Saturday, August 31, 2019

A note on social criticism of novel Joseph Andrews Essay

Q Write a note on social criticism as presented in book I and book II of this novel. This novel is basically a satire on mode of living of the social classes of 18th century. The most promising and solid features (as a means of social criticism) that one might extract from the novel, in the light of book I and book II are highlighted as below: Artificiality of love Here the example of lady booby explains the point clearly. She loved Joseph as claimed by herself, but she wanted to keep their relation hidden from people, thus depicting the point of artificiality. She intended to seduce him just for the sake to gratify her sexual appetite. She, by no means portrayed any signs of true love. This factor, fielding critised by employing the character of lady booby as discussed above. Moral degradation Another social evil of that time, certainly was that the people look down upon morality with an eye of contempt. They degrade it in all possible ways. Here the example of Joseph can be taken into consideration. His inner goodness was ridiculed in the very society. Lady Booby once mocked him of his being maintain an ally of morality, when she herself as of superior stature had discarded her own conscience for him. Sympathy within the same class Sympathy is a factor that prevails only within the same class. As the example of postillion who provided Joseph with his coat when he had nothing to cover himself and was in a very miserable condition, states very well the fact. Indeed, both belonged to the lower class. Lack of charity Charity, a quality not so common in common man. When parson Adams consulted Parson Trulliber as his Christian brethren, with the aim of expecting some charity to pay off his bills of the inn they stayed at, got nothing but rejected in the face is just a demonstration of the fact of lack of charity. Duality in nature Parson Barnabas presents himself as a character with duality in nature. A glutton and drunkard, yet a parson by profession, indeed a presenter of dual  sides. Such characters as this do exist in our society and are tainting the fabric of world with their paint. Lack of knowledge The world also has people who claim the professions they have no thorough knowledge of. They are professionally incompetent, yet roam around in the society like foolish quacks with pride. The surgeon and parson Barnabas are such examples. Lust of ladies Lady Booby and Mrs.Slipslop had amorous disposition. And to gratify their sexual apetite they look upon Joseph with an eye of lust. Consequently, because of their intentions they lay Joseph open in the jaws of chastity. Such people as these should be placed infront of mirror, to render them with the realization that what creature have they become. Height of jealousy Jealousy, a trait found very well-groomed in society. Fielding has portrayed this social-ill as one of the core aspect in his novel. Mrs.Slipslop out of extreme jealousy blamed Joseph of being an ill-character and of amorous inclinations. Indeed, a very dangerous trait. Hypocrisy can also be attributed to the consequence of height of jealousy. The higher class in the novel is portrayed as highly submerged in hypocrisy. False promises A trend common in that society was to make promises and then break them. While Joseph, Fanny and Adams are on their way, they encountered one such fellow and fell for his promises. A trend that ought be condemned with solemn attitude. Corruption People like the surgeon and Parson Barnabas are perfect examples of tainting the society with corruption and morally ill-standard behaviour. Such follies and vices of society depict very well a social criticism, in the light of book I and book II.

Friday, August 30, 2019

Our Story : Shaketeaholic Is a Philippine Homegrown Concept

It all started year 2013 when the owner wished to introduce a milk tea drink in Umbilical City , along with Filipino style ambiance. The name is derived from the drink to represent us that we specialize in producing milk tea shake revered with the best bubbles (pearls) and toppings.Many people especially students and workers would look forward for buying a cup of refreshing drink after a long hard day of studying, working and playing rather than buying a food that will lessen their hunger. Now STAKEHOLDERS are giving Umbilical City consumers something new to chew after swallowing – something gummy and sweet called pearl or sago. Stakeholders found a surprisingly large following when they discovered that milk tea has a huge market potential and it is a trendy product.And to give our product a waist, we gave our customers a variety of choices when it comes in choosing their toppings, and aside from buying the usual milk tea, we will make the simple Milk tea into a Refreshing and Flavor milk tea SHAKE. Stakeholders offers variety of flavors like melon, chocolate, strawberry, vanilla, be. At Stakeholders we only used fresh quality ingredients that have no preservatives added, as we associate ourselves with world class brands from Taiwan, so it's really healthy because many people now are getting into health benefits if milk, tea and pearl which some studies show that it may help fight cancer.

