolonged exposure to classrooms (Pellegrini and Davis, 1993). Thus, this gives roof to the need of playgrounds and outdoor games for the instillation of the lost concentration. Playgrounds, the main instillers of self-confidence and self-esteem need to replicate nature. They also need to provide an opportunity to children to learn from experiment, risk, and control of the environment. It is also essential for the playgrounds to serve better by being responsive to each and every child. These playgrounds meeting the need of children might often appear a little messy and disorganized to the adult (Moore, 1986). The present need is to realise the existent need for well-designed playgrounds for the development of self-esteem in the school children (Titman's 1994). It has long been noted by Sucklin (1981) that social skills known, learned, and practiced on the playground during recess are important even for the later development of children. This is also essential because before the beginning of adolescence, children relate to the surrounding world mainly through their senses and bodily movement, which is greatly motivated by the outdoor environment’s freedom and diversity. This holds a more powerful stand for the green environments in close intimacy. (Kuo & Sullivan, 2002). The social and emotional development of the children also gets influenced by the availability and easy reach of the outdoor facilities and resources.

The impact of leadership or Entrepreneurship Literature Review Essay

The impact of leadership or Entrepreneurship Literature Review - Essay Example A series of studies published in regard to this issue has been reviewed in order to identify the key aspects of the involvement of leadership in organization. It has been proved that leadership can highly impact modern organizations; still, the level at which leadership affects organizations is not standardized. Rather, differences seem to exist under the influence of internal and external organizational environment. In addition, the impact of leadership in organizations can have many aspects; reference can be made, as an example, to the influence of leadership on organizational strategy (Fairholm 2009). The literature review is presented in section 2 of this study. The particular section, which is the study’s main body, has been divided into two parts. The first one presents the literature that addresses the potentials of leadership to impact organizational performance. Then, in the second part of section 2, the various aspects of impact of leadership in organizations are ana lytically presented using relevant academic studies. 2. Impact of leadership in organizational performance – literature review 2.1 Can leadership impact organizational performance? Udoh and Agu (2012) have investigated the potential influence of two specific types of leadership, the transformational and the transactional leadership, in organizations operating in the manufacturing industry of Nigeria. The workers of three organizations operating in the particular industry have been asked to participate in the survey. A total of 286 workers have accepted to state their view in regard to the issues explored through the particular study. It should be noted that workers at different level of the organizational hierarchy have participated in the study, aiming to secure the study’s credibility. The responses of the participants indicated a close relationship between the two leadership styles, i.e. the transformational and the transactional leadership, and organizational perfo rmance (Udoh and Agu 2012). The importance of the above study can be identified at this point: the study of Udoh and Agu (2012) shows that, even if based on different approaches for enhancing employee performance, the transformational and the transactional leadership are equally powerful in securing high employee performance. On the other hand, for Boerner, Eisenbeiss and Griesser (2007) transformational leadership is more likely to boost organizational performance, compared to transactional leadership. The above researchers used both the literature review and the empirical research in order to check the impact of transformational leadership and organizational performance. The review of the literature related to this issue revealed that transformational leadership can enhance employee performance by focusing on the relationship between the leader and employees (Boerner, Eisenbeiss and Griesser 2007). Indeed, it seems that through transformational leadership ‘trust, agreement o n values and self efficacy’ (Boerner, Eisenbeiss and Griesser 2007, p.15) help employees to keep their performance at high levels, a fact that positively affects organizational performance. When the effectiveness of transactional lea

How Does The Outdoor Environment Support Children's Personal, Social Essay

How Does The Outdoor Environment Support Children's Personal, Social And Emotion Development - Essay Example Concentration, an important constituent for the development of child, declines following prolonged exposure to classrooms (Pellegrini and Davis, 1993). Thus, this gives roof to the need of playgrounds and outdoor games for the instillation of the lost concentration. Playgrounds, the main instillers of self-confidence and self-esteem need to replicate nature. They also need to provide an opportunity to children to learn from experiment, risk, and control of the environment. It is also essential for the playgrounds to serve better by being responsive to each and every child. These playgrounds meeting the need of children might often appear a little messy and disorganized to the adult (Moore, 1986). The present need is to realise the existent need for well-designed playgrounds for the development of self-esteem in the school children (Titman's 1994). It has long been noted by Sucklin (1981) that social skills known, learned, and practiced on the playground during recess are important even for the later development of children. This is also essential because before the beginning of adolescence, children relate to the surrounding world mainly through their senses and bodily movement, which is greatly motivated by the outdoor environment’s freedom and diversity. This holds a more powerful stand for the green environments in close intimacy. (Kuo & Sullivan, 2002). The social and emotional development of the children also gets influenced by the availability and easy reach of the outdoor facilities and resources.