Thursday, August 29, 2019

Food Borne Diseases Lab Report Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Food Borne Diseases - Lab Report Example It should be noted that even though meat differs in terms of composition and mode of production, the infestation from microorganisms occurs in a similar manner. Meat which has gone bad is characterized by the odor of the gas it produces and an irritating taste. Raw ham is infested by microorganisms which include gram-negative bacteria, lactic acid bacteria, and yeasts. After the ham was pasteurized, the number of the bacteria reduced. High-care treatment causes preference towards the lactic acid bacteria and enterobacteriaceae. After slicing and covering, the refrigerated ham harbors cornobacteria, leuconostocs, and thermosphacta. What Are The Concentrations Of Microorganisms In Ready-To-Eat Luncheon Meat? In ready to eat tumbled meat that has not been preserved or treated, the bacterial concentration is 4.8 log (cfu g (-1)). After the high care treatment, however, the concentration decreases to 2 log (cfu g (-1)). The concentration after packing and decreasing fall significantly as the microorganisms are inactivated and they do not reproduce any more. In case there is no preservation, the meat reaches the spoilage point after a short time. What Concentration Of Bacteria Can Be Consumed Without Causing Illness? As highlighted in the above mentioned case, the concentration of bacteria that have not gone past the spoilage point is safe for consumption. ... Refrigeration causes inactivation of microorganisms. However, after the temperatures are raised, the microorganisms grow faster. How Is Food Poisoning Defined? Food poisoning is defined as flu like illness typically characterized by vomiting and diarrhea. It is caused by ingestion of contaminated food. The food contains mainly monocytogens, Vibrio vulnificus, and Norwalk virus. The following is a brief overview on how each of the above named microorganisms causes food poisoning. The Norwalk virus is responsible for more than two thirds of food poisoning that happens in the world. They are the fastest spreading microorganisms in contaminated food. They contaminate the whole tainted food in a day or two and causes stomach upsets if consumed (Food 2009). The leading cause of bacterial food poisoning is Campylobacter jejuni. They usually affect undercooked contaminated poultry meat. A drop of soup from such poultry meat is enough to make a grown adult sick. In 2 to5 days, the symptoms start kicking in with cramping of the abdomen, diarrhea, and vomiting. In such a case, however, the diarrhea is bloody and the victim suffers a fever. Though salmonella does not cause a lot of food poisoning, most of food related deaths in the world are caused by the bacteria. These deaths, however, affect old people with a weak immune system. An expectant mother is, however, in danger from the salmonella because of the risk associated with pregnancy due to compromised immunity and can lead to stillbirth (Food 2009). How does storage affect meat quality and safety? All meat should be stored below 400 F to preven t the development of bacterial pathogens on its surface. This is usually how meat is stored. Chilling is the most advantageous method of storing meat.

Wednesday, August 28, 2019

Python assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Python - Assignment Example Before using methods of a classes that are user defined, it is necessary to create an object which will temporarily hold values returned by the various methods of the associated class. bFiles is created to facilitate calling of the two methods of BrowseFiles. After variable and object declarations and initialization, the files containing the group of words to use for the game are read into the program using the open() method and stored in variables f1, f2, and f3 as shown in the file above. This program has used only three input files, however more files can be reead into the program when a method to read files is defined. The three for loops then loop through each file adding each word to a group according to its file. Once all the files have been loaded into the program and assigned to different groups, suggested management activities can be performed upon them. To browse the groups available, a user is asked to choose one of the groups so that its contents can be displayed. Using the object created BrowseFiles method browseGroups is called and given the user value for the group together with the groups as arguments. It then prints the words under the specified group. Deletion is done in the same way where the delGroup() is called and given the group name to delete. Fig.1.0. illustrates these activities. First important variables are declared: choice holds the string of words entered by user, score holds the number of words from the user choice that are present in the group chosen while score_record holds the score together with the timestamp of when it was created. The game prompts the user to enter the name of the group from which the jumbled words should be extracted. The group is then returned containing the words in reverse. The user is then prompted to enter the words that they can make out from the list. The loop checks each of the words against the original group and increments the

Tuesday, August 27, 2019

Portfolio task Human Resource Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 5000 words

Portfolio task Human Resource Management - Essay Example The running of this organization relied much on the research services my team offered in evaluating the social needs that the population had, device and advise on appropriate policies to undertake the relevant adjustments. Moreover, as a research team, we were involved in managing a database for the organization’s beneficially and issue identification cards through which the organization would track the frequency of using the facilities by the members and carry out periodical analysis for possible improvements. The success of our role as a team was therefore dependent on various factors, which were intrinsic to members, as well as other environmental factors. Though our team had a temporal assignment with the organization, success in the task assigned was mandatory. The team comprised of various players such as organizers and supervisors, coordinators as well as team workers who attended to different tasks as assigned. A general review of the performance of the team revealed a great success in the mandate assigned having completed the exercise a month earlier than the expected time and satisfactorily having delivered as required. The analysis however revealed the success to be explained by team behavior as against such factors as the intellect of the members. Nevertheless, we can no refute the strategic role played by skills and competencies exhibited by the members in handling the technical roles assigned. Each behavior portrayed by the team had a strategic and specific role to play in the overall success of the team as recorded (Cohen, 1993, p. 1-3). The ability of the team to combine ideas before the onset of the team as a functional unit reveals a high level of sense of commitment and obligation. Moreover, the team had a well-organized leadership structure through which the management was carried out. Incorporation of new members wherever needed had a specific structure which ensured the correct skills and competencies needed were sought and harnesse d. Inter as well as intra team relations between the team members and other teams within the organization would be equally commended for the good performance of the team as noted. According to literature, the success of any team rests on such factors as cooperation and efforts of individual member. Moreover, teams do not behave, think or feel while the persons making up the team do. In this respect, teams have no obligations as distinct entities but rather, their successes depend of the factors inherent on team members. Therefore, the success from our team would therefore be explained by the good coordination as well as the individual traits to the members. Task 2 [The Coca-Cola limited (UK) is a constituent retail multinational organization which specializes in manufacture and sale of soft drinks across the globe. Having been in existence over many decades, the organization has had great exposure within the beverage industry and thus commands great mastery of business operations wi thin the industry ( more than the emergent competitors command). The retail organization has employed thousands of persons in the UK and has numerous retail outlets within the country. This paper intends to analyze the operations of the retail organization with a special attention of its operations within the United Kingdom. Its official website URL is http://www.coca-cola.co.uk/.] The company specializes in manufacturing drink concentrates as well as syrups, which are later

Monday, August 26, 2019

ART 2 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

ART 2 - Essay Example This paper shall briefly discuss the concept of iconography. Moreover, iconographic evaluation shall also be done on two kings of Mesopotamia and Egypt who represented their culture. Iconography is that study of art that interprets meanings and purpose behind art pieces. The study also deals with the broader understanding of symbols that beholds mysterious and encrypted messages. Iconographers evaluate different content presented in the form of art such as paintings, sculptures etc (Kleiner & Mamiya, 2010). On evaluation of images of Egyptian king, it can be observed that they were always presented surrounded by feminine. This represented Egyptian culture and structure of Egyptian kingdom. It was not known until the iconographers compared all the art pieces of Egyptian king. It was observed that sculptors were made in order to reflect the prestige of kings. Also, iconography helped in understanding that Egyptian kings were drawn after their deaths because that kept them alive in the memories of people. This resulted as an addition of their family prestige and their kingship (Kleiner & Mamiya, 2010). For instance, the image selected for iconographic evaluation of Egyptian king represents Seti I as being welcomed by a Goddess.

Sunday, August 25, 2019

Discussion Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 108

Discussion - Assignment Example all, the characters and the cinematography of the movie never showed the actual scenarios on who are the antagonist and the protagonist (Nelson & Aragon, 2011). The central discussion that is evident in the film is the theme of the hubris outbreak. The cause of this argument resulted from excessive bride or ignorance from the human being. In the clip, more point of the discussion emerges when a woman decided not eat because her boyfriend went missing in action for more than five days. The other family members were telling her that he might have died because is attacked by the zombies (Nelson & Aragon, 2011). The importance of this theme is in a way that it made the scientists understand that development is not the effort to discover the primary cause of a disease after it has affected many citizens. It is significant for the scientist to have in mind that the infection have been brought by the misguided efforts that they want to control the nature (Nelson & Aragon,