Issues in the 2008 Presidential Elections Essay Example for Free

Issues in the 2008 Presidential Elections Essay The forthcoming US presidential election has elicited excitement from the public due to its unique characteristics. For the first time in the history of the United States there is a high probability that the next president to take the office will be either the most advanced in age or be from a minority grouping. The core of the election however is not on the superficial characteristic of the two individuals but by on the far reaching policies that affect the Americans. The purpose of this paper is to look at the nature of the policies that each candidate vows to uphold. It will also offer a persuasive opinion on who between the two candidates has the better policies. A look at the US foreign policy indicates that it revolves around a number of issues key to them being terrorism and proliferation of nuclear weapons. For John Mc Cain’s, the Republican Presidential candidate, foreign policy adversely focuses on these two issues. McCain links the ongoing Iraq war to the war on terror. To him, a win in the war will be a huge step in the eradication of terrorists especially the Islamic extremists in the Middle East. His policy points out to the need to provide additional forces in Iraq and also in Afghanistan. Afghanistan requires a surge of NATO forces to get rid of the insurgents that are currently carrying out bomb attacks against civilians and the coalition forces present. McCain’s foreign policy is mostly centralized in the Middle East. He advocates for the closer ties between the US and Pakistanis which is a strategic partner in the war against terror. He notes that America must continue to work with President Perez Musharraf to dismantle the cells and the camps that the Taliban and Al Qaeda maintain in his country (Council of Foreign Relations, 2007) On nuclear weapons McCain first target is Iran which he accuses to be a chief supporter of terrorism and hence an arch enemy of the US. He proposes the imposition of sanctions to compel Iran to forego its nuclear mission. He also advocates for the solving of the global issues through partnerships with other nations in the world through what he refers to as the â€Å"world wide League of Democracies. † (Council of Foreign Relations, 2007) In Foreign policy, the Democratic Party presidential candidate, Barrack Obama advocates for defensive attacks as opposed to pre emptive attacks. In the same breath his policy voices its opposition to the war in Iraq. He terms it as having been pre emptive. Obama’s proposal is that it is the high time that the United States began a well laid down policy that addresses pulling out the forces in Iraq. He sees no link between the war in Iraq and terrorism instead believing that Afghanistan should be the centre of attention. He argues that his core strategy will be â€Å"getting out of Iraq and on to the right battle field in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Such strategy will be backed by multilateral interactions with other partners and not through unilateral actions (George, 2008). In contrast to McCain, Obama does not believe that sanctions in Iran should be the first steps but rather he advocates for the initiation of direct diplomatic talks to address the underlying issues. (Nicholas, 2008) On health care, McCain’s core interest is on the cost and the expensive nature of health insurance cover. He notes that it is becoming increasingly costly for both employers and individuals to buy health covers. Hence, the key concern would be making it cheaper. Universal care to him is not the solution but the solution lies in addressing the factors that push the cost of healthcare. Americans, according to McCain, should be allowed to buy their insurance from any place in the nation where they deem it cheap rather than restricting them to their own states. In this hence, employers will not be compelled to provide insurance cover to their employees making his scheme to be more individual oriented (Catherine, 2008). Obama’s plan for health care differs from McCain. Whereas McCain is advocating for lesser government role health care, Obama is for increased government participation. Obama refers to his plan as advocating for managed competition where the government sponsors health care provision and also gives room to the provision by private insurers but notes on the importance of their regulation to ensure they do not deny access to some members. Contrary to McCain’s plan, Obama does not propose individual access or intra-state buying of health insurance. Obama also states that it will not be mandatory upon adults to have an insurance cover but insists that children will have to be covered (Catherine, 2008). The issue of immigration has also been given prominence in the election and it is posing tricky challenges with each candidate hoping to garner the support of over 8 million Latinos and at the same time being cautious not to vex the conservative block in their specific parties. McCain recognizes the urgency in the need to address the issue of immigration. His approach to the problem is to first seal the boarders to prevent illegal immigration then proceed from there. His policy lacks in clarity and concision especially in the knowledge that he introduced a bill in the house to address comprehensively the issue of immigration. McCain appreciates the fact that immigration is the force behind the wave of crimes that face the United States and believes that the solution lies in deporting criminals and only allowing guest workers from Latin America. He vows to introduce an electronic system that will verify the identification of workers and be able to detect aliens. This will be backed by the need to prosecute those employers that employ illegal immigration (McCain- Palin, 2008). Obama also recognizes the seriousness of the issue and how it continues to draw heated debates in the public forum. He is in support of the McCain-Edward bill that sought to address the issue and advocates for comprehensive immigration reforms. He promises to address the issue during his first year in office. Both McCain’s and Obama’s immigration policies resemble each other although Obama emphasizes on the need also to fast track the process of legalization for those that are yet to be registered in the United States, while at the same facilitating family immigrations (Farnam, 2008).. The verdict on the race to the white house indicates that it is a hotly contested election. Both candidates are running neck to neck though some polls favor Obama as having an edge over McCain. A look at the issues presented in this paper and on others in the public court indicates that both candidates have set out concrete plans to drive the nation for the next four years. However, a simple analysis of the core issues that require immediate attention reveals Obama’s policies to be better than McCain’s. Obama had vehemently voiced his opposition to the war long before his candidacy to 2008 presidential elections had become obvious. McCain on the other hand had voted for the Iraq war and has continued to support an upsurge of the military forces in Iraq. It is plausible to say that the war in Iraq has contributed a lot to the woes facing the United States today. The government has spent billions in a war that meant nothing to Americans in the face of the spiraling economic recession. McCain is vowing to continue with the war, risking more of American soldier’s lives and spending additional billions. Obama has advocated for a withdrawal vowing instead to concentrate efforts in Afghanistan which is believed to be the cradle of terrorism. This is a sound foreign policy strategy and majority of Americans are siding with him. Most Americans draw parallel between the wars in Iraq and woes facing the economy. With no additional expenditure on the war and with a better plan to revive the economy, Obama indicates he is in touch with the immediate problems facing the United States. This is further evident in his health plan. While it is clear that both candidates are seeking for the extended health coverage for Americans, Obama’s idea of regulating health insurance companies and emphasis on the increased role of the government emphasizes the importance of the government to directly safeguard the health interests of its citizens. It is indeed clear that with the proposal for a multilateral approach to global problems, the sound health policy and the recognition of immigrants’ labor importance, Obama is the natural choice of the forthcoming presidential elections.