Saturday, August 24, 2019

Horizon Human Services Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 1

Horizon Human Services - Essay Example Funding of Horizon Human Services derives mainly from governmental organizations such as the â€Å"ADHS, DES-CSA† to provide the services for victims of problems like â€Å"domestic violence† (Domestic Violence Services, 2013). So far it relates to funds for services in the areas of housing, they receive assistance from â€Å"US Department of Housing, Urban Development and the Arizona Department of Housing† (Community Housing, 2013). In addition, they also accept donations from the public as well as corporate entities.   Any person intending to avail the services of Horizon Human Services can call their office for an appointment with a screening specialist and once screening is completed, he or she will be sent to the intake specialist who will assess the individual and provide initial counseling to â€Å"help address the reason† for which services have been sought (Getting Started, 2013). People who seek services will have to produce their ID document, proof of income, social security, and any documents relating the problem they wish to address with the help of the organization. Major services, as per information on the â€Å"services† section of their site, include:   Adult Residential Services: It is a program for mentally ill or substance abusing adults, by providing â€Å"clean and tidy† therapeutic â€Å"environment,† as envisaged in quality social work practices, which is free of substances (Malley & Fernandez, 2010, p.561).   Community-Based Services: This is also a program targeted to mentally ill, within the community to help them cope with the problem. The services include counseling and monitoring of medication apart from a variety of other services that the patient requires from time to time.

Friday, August 23, 2019

Basis history of oppression, diversity and struggle of human rights in Coursework

Basis history of oppression, diversity and struggle of human rights in the U.S - Coursework Example Thirdly powerless refers to a state where there is imbalance of power whereby the oppressed group becomes the recipients of oppressive authority. The fourth form of oppression according to Young (1990, p49) is cultural imperialism, which entails the â€Å"universalization† or establishment of the culture and experiences of the dominant group in the society as the model or norm from which other groups should adopt. The cultures or traditions of the oppressed group are not indentified and are regarded as deviant because they do not conform to those of the dominant group. Finally, violence is the fifth form of oppression and Young (1990, 54) defines it as â€Å"unprovoked physical attacks of a person and /or their properties†. Latina women and people with disabilities experience the Young’s five forms of oppression in the United States with varying degrees. Latinos have unique history of oppression in the United States society .The women of Latino descent experience oppression for being members of a minority group in the country as well as within their distinct ethnic groups (Gonzales, 2000). Historically, people from Latin America have been source of cheap labor for the Americans, working for low wages in American industries and plantations. Although the Latinos benefit from getting their subsistence, the rewards of their labor profit the American owners. Use of Latinos cheap labor amounts to oppression according to Young (1990). Marginalization of Latinos is a prevalent occurrence especially in regions with high population of these minority groups. Marginalization is manifested by exclusion of the community in making crucial economic, political and social policies in the United States. Consequent ly, Latinos suffer from higher unemployment rates, poverty and illiteracy levels than the majority group. For long period, Latinos have been

Information security Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Information security - Essay Example Although this protocol allows devices to communicate with each other easily, but the network-enabled devices have a number of weaknesses in them that have make the networks exposed to attacks (Westervelt 2013). â€Å"The United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) is warning about weaknesses in the Universal Plug and Play protocol† (Westervelt 2013, p. 1). The reason behind the warning is a recent research about the security flaws in universal plug and play devices which has identified some protocol vulnerabilities and configuration errors in the use of UPnP devices. According to the report, 81 million universal plug and play devices expose themselves to the internet and nearly 16 million devices of those have the tendency of allowing attackers to intrude into the systems by making the firewall ineffective (Moore 2013). In this paper, we will cover some of the main issues associated with the universal plug and play devices and the ways that can be used to overcom e the risk of hackers’ attacks. The discussion will support the statement that technology usually gets deployed in a hurry without proper consideration of the harms associated with it. 2. Weaknesses Although plug and play devices allows easy communication between devices, there also exist some major weaknesses related to network security protocol. Researchers have shown that nearly 40 to 50 million network-enabled devices face risk because of universal plug and play protocol vulnerabilities (Moore 2013). UPnP allows communication between devices, such as, printers, routers, smart TVs, media players, webcams, and network-attached storage (NAS). The three main security flaws bringing millions of users under risk of attack include programming issues in SSDP raising the risk of execution of arbitrary code, exposure of private networks to attacks because of exposure of plug and play control interface, and crashing of the service because of programming bugs in HTTP, UPnP, and SOAP (Moore 2013). Disabling the universal plug and play protocol is one way to prevent the attacks the risk of which is always associated with the use of UPnP devices. Most of the vendors usually do not have any plan of updating their vulnerable devices. Therefore, organizations need to use Metasploit modules and ScanNow UPnP tool to identify vulnerable media servers, printers, and other UPnP devices (Blevins 2013). One of the main weaknesses of universal plug and play devices is that trust on all other communicating devices which in most cases are not trustworthy. There is no software that can check whether the devices with which UPnP devices communicate are prone to attacks or not. Moreover, buffer overflows are also an issue regarding the use of UPnP devices (Schmehl 2002). An effective way to overcome this issue is the blocking of the UPnP at the Internet gateway. After doing this, link to any system outside the LAN should be blocked using the firewall in such a way that it does not access the ports 1900/UDP anymore. In case of Windows system, those ports are 2869/TCP. Along with this, UPnP on the router should also be turned off (Vaughan-Nichols 2013). As Raikow (2001, p. 1) states, â€Å"an attacker could gain complete control of an entire network of vulnerable machines with a single anonymous UDP session†. The attack not only provides the hacker with an access to all files and data stored in