Implications of the TRAPPIST-1 Discovery

Implications of the TRAPPIST-1 Discovery The Search for Extra-Terrestrial Life in the Universe and the Implications of the TRAPPIST-1 Discovery Abstract Despite the absence of any discovery of life beyond the Earth in the Solar System, or communication in the form of radio signals from beyond the Solar System, humankinds quest to answer the question whether there is life elsewhere in the Universe continues apace. The answer to the question could be tantalizingly close now with some ambitious missions being planned in the Solar System to try and find life itself, and surveys of unprecedented scale being conducted with space and terrestrial telescopes to identify potentially habitable exoplanets showing evidence for the existence of life. One such survey (the TRAPPIST survey) led to the discovery of a nearby solar system with a dwarf star at its centre, and in February this year the existence of seven Earth-sized planets orbiting the star was confirmed, with at least three lying in the habitable zone. Studies are continuing to see if there is evidence for the existence of life on any of these planets, with profound astronomical implica tions. This dissertation considers the question of what is life, before reviewing the history and future of the search for extra-terrestrial life in the Universe. The techniques employed and the results from the TRAPPIST survey are reviewed and the implications of the follow-on studies that are now planned are discussed. It concludes by considering the question whether humankind will ever encounter intelligent life in the Universe.      Ã‚   Thomas Zurbuchen Associate administrator of the Science Mission Directorate at NASA speaking at the press briefing about the TRAPPIST-1 exoplanets in February 2017 The Search for Extra-Terrestrial Life in the Universe Contents 1.Introduction 2.What is Life? 3.Pre-requisites for Life 5.History of the Search for Life Beyond Earth Works Cited References The Search for Extra-Terrestrial Life in the Universe Introduction Despite the absence of any discovery of life beyond the Earth in the Solar System, or communication in the form of radio signals from beyond the Solar System, humankinds quest to answer the question whether there is life elsewhere in the Universe continues apace. Exobiology the search for life or for evidence of it has been stimulated by the extraordinary success of missions to planets and other bodies in the Solar System and the rapid advances that have been made in telescope technology in recent decades. The answer to the question could be tantalizingly close now with some ambitious missions being planned in the Solar System to try and find life itself, and surveys of unprecedented scale being conducted with space and terrestrial telescopes to identify potentially habitable exoplanets showing evidence for the existence of life. One such survey (the TRAPPIST survey) led to the discovery of a nearby solar system with a dwarf star at its centre, and in February this year the existence of seven Earth-sized planets orbiting the star was confirmed, with at least three lying in the habitable zone. Studies are continuing to see if there is evidence for the existence of life on any of these planets, with profound astronomical implications. This dissertation considers the question of what is life, before reviewing the history and future of the search for extra-terrestrial life in the Universe. The techniques employed and the results from the TRAPPIST survey are reviewed and the implications of the follow-on studies that are now planned are discussed. It concludes by considering the question whether humankind will ever encounter intelligent life in the Universe. What is Life? Is there life elsewhere in the universe? Before setting out to answer that question we need to understand what we mean by life. In popular culture extra-terrestrial life is usually characterised by intelligent humanoid creatures with whom mankind can interact and communicate, but one only has to look at the diversity of life on Earth to appreciate that there are countless life forms, each unique and a product of the environment it inhabits. Nor can all life forms on Earth necessarily be described as intelligent, perhaps as defined by the Oxford Concise Dictionary: The ability to acquire and apply knowledge and skills. It is reasonable to assume that an ability to communicate is essential if a species is to be described as intelligent, but intelligence is not a pre-requisite for the development of life. There are many scientific definitions of life, such as that offered by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary; An organismic state characterized by capacity for metabolism, growth, reaction to stimuli, and reproduction. This definition is helpful but it does not explicitly recognise that the ability to evolve, particularly in a changing environment, is vital for the development of sustainable life. Mankind has expended considerable effort over the millennia trying to understand the cosmos. The ancients saw it as a place inhabited by the gods, but as astronomy developed, and with it our understanding of the Solar System and the Universe, we began to ask the question, Are we alone?, or perhaps more precisely, Are there others out there like us? Perhaps the question we have been seeking to answer should really have been in two parts; Is there life elsewhere in the universe, and if so is it intelligent and would we be able to interact with it in some way? Pre-requisites for Life Earth is the only place where it is possible today to study living things and fossils to understand life, its evolution and the habitats where it can thrive. On Earth life is found in many extreme environments including; around volcanic vents on the mid-ocean ridges; in deeply-buried porous sedimentary rocks (Bruckner, 2017); permanently in caves; in glacier ice (Edwards, 2014); in thermal springs; in the stratosphere (Major, 2016) and in naturally toxic environments that would be poisonous to most other life forms. Despite the abundance of life on the surface of the Earth it has been suggested that there may even be more life below the surface than there is above (Cox, 2013). Figure 1: Colony of Deepsea Tube Worms and other fauna at the Galapagos Rift. (Photo: NOAA 2011 Galapagos Rift Expedition) Figure 2: A loach, a permanent cave-dwelling fish that crawls out of the water to feed on bacteria growing on damp rocks. (Photo: Dantà © Fenolio) All terrestrial life exhibits metabolism, which is a chemical process to harvest energy from the environment to maintain the living state of the cells that make up an organism. Metabolism involves moving and breaking down nutrients in order to produce energy to synthesize new proteins, nucleic acids etc. that are essential to sustain life (Dr Ananya Mandal, 2013). All terrestrial life is based on the carbon atom, which can form chemical bonds to create the long and complex organic molecules that are the essential building blocks for life (Freeman, 2011). All terrestrial life is also reliant on liquid water as the medium within which the metabolic process occurs. Without liquid water there can be no metabolism and therefore no life, as demonstrated by the Atacama Desert the driest place on Earth where there is no evidence for the existence of any living organisms (Cox, 2013). It is generally accepted that the pre-requisites for life are; Access to nutrients that contain the chemical elements necessary for life; An energy source that can be harvested directly or indirectly; and Liquid water. Given that all elements occur throughout the Universe, as do stars that emit energy in the form of photons, the most obvious place to look for extra-terrestrial life is on the surface of planets where there is likely to be liquid water. In any solar system there will be a region around the star within which the temperature is such that water will exist as a liquid. This is known as the Habitable Zone. The distance of the habitable zone from the star and its extent will be a function of the spectral type (and therefore mass) of the star and can be estimated using the Inverse Square Law, assuming the existence of an atmosphere with sufficient density to prevent sublimation of the water. The figure below shows the extent of the habitable zone for various star masses, with the Solar System planets and the exoplanets orbiting the red dwarf star Gliese 581 superimposed. Figure 3: The habitable zone as a function of stellar mass and distance from the star (Chester Harman, Planets: PHL at UPR Arecibo, NASA/JPL/APL/Arizona) Another potential habitat for life is on the moons of large planets with elliptical orbits are subjected to tidal heating caused by tidal friction. Orbital and rotational energy is dissipated as heat in the crust of the moon, in some cases melting the ice and forming an ocean beneath the ice crust. Two known examples of this in the Solar System are Jupiters moon Europa and Saturns moon Enceladus. It is postulated that life could also exist below the surface of Jupiters moon Io where there is plentiful heat to keep any water that was trapped in a liquid state, and where living organisms would be protected from Jupiters radiation (Choi, 2010). The Origin and Evolution of Life on Earth and Elsewhere Through the study of living organisms the pre-requisites for life are reasonably well understood, as is the evolutionary process through inter alia the study of fossils. However, to answer the question of how life came to be established on Earth it is also necessary to look beyond the Earth for clues. The elements that make up organic molecules are very abundant in the Universe and are known to originate from non-biological processes (e.g. volcanic activity on Mars (Carnegie Instution, 2012)) and there is a lot of evidence to suggest organic molecules are widespread in the galaxy, e.g.: Iso-propyl cyanide has been detected by examining microwave emission lines in inter-stellar clouds in the Milky Way (BBC, 2014). Organic molecules have been detected using spectral analysis in the tails of comets. The Rosetta mission to comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko also detected organic molecules (ESA, 2016). Organic molecules have also been found in certain types of meteorite collected on Earth. Carbonaceous chondrites are rare meteorites that have not melted at any stage of their life so are thought to pre-date the Solar System. They contain substantial amounts of carbon, including complex organic compounds and occasionally amino acids, and up to 20% water (Freeman, 2011). In the early Solar System comets and meteorides were very numerous and according to the Panspermia Hypothesis they seeded the Universe with simple life forms that got trapped in ejecta thrown into space when collisions occurred between planets and moons. This theory was given credence when living bacteria was found in a sealed camera recovered and brought back to Earth by the Apollo 12 astronauts from the Surveyor 3 spacecraft. Surveyor 3 had been on the lunar surface for three years. Another possibility is that organic molecules were formed on Earth, as hypothesised by Oparin and Haldane (Oparin, 1924). In 1952 Miller and Urey conducted their famous laboratory experiment which simulated conditions on early Earth. They mixed water, ammonia, methane and hydrogen in an atmosphere of water vapour, through which electric sparks were fired regularly to simulate lightening. At the end of the experiment they discovered that amino acids had indeed formed, giving credence to this hypothesis (Miller, 1953). Figure 4: The Miller-Uray apparatus Once all the right ingredients were present something kick-started life on Earth, and/or elsewhere in the Universe if the Panspermia Hypothesis is right. It is not possible today to conclude how life originated on Earth, but in any event the fossil record shows that the first simple living organisms appeared on Earth around 3.8 billion years ago, and so began the process of evolution producing the incredible diversity of life on Earth today. Whether life was kick-started on Earth or arrived from elsewhere is arguably one of the most important factors influencing the possible distribution of extra-terrestrial life, and is discussed again in Section xx. History of the Search for Life Beyond Earth NASA was established by an act of the US Congress in 1958, mainly in response to the launch by the Soviet Union of Sputnik 1. Most of its efforts were initially concentrated on the development of manned and unmanned space flight, but in the 1970s exploration of the Solar System using scientific probes began, driven to a large extent by the search for life beyond Earth. NASA began a broad-based effort to learn how to look for the presence both ancient and current of life beyond Earth, giving birth to a new science which became known as Exobiology. The fundamental questions that NASA set out to answer were; What is needed for life to thrive? How does life evolve? Where else in the Universe could it have evolved? How do we find it? In time it was acknowledged that to help answer these questions the detailed study of life on Earth was necessary to understand the origins and evolution of life and the habitats where it is found. The scope of exobiology expanded and it became known as Astrobiology (Freeman, 2011). During the 1960s a number of European countries started to get involved in space exploration, eventually clubbing together to form the European Space Agency (ESA) in 1975, bringing more resources to the exploration effort. The Search for Evidence of Intelligent Life In 1959 Guiseppe Cocconi and Philip Morrison observed that if intelligent extra-terrestrial life had been attempting to communicate it would probably have been doing so using radio waves transmitted at the wavelength of neutral hydrogen (21.1 cm), which is in a region of the radio spectrum dubbed the water hole due to its proximity to the hydrogen and hydroxyl radical spectral line. These radio waves do not experience diminution when they travel through the interstellar medium or through the Earths atmosphere and they argued that it should therefore be possible to detect such signals with terrestrial radio telescopes because (Cocconi Morrison, 1959). In 1960 Dr Frank Drake used the radio telescope at the National Astronomy Observatory in West Virginia to search for four months for radio signals with a wavelength of 21.1 cm emanating from the vicinity of nearby stars Epsilon Eridani and Tau Ceti (Drake, 1961). He failed to detect any signals but this heralded the beginning of SETI (the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence). Since the 1980s there has been an international collaborative effort to detect meaningful signals across an increasingly wide range of wavelengths, but although occasional signals have been detected they have not been sustained or repeated, which suggests they were not produced by an intelligent life form seeking to communicate. Notwithstanding this, the search continues. The Search for Suitable Habitats and Evidence for the Existence of Life Aristotle was the first to observe life in snow as a snow algal bloom. These occur as algae produce reddish-pink blooms (watermelon snow) as seen in this sample of Svalbard snow. The reddish-pink pigments are a microbial sunscreen, protecting the algae from UV radiation. Photo credit: Dr Arwyn Edwards (Edwards, 2014) Drake Stars w/ mass > 1.5o unlikely to support life humans took 4bn + yrs Small stars long life but low temp, planets have to be close but then gravity locked v. low POS based on current understanding = sun-like star- low rate of formation; 1:10 w/ habitable zone Implications of Trappist-1 results and historical assumptions The Probability of There Being Extra-Terrestrial Life in the Universe The Drake Equation The Drake equation is: N = Rà ¢Ã‹â€ - à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ ¹Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ fp à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ ¹Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ ne à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ ¹Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ fà ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã¢â‚¬Å" à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ ¹Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ fi à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ ¹Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ fc à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ ¹Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ L where: N = the number of civilizations in our galaxy with which communication might be possible (i.e. which are on our current past light cone); and R* = the average rate of star formation in our galaxy fp = the fraction of those stars that have planets ne = the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets fl = the fraction of planets that could support life that actually develop life at some point fi = the fraction of planets with life that actually go on to develop intelligent life (civilizations) fc = the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space L = the length of time for which such civilizations release detectable signals into space No table of figures entries found. 2. Prof BBC. (2014). Complex organic molecule found in interstellar space. Bruckner, M. (2017). Endoliths-Microbes Living within Rocks. Microbial Life. Carnegie Instution. (2012). Organic carbon from Mars, but not biological. Science Daily. Cox, P. B. (2013). Wonders of the Solar System. Dr Ananya Mandal, M. (2013). What is Metabolism? Edwards, D. A. (2014). Glacier Ecosystems. Antarctic Glaciers. ESA. (2016). Rosettas comet contains ingredients for life. Freeman, R. (2011). Universe Ninth Edition. J. Mayo Greenberg, C. X.-G. (1992). The seeding of life by comets. Advances in Space Research. Major, J. (2016). Hunting for High Life: What Lives in Earths Stratosphere? Universe Today. Oparin, A. I. (1924). The Origin Of Life. The Oxford Concise Dictionary. (n.d.).   Ã‚   http://www.news-medical.net/life-sciences/What-is-Metabolism.aspx https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/05/120524143450.htm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia https://history.nasa.gov/factsheet.htm https://astrobiology.nasa.gov/about/history-of-astrobiology/ http://www.esa.int/About_Us/Welcome_to_ESA/ESA_history/History_of_Europe_in_space Ken Rice : The Detection and Characterization of Extrasolar Planets; Published: 19 September 2014

Crime And Drugs :: Crime Drugs Research Papers

Crime and Drug Use The link between drug use and crime is not a new one. For more than twenty years, both the National Institute on Drug Abuse and the National Institute of Justice have funded many studies to try to better understand the connection. One such study was done in Baltimore on heroin users. This study found high rates of criminality among users during periods of active drug use, and much lower rates during periods of nonuse (Ball et al. 1983, pp.119-142). A large number of people who abuse drugs come into contact with the criminal justice system when they are sent to jail or to other correctional facilities. The criminal justice system is flooded with substance abusers. The need for expanding drug abuse treatment for this group of people was recognized in the Crime Act of 1994, which for the first time provided substantial resources for federal and state jurisdictions. In this paper, I will argue that using therapeutic communities in prisons will reduce the recidivism rates among people who have been released from prison. I am going to use the general theory of crime, which is based on self-control, to help rationalize using federal tax dollars to fund these therapeutic communities in prisons. I feel that if we teach these prisoners some self-control and alternative lifestyles that we can keep them from reentering the prisons once they get out. I am also going to describe some of today’s programs that have proven to be very effective. Gottfredson and Hirschi developed the general theory of crime. It According to their theory, the criminal act and the criminal offender are separate concepts. The criminal act is perceived as opportunity; illegal activities that people engage in when they perceive them to be advantageous. Crimes are committed when they promise rewards with minimum threat of pain or punishment. Crimes that provide easy, short-term gratification are often committed. The number of offenders may remain the same, while crime rates fluctuate due to the amount of opportunity (Siegel 1998). Criminal offenders are people that are predisposed to committing crimes. This does not mean that they have no choice in the matter, it only means that their self-control level is lower than average. When a person has limited self-control, they tend to be more impulsive and shortsighted. This ties back in with crimes that are committed that provide easy, short-term gratification. These people do not necessarily have a tendency to commit crimes, they just do not look at long-term consequences and they tend to be reckless and self-centered (Longshore 1998, pp.

heroarms A Comparison of Code Heroes of A Farewell to Arms and For Who

The Code Heroes of A Farewell to Arms and For Whom the Bell Tolls      Ã‚  Ã‚  In Ernest Hemingway's fiction, there is something known as the "Hemingway Hero".   This term is usually applied to the male protagonist in his works.   The Hemingway hero illustrates a variety of traits, ranging from heavy drinking to his role as a leader among the characters with whom he interacts.   Traits of this hero also resemble the personal characteristics of Hemingway himself, and the hero usually finds himself in similar predicaments Hemingway faced in his life.   Two Hemingway heroes, Robert Jordan from For Whom the Bell Tolls and Frederic Henry from A Farewell to Arms, exhibit the traits established in Hemingway's heroic code.   Given the presence of war in each novel, the two heroes display leadership in some form many times.   Jordan and Henry also mature to realize that they hold the capacity to love as each develops an intimate relationship with a woman they meet.   Just as Ernest Hemingway aided the injured in the Great War, Frederic Henry d rives an ambulance for the Italian army in the same war.   And although Hemingway did not fight in the Spanish Civil War as Robert Jordan does, he wrote newspaper articles covering the war in order to publicize the Republican struggle.   The hero Hemingway creates in his fiction serves several purposes.   Through his heroes, Hemingway idealizes his beliefs about life and how men should act as well as events in his own life.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Since Hemingway's time, literary critics have defined his heroic code to include the following:   The Hemingway hero does not believe in the afterlife, is brave, strong and seeks pleasure,   thinks cowardliness is disgraceful, believes in grace, courage and discipline, thinks de... ...as collecting important information about the bridge for Robert.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Frederic Henry, on the other hand, has little respect for discipline, and intern, displays hardly any of his own.   Henry begins the war helping the Italian Army, serving as an ambulance driver.   He receives an injury to his leg, and after recovering, deserts the army when he becomes separated from the rest of the army during a retreat......    Works Cited Hemingway, Ernest. A Farewell to Arms. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1957.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   ---. For Whom the Bell Tolls. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1968. Ernest Hemingway in His Time.   July, 1999. Universtiy of Delaware Library, Special Collections Department. 29 Dec. 20002 Flashback. July, 1999. The Atlantic Monthly. 29 Dec. 2000 Hemingway Campfire. February, 2000. Hemingway Nantucket Campfire. 5 Jan. 2002

Film Review: Sleepless In Seattle Essay

When Hollywood makes a movie about a spouse who has lost a significant other, the story usually evolves around the wife. How she deals with the loss, the grief, her support group and how she manages to get her life back on track for the sake of her children and herself. But Sleepless In Seattle is a totally different kind of widower movie. The movie released in 1993 was helmed by Nora Ephron from a story by Jeff Arch, the movie casts a pre Oscar winner Tom Hanks as the widower Sam Baldwin who is learning to cope with the loss of his wife, raising his son Jonah ( as portrayed by Ross Malinger) alone and helping the child to adjust to life without his mother, as well as trying to get his own personal life back on track. The movie is based upon the old plot of a grieving widow who needs to get on with life. Its plotline centers on the little known truth that men also grieve when their spouse is taken away from him by illness and death. Tom Hanks is highly effective as the spouse who is so deeply affected by his wife’s death that he practically places his life on hold except for the basic things that he needs to do such as raise his son and earn a living. Although his friends and family rallied to his side upon the death of his wife either by attending the funeral, being more active and present in his and his child’s life, even going as far as to refer him to support groups and psychiatrists in order to help him deal with his loss, Sam still feels alone and keeps his grief to himself. For him, the best solution seemed to be to move to another place and try to start life anew. He chooses to be alone with his memories of his wife and deal with his grief privately and alone, but his son has other ideas. Little Jonah has decided that his dad has grieved enough (it has been a year since his mother died) and his dad needs serious help. So one night, the boy sneaks a phone call to a radio psychologist and relates the personal turmoil of his father. The doctor then asks to speak to his father in order to help him and advise him about how to let go of the memory of his wife and move on with life. The doctor gives him the handle Sleepless in Seattle while advising him to move on with his life because his son now believes that he needs a wife to care for them. The movie dealt with the reality that the death of a spouse is not easy for the widowed husband or wife. The remaining spouse has to accept the reality that the life he once had with his wife, that which made him feel happy and complete has come to an abrupt end. In her personal blog, a woman who simply goes by the name Sara indicated that men deal with the loss of the wife in a different manner because widows â€Å"tend to lose their social networks since their wives the family ‘kinkeepers. ’ According to the article Good Grief: Bouncing Back From a Spouse’s Death in Late Life, Deborah Carr indicates that certain personal and social factors should be considered when helping the widower move on with his life. 1 Sara makes references to this article in her blog wherein she argues that (as cited in Carr, 2007 ) â€Å"the age of the husband and wife, how the spouse died, and what the couple’s life was like prior to the death are the most important factors that influence spousal bereavement. † In the movie, Sam embodies this personal turmoil by refusing to go on with his life and continuing to mourn her death one year later. Instead of accepting the death of his wife and moving on, he wallows on the what if’s of their married life. Socially husbands tend to grieve for a longer period of time because of the way his wife becomes the crutch of his life. He does not know how to move on without his wife because of his emotional need to hold on to the past memories of his wife. Sam Baldwin solidly illustrates how a man is lost without his wife. Without her, he lost his desire to dream and achieve more in life because his muse has passed on. He chooses to just live day to day with the hope that eventually, he will stop hurting emotionally. In reality, a man who loses his wife has a tendency to lose his place in the social circles because it was the duty of the wife to set the family social calendar. Sam Baldwin also showed us the difficulty of having to raise a child in a single parent environment where the grieving and closure process has not been completed. Widowed men also have to deal with the reality that he is now in charge of the household and has to portray the role of mother, wife, father, and financial provider all at the same time. Although considered to be a lightweight romantic comedy, Sleepless in Seattle gives us a realistic look into the life of a grieving husband. The situations portrayed in the movie do happen to male widows in real life. Due to the loss of the wife, the husband can experience a rollercoaster of emotions. . 2 According to the website planet-therapy. com, in its section regarding Grief: Living with the death of a partner, a grieving widow experiences a gamut of emotions ranging from â€Å"feelings of sadness, despair, emptiness, anger and guilt, restlessness and sleep problems, and a sense of inadequacy and concerns about health and well-being. † In the movie, as Sam Baldwin speaks to the psychologist over the radio, he shares the same list of his grieving experiences with the listeners. Today’s modern society tends to be more helpful of a spouse who has lost his or her partner through death rather than divorce. Mainly because it is harder for a spouse to get over the death of a spouse rather than what is usually a nasty divorce proceeding. The grieving widow needs more reassurance in life because, if a spouse is lost due to illness, such as the case with Sam Baldwin, his life will effectively be placed on hold until the death of the spouse which will then leave the husband or wife as a socially disconnected entity who will need to rebuild the personality he once had. Society accepts that it is easier for a divorcee to move on with life. Therefore there is no real need to be an emotional crutch to this person because he or she will want to celebrate the newly gained freedom. In the case of a widower, the death of the spouse usually becomes a traumatic experience wherein the living spouse become uncertain about how to socialize with people and get on with his life. Sometimes, the widow even goes so far as to consider himself or herself a jinx and vows never to remarry. Between the two, the widows need more reassurance and push towards reclaiming the life he once had or could have once the grief is conquered. This is why in the movie, Sam’s friends rally to his side and help him deal with his reentrance into the social circle. From dating advise, to sexual advice, this is the support group that helped Sam realize that he can let go of his wife’s memory without dishonoring the same. In reality, a widow tends to continue to speak with the deceased spouse long after death and fiercely holds on to the memory of the deceased even to the point of continuing with their old traditions even if he or she must do it alone. But in the case of Sam, he voluntarily reactivates his social life in an effort to get over his grief and possibly find a mother for his son who needs female guidance as well. In the movie, Sam chooses to eventually go on with his life after the radio consultation causes an influx of postal mail from various single women across the land pour into his home. This is where the story reaches its complicated plot line. Sam does not show any interest in the mail he receives because he is the kind of man who believes in the old fashioned dating game. He has a few bad dates before finally settling on one woman whom he considers a potential candidate for the role of wife and mother in his family. The problem is that Jonah believes more in fate and makes his choice on the basis of a letter from Annie Reed. A hopeless romantic whose favorite movie is A Love Affair. Incidentally, A Love Affair plays a pivotal part in the movie as it is used as the reference for the final, climactic scene at the Empire State Building. Although the movie is well crafted and has a good script, I am deeply disturbed with the way the characters of Jonah Baldwin and his friend Jessica were portrayed. With a maturity beyond their ages, and an unbelievably good grasp of adult issues, it is quite disconcerting to watch these two kids work their way around adults to the point of using emotional blackmail to get the parent to do as the child wants. I am willing to accept that Sam and Annie were meant to be together. But the way they got together is one that would drive a parent to the brink of worry and insanity while totally rejecting any positive outcomes such a scenario may present to all the parties concerned. Had this movie really been based on reality, I sincerely doubt that Sam would have dropped everything and hopped on a plane for New York to find the errant child. In reality, the parent would be on the telephone with the police trying to coordinate a cross country search since nobody is really sure as to where the child would end up in a city as huge as New York and how. The fact that the child was not punished but instead cuddled in the end by the worried father delivers a bad message as far as I am concerned. To me, it says â€Å"Hey, dad does not want to do what I want. I will run away from home. â€Å" We all know how that scenario would have really ended n reality and therefore should have not have been included in the movie. The movie can be considered a chick flick because it caters to the romantic notions held dearly by women while the men are considered clueless most of the time. When not being regarded as the unbelievably gullible opposite sex. The movie asks us to suspend disbelief for over an hour as we wait to discover if these two people will finally meet and how will that meeting end? The references to the primitive internet of the time was a wonderful throwback to an era when America was still discovering what things could be done online. Basically a well executed movie, Sleepless in Seattle is a movie made for those who believe that fate and karma will bring love your way even if you have lost hope. I do find it hard to believe though, that two people who do not meet until the very end of the movie and shared no more than a minute glance at each other in the middle of the movie will have an ever after ending. Footnotes 1 See Sara’s blog section number 13entitled Relating to Family Transitions (2007) for the full content of the article Good Grief: Bouncing Back From A Spouse’s Death in Late Life by Deborah Carr 2 See planet-therapy. com (2007) specially the sections relating to grief and loss, death of a partner, solutions for people who lose a partner, and possibilities for change after the death of a partner. Work Cited Foster Gary (Producer). Ephron, Nora (Director). (1993). Sleepless in Seattle [Motion Picture]. United States: TriStar Pictures. Planet Therapy. (n. d. ). Grief and Loss. Retrieved 21 August 2007 from http://planet-therapy. com/pub/gen_problems/grief/grief-2. html. Sara. (2007, April 26). Family Transitions [Blog 13]. Message posted to http://quicksa. blogspot. com/

Onion DNA Extraction Essay

DNA(deoxyribonucleic acid) is found in every living organism. It provides the information and instructions to build and regulate cells in organisms. The information it contains is used when organisms are being reproduced. It is made up of two polynucleotide chains known as DNA strands. Within the two chains there are four nucleotide units: adenine, thymine, cytosine, and guanine. Materials and Methods An onion was cut into pieces and placed in a blender with 50 mL of water and blended for one minute. Once blended, 20 mL of 25% saline solution and 10 mL of liquid detergent was added to the mixture and blended for 3 minutes. The mixture was then added to a flask and placed into a bath of hot water at 42? C for 10 minutes. The mixture was then removed from the hot water bath and filtered using a cheese cloth (dryer sheet) into a beaker. In a test tube (test tube â€Å"B†), 10 mL of 90-95% ethanol was placed into a beaker filled with ice. Then 10 mL of the filtered mixture was then placed into a test tube (test tube â€Å"C†). Test tube â€Å"C† was tilted at an angle and the ethanol from test tube â€Å"B† was slowly poured into test tube â€Å"C†. After 5 minutes, a white layer was formed between the onion-detergent mixture (test tube â€Å"B†) and the ethanol (test tube â€Å"C†). A plastic pipette was used to remove the white layer from the tube and placed into a micro centrifuge tube. The micro centrifuge tube was centrifuged at 10 K rpm for 1 minute. The supernatant in the tube was then removed and discarded only leaving the white pellet that was formed at the bottom. Results During this experiment, the DNA of the onion had formed at the bottom of the micro centrifuge tube.

Auditing - Assurance - and Compliance Services

The present study sheds light on the relevant accounting theory and the auditing and assurance services. This particular study is based on a case study that illustrates the operations of the BSF Ltd., an Australian bioresearch organization that is listed in the Australian stock exchange. This particular organization carries out research for the purpose of utilization of the bacteria for the manufacture of fish. However, the corporation BSF Ltd also undertakes diverse research operations that orients around bioresearch for discovery of the sustainable aqua cultural feeds. The study also reflects the challenges faced by the research organization that encompasses the failure of research on the plant-based feed that could solve the concerns of the fish based feed along with the cost borne by the organization due to the unsuccessful projects. The unsuccessful research also drew criticisms from the environmentalists and faced the allegation of diversion of the high worth food crops into lu xurious fish. This led to the new research on the bacteria based research for the generation of the feeds that ultimately met with success. The current study therefore deals with the steps that need to be taken into consideration before the auditing and application of the same into the operations of the BSF Ltd. Thereafter, the present report deals with the evaluation of the risk of the audit, process of application of different functions. Furthermore, the current study discusses the entire audit program for the company and discusses the accounting treatment of the research as well as development transactions. Besides this, the present study also discusses the accounting treatment of the government grant received by the corporation from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (Federal Government of Australia). Consequently, the study deals with the evaluation of the research as being socially as well as environmentally friendly. Finally, the present assignment carries out analysis of the reasonableness of the assertion regarding the patent value as the exclusive control over the advanced technolo gy used by the research organization. The audit process necessarily needs to adhere to the auditing standards stipulated under the section 336 of the Corporations Act 2001. The process of conduction of the auditing needs to comply to the auditing standards namely, the â€Å"ASA 100 (Preamble to AUASB Standards)†, â€Å"ASA 101 (Preamble To Australian Auditing Standards)†, â€Å"ASA 102 (Compliance with Ethical Requirements when Performing Audits, Reviews and Other Assurance Engagements)† among many others (Christensen et al., 2012). The process of the evaluation of the audit comprises of the inspection of the prospective clients of the accounting firm, allied activities of the business together with the owners. The sequential process of the audit also comprises of evaluation of diverse objectionable risk associated to the client that includes enquiry of the overall reliability of the corporation (Duncan & Whittington, 2014). However, as a result the procedure of the audit follow the due diligence p rocedure and verify the overall ethical threats associated to the confidentiality or else the contradictory advantages. In addition to this, the BSF Ltd also needs to have the adequate competence for executing the business activity, as this organization is mainly a bioresearch organization. However, diverse circumstances for the purpose of the performance of the audit embrace the process of determination of different suitable framework for the financial as well as account of the corporation (Homb et al., 2014). Furthermore, the process of audit also includes the examination of the legitimacy of the presented information concerning the client along with the conformation with the diverse accounting standards. Besides this, the auditor also needs to examine the overall ethical requirements and maintain the overall quality of the activity (Ahmed Haji & Anifowose, 2016). Over and above this, the management of the corporation also needs to be in agreement with the one another as regards t he preparation of the financial statement. Therefore, the evaluators need to ensure that the financial statements of the company are also free from the material error that might be owing to fraudulent activities if not unintentional mistakes. As rightly indicated by Shah & Nair (2013), the assessor can disallow the overall engagement with the client firm if the management implements constraints on diverse activities of the audit. In addition to this, the assessors can in turn refuse certain suggestions of audit when the financial records are not prepared according to the acceptable regulations. Nevertheless, the assessors assume confirmation from the preceding auditor as regards the execution of the legal and at the same time the process of implementation (Simpson et al., 2016). In addition to this, the assessors also need to make it certain that the choice of the proposed assessor according to different statutory obligations. Ultimately, the auditor has the need to submit the requi site letter of engagement with the client.   The process of evaluation of the audit risk needs to adhere to the Australian Auditing Standards that institutes different requirements and at the same time offer the process of implementation of the standards. The assessor can abide by the rules such as the AUASB ED 7/08 ( the â€Å"Proposed Auditing Standard ASA 315†) that helps in the process of identification as well as assessment of the risk of materiality. In addition to this, many other standards are laid down as a guideline for carrying out the entire audit. The primary intention of the assessor is to identify and at the same time reduce the overall risk to a significantly low level (Hegazy & Farghaly, 2016). The analysis of the present case study reveals the fact that the inherent risk of BSF Ltd is 90% and on the other hand the control risk stands at 5%. In addition to this, the risk of detection is recorded to be 80%. The audit risk in the present case can be evaluated by utilization of the Audit Risk   Model in which the assessor can take into consideration both the control as well as inherent risk (Chambers & Odar, 2015). Therefore, the audit risk can therefore be calculated by implementation of the formula that states that the risk of the audit is necessarily the multiplication of all the registered inherent risk, detection risk as well as the control risk. Therefore, the formula for the calculation of the audit risk can be put across as â€Å"(Audit Risk = Inherent Risk*Detection Risk*Control Risk)†. As mentioned in the case study, the audit risk is therefore equivalent to 0.36 â€Å"(0.36=0.8*0.9*0.05)†. Thus, the audit risk is registered to be 36%. However, the audit risk in this case is under 10% that is regarded as the standard for the audit risk, therefore, there is a need to have audit risk within the limit of 10%. This reflects the fact that the assessors can execute the role of audit for the client company BSF Limited. As rightly indicated by Pitt. (2014), the auditors have the need to devise and at the same time create audit program in a bid to make it certain that the business functions as well as control of the organization can be evaluated for the purpose of rectification. In addition to this, the assessors can also get hold of adequate information as well as requisite substantiation by conduction of diverse audit programs that includes list of different functions that are essentially involved in the process of assessment and audit process. Again, the suitable individual audit procedure are primarily designed with the intention of the development of accounting methods and at the same time accounting strategies (Graham, 2015). Nevertheless, the audit process also takes in different substantiated tests as well as other methods of control. For the purpose of the substantiation of the audit opinion, the assessors need to comply with diverse performance requirements according to the specific require ments of the audit regulations (Australian Auditing Standards) for the particular audit program and thereby build up the important working papers of the assessors (Lowell, 2016). Again, the assessor also needs to record different features that in turn can aid the entire procedure of the validation of the audit (Auasb.gov.au., 2016). The important factors of the audit program also need to integrate the process of the preparation of the working papers that can essentially facilitate the overall process of retention of the union with the presentation of the audit. In addition to this, the auditors also need to arrange the working papers and keep account of the business functionalities in both the current as well as the permanent audit directory. As rightly indicated by Chambers & Odar (2015), the permanent audit paper therefore includes diverse substances that can persistently exert impact on the entire performance that comprises of the â€Å"Document of the Copy of Memorandum of Asso ciation† of the company BSF Ltd. In addition to this, the permanent audit paper also comprises of extracts of different important legal documents significant minutes in addition to the documents of agreements of the organization BSF Ltd. In addition to this, the documents of the audit also need to include important information concerning the internal control and at the same time the process of the accounting that the management of the organization BSF follows (Christensen et al., 2014). In addition to this, the audit documents also comprises of the structure of the company, information offered by the legal advisors as well as the bankers of the particular business entity along with the letter of the engagement. The document also replicates the evaluation of diverse accounts of balance of the corporation BSF Ltd, illustration of the process of evaluation of the financial statements at the time of audit by other auditors along with the perspectives of the assessor. The auditor presents the points of view regarding the overall internal control procedure, procedure for accounting, adherence to different ethical requirements along with the quality of the financial declarations (Chychyla et al., 2015). In addition to this, the important performance indicators together with the important ratio can assist in the process of detection of the specific trends of the business as well as the evaluation of the process of assessment. Moreover, the working paper of the audit also comprises of the constitutional documents of the BSF Ltd that replicates the entire business structure. The Journal entries for the research and development expenditures are as follows The journal entries for the Year 2013 Cr. Unearned grant revenue $400,000,000† The journal entries for the Year 2014 Dr. Unearned grant revenue 100,000,000 Cr. Research grant revenue 100,000,000† The journal entries for the Year 2015 Dr. Unearned grant revenue 100,000,000 Cr. Research grant revenue 100,000,000† The journal entries for the Year 2016 Dr. Unearned grant revenue 60,000,000 Cr. Research grant revenue 60,000,000† In keeping with the accounting directions established under the standard â€Å"AASB 120† that yet again congregates with the conditions stipulated under the â€Å"IAS 20†, the dealings of accounting for ascertainment of the government grants can be carried out properly (Aasb.gov.au. 2016). Again, as mentioned in the accounting stipulations, the set of laws established under relevant principles of accounting, the government grants can be registered as profit or else loss and in a systematic way during the course in which the business entity identifies the expenses as the connected costs (Cohen et al., 2013). In addition to this, the process of recognition in addition to documentation of varied government grants similar to profit if not loss is not according to the specific assumption of accrual accounting as revealed under the standard â€Å"AASB 101 Presentation of Financial Statements† (Aasb.gov.au. 2016). Nevertheless, the method by which the government grant c an be recorded does not convince the complete technique of book-keeping that can essentially be executed on the subject of the grant. Nonetheless, the government grant can be regarded as a receivable and can be treated as a reimbursement for offering the instant financial preservation to the entire business unit with no probable allied costs that can be documented in profit if not loss throughout the particular time (Cohen et al., 2013).   As rightly put forward by Shah & Nair (2013), the research process carried out by the BSF Ltd also have the need to be socially responsible and at the same time environmental friendly. As mentioned in the case, the research work conducted by the company BSF Limited on the plant based feed faced criticisms from the environmentalists that alleged that the process of diversion of the human quality food crops into the lavish fish is almost identical to the process of diversion of the low valued fish into the course of production. Therefore, this business practice can also affect the poor people and in turn escalate the risk associated to malnutrition. Therefore, there is a pressing need for the development of a socially responsible and at the same time environment friendly research activity. This practice also reflects the fact that the business units have the need to adhere to different set of rules as well as regulations that are essentially stipulated under both the social as well as environmental evaluations in the process of carrying out daily business operations (Christensen et al., 2012). Again, there is also an obligation on the part of the corporation regarding the implementation of the regular tracking of diverse environmental issues in the entire business unit. In addition to this, the brand also has the need to abide by various severe regulation regarding the operational policies that can assist the process of deliverance of the operation (Ahmed Haji & Anifowose, 2016). Again, the human resource segment of the company also need to hold fair as well as transparent view that in turn can avoid the partialities to a particular party in a bid to maintain social accountability (Chambers & Odar, 2015). Again, the research process also need to abide by the rules of the administration of the company BSF Limited. As rightly indicated by Chambers & Odar (2015), the process of functioning of control over basically an intangible asset can direct and help in the commencement of forthcoming economic growth (Lowell, 2016). Nonetheless, the capability of a particular corporation to deal with the impending economic refund from a specific intangible asset can occur out of various legal associations that efficiently can be considered as obligatory under necessities of pertinent law. On the other hand, the special control of the company over certain intangible assets that in turn can support the entire course of improvement in common technical aspects. This can facilitate the process of acquirement advantages in the forthcoming phase (Cohen et al., 2013). According to Cohen et al. (2013), the â€Å"AASB138 paragraph 13 -16†, the association   BSF Ltd also have the need to be accustomed to the level of expertise as well as potential of the members of the staff that sequentially can generate the step up of economic rewards in the forthcoming time (Aasb.gov.au. 2016).  Ã‚   Yet, owing to lack of various lawful manipulations, the corporation BSF Limited can defend the future rewards through substitute actions or trials. Christensen, B.E., Glover, S.M. and Wood, D.A., 2012. Extreme estimation uncertainty in fair value estimates: Implications for audit assurance.Auditing: A Journal of Practice & Theory,  31(1), pp.127-146. Homb, N. M., Sheybani, S., Derby, D., & Wood, K. (2014). Audit and feedback intervention: An examination of differences in chiropractic record-keeping compliance.  The Journal of chiropractic education,  28(2), 123. 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