Thursday, August 22, 2019

Ethical and Legal Systems of Health Care Organizations Essay Example for Free

Ethical and Legal Systems of Health Care Organizations Essay Aetna Incorporated, a health care plan company, is one of the American leading companies in diversified benefits of a range of traditional and consumer directed health care insurance services. It includes vast service offerings in health care insurance from mental and behavioral health to long-term care benefits and other health-related care and concerns . (Aetna, 2007a; Wikipedia, 2007) Moreover, it is the nation’s pioneer in full-service health insurer that proffers a consumer-oriented health plan. Aetna provides its members with the opportunity to reach out on suitable tools and comprehensible information for them to perform based decisions regarding health and financial interest (Aetna, 2007a). For over 150 years, Aetna has been committed to supporting people in attaining health and financial security. The company establishes information and necessary resources to work for its members and clients for them to execute â€Å"better-informed decisions about their health care. Currently, Aetna membership numbers up to 15. 7 million (M) medical members, around 13. 7 M dental members and around 10. 5 pharmacy members (Aetna, 2007a). In terms of health care networks, it holds on more than 783,000 health care professionals, 458,000 major care doctors and specialists, 4,681 hospitals and a network called AexcelSM, of specialist physicians. Aetna is also the provider of benefits through national employers of small, mid-sized and large multi-state scales in all 50 states, as well as individuals and Medicare recipients in certain markets. Aetna: Code of Conduct The company’s Code of Conduct contains a unique and consistent set of values and standards of integrity and business practices. It mediates in guiding the company in complying with the laws, regulations and ethical standards that controls Aetna’s business functions (Aetna, 2006). According to the preface message of Aetna’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and President Dr. Ronald A. Williams, every company’s employee, officer, and director is expected to follow the Code of Conduct because: a) it is the expectations of the customers from the company; b) they have a vow to live b their values, and; c) they would be functioning with the utmost principles of fair and ethical business guidelines given that they follow the contained guidelines in all their business aspects. However, the Code cannot cover all situations and Dr. Williams encourages the assistance or guidance of The Aetna Way and their Ethical Decision-Making Framework (to be discussed later in this paper) to conduct sound decisions and take the right actions in performing Aetna business practices. Ethical System The Code of Conduct contains ten (10) specific areas of topics in which the company discusses some policies on specific matters. The first one or Statement 1 deals with Conflicts of Interest that in general regards with the company’s requirement that its employees, officers and directors to keep away form real or obvious conflicts of interest to protect Aetna’s reputation. There should be avoidance in ownership interests or participation in excluded activities that would create a conflict of interest or interference in performing of a job. This requires reporting to the manager and compliance officer for review and sanction of affiliations on hand or ownership concerns that involves him or her or a family member or even a close friend residing in a home such as any positions with any â€Å"business, nonprofit organization or government entity that is an Aetna competitor, customer, provider or supplier† or for other cause or motives that may induce conflict of interest, and; getting hold of a considerable amount of partnership in possession of interest in any business or even partnership. However, the determination of conflicts of interest might sometimes be blurry and hence, guidance of a compliance officer might come necessary. There are also guidelines in the affiliations and interest of the Director and are not far-related to what have been discussed previously, and the review by the Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee must also re regarded relevant. There are also guidelines and rules in accepting or giving gifts; travel, entertainment and honorarium; discounts and preferential treatment; and loans and guarantees of obligations. Statement 2 deals with record-keeping and use of the company’s property and resources which should be entirely legal and proper. This is so since Aetna and any other companies for that matter, is mandatory to submit relevant documents, reports and public communication to the Securities and Exchange Commission and other regulators that also includes disclosure in a manner that is whole, impartial, accurate, timely and comprehensible. All of the company’s resources and property such s e-mail, internet and other computing and communications systems should only be used for the company’s purpose. Bribes and other illegal payments are also strongly discouraged by the company. Statement 3 embarks on fraud, dishonesty and criminal conduct since these apparently affect Aetna’s reputation and continued success. Hence, all business functions must be performed with honesty and with compliance with applicable laws, regulations and ethics rules. Statement 4 is with regards with protecting member and other confidential information of members, employees and the company itself from any inappropriate access, use or disclosure. This is also in integration and compliance with federal and state privacy and security laws that is applicable to the company. Private company information refers to member information, the company’s professional interests, and other relevant information about its clients, subordinates and even suppliers that might be used against the company or for the benefit of its competitor. This is applicable in the course of being under Aetna or after the affiliation with the company. Statement 5 deals with the company’s business and trade practices which should be complied with honesty and integrity since Aetna has its own laws and regulations that apply to the company’s business which are under federal law. The company’s Record and Management Policy is also strongly encouraged to be followed. Statement 6 encourages the company’s subordinates to support Aetna to be a responsible and trustworthy government contractor since the company treasures winning and keeping government contracts. This can be achieved by following federal, state and local laws that regards with government contracting and procurement. Employment laws must be also strictly complied with. The Code is also concerned with proper employment practices and welfare as well as the appropriateness of its workplace (Statement 7). The company complies with policies and programs that ensure the inclusiveness and safety or the workplace for its employees and business partners, promote fairness and respect for all, and promote a working environment where diversity and inclusion are appreciated. Federal laws that discourage discrimination, harassment, special personal relationships, violence and vices are strongly administered by the company. Such laws that are complied with in the company are the Equal Employment Opportunity and the Affirmative Action, which takes away the basing of business decisions on individual’s characters (such as sex, race, color, nationality, age and others; and the company’s very own Alcohol and Drug Policy that prohibits distribution, possession, use, purchase or sell of alcoholic beverages and illegal or prescription substances and drugs. Statement 8 deals with Aetna’s securities transactions which prohibits trade securities if an individual has no material nonpublic information about particular securities. Under this code, all are expected to comply to all insider trading and securities federal laws and the company’s own relevant regulations. Also included dealing and transacting with securities matters and management and secrecy of private information. The company and a subordinate could face civil and criminal consequence for insider trading since insider trading is unethical and unlawful. The statement also discusses on â€Å"material information† relevant in decision-making that concerns any transactions on the company’s securities. Statement 9 deals with the company’s interaction whether private or public to any external institution such as media organizations and even with the federal government. Anyone in close relation to the company and even its subordinates should not speak in behalf of Aetna only there was consent or authorization from the Board of Directors to take such action. Personal views should also be kept separate from the company’s view. He funds of the company should not be also utilized to engage on a lobbyist or to make a political donation except authorized by the Government relations. These are for the protection of Aetna’s reputation and an individual as well, under compliance of laws. Finally, Statement 10 deals with Aetna’s intellectual property. Apparently valuable, such property must be protected from improper use or disclosure whether owned by the company or licensed from others. Intellectual properties of the company must be controlled the legal and proper way. Usage of such property must be under approval of an internal legal counsel and in accordance with the Aetna Intellectual Property Guide. Policies on Aetna’s intellectual properties are also extended to the websites, videos, music and publications. Aetna’s ethical system as contained in its own Code of Conduct presents a vast range of policies that protects the reputation, integrity, security and welfare of both the company itself and its subordinates and members. As discussed above there are specific policies or code of ethics from recordkeeping, employee’s equal opportunity and to intellectual property rights. According to the company, all policies are established in compliance with federal laws. The company’s policies regarding conflicts of interest and confidentiality have general basis as concluded by the study in a position paper from the Society for Health and Human Values and Society for Bioethics Consultation Task Force on Standards for Bioethics Consultation (Aulisio, 2000). One of their conclusions is that, abuse of power and conflicts of interest must be avoided in health care companies. This is so since ethics consultants have the authority and power to influence clinical care and such power can be exploited. Since conflicts of interest can be partial to consultants’ recommendations, important personal or professional linkages with one or more parties should be disclosed and be get rid of. In addition, the personal concerns of the consultants may be affected by giving advice that could act against the company’s financial or public relations concerns. Policies that concern on recordkeeping and use of the company’s property and resources, and insider trading are all in accordance to federal laws specifically in the Securites Exchange Act of 1933 and 1934 (USSEC, 2007). The two basic objectives of the former it that to mandate investors or companies receive financial and other relevant information regarding securities being offered for public sale and forbid â€Å"deceit, misrepresentations, and other fraud† in the sale of securities. The latter states that insider trading is illegal when an individual trades a security while in ownership of nonpublic material information in disobedience of an obligation to withhold the said information or renouncement from trading. On the other hand, policies regarding the company’s employment practices are also observed in compliance with federal employment laws. Federal Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Laws prohibit job discrimination which covers almost all private employers, state and local governments, educational institutions and even the federal government (USEEOC, 2005). The said law is enforced by the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and also complies with the American College of Healthcare Executives or ACHE (ACHE, 2003). Overall, Aetna covers the essential and core ethic issues in accordance to federal laws.

Wednesday, August 21, 2019

Effect of Short Message System Reminder on Medicine Regime

Effect of Short Message System Reminder on Medicine Regime Effect of Short Message System reminder on adherence with recommended regimen among Ischemic Heart Disease patients. Introduction: Ischemic heart disease is the narrowing of coronary artery by a plaque which composed of fat material, according to World Health Organization (WHO) ischemic heart disease (IHD) is the first leading cause of mortality and morbidity worldwide, accounting for 13.3% of death cases (World Health Organization, 2011). 75% of death and 82% of disability adjusted life years (DALY) in low and middle-income countries occur due to IHD (Gaziano, Bitton, Anand, Abrahams-Gessel, Murphy, 2010), in Jordan IHD account for 18% of death cases, being the first leading cause of death (CDC, 2013). However survival rate of IHD increase recently (Piepoli et al., 2010). Patients discharge to their homes within five days (Saczynski et al., 2010), and the progress of healing after discharge demands an effective care planning, particularly, those who are newly diagnosed with IHD. After discharge patients encounter a challenge time (Eshah Bond, 2009), and life style changes include, adherence with eating heart-healthy diet, adherence with regular physical activity, and adherence with medication have ascertained by American Herat Association and considered from moderate and strong evidence (Eckel et al., 2013). adherence with these recommendations are associated with decrease readmission and mortality rate (Heran et al., 2011) , however few people adhere with recommended guidelines (Martin, Williams, Haskard, DiMatteo, 2005). Non adherence, one of the most important obstacle for successful treatment, is a widespread health problem that threat the health and cause a valuable economical burden as well (Martin et al., 2005). Non adherence to healthy lifestyle including eating unhealthy diet, physical inactivity, smoking, and non compliance with medication are known to increase the development and progression of IHD (Danaei et al., 2009). On the other direction adherence with healthy lifestyle would decrease the burden of IHD (Chiuve, McCullough, Sacks, Rimm, 2006). Medication adherence refers to whether patients take their medications as prescribed, as well as whether they continue to take a prescribed medication (Ho, Bryson, Rumsfeld, 2009). Medication non adherence is a major public health problem (Desai Choudhry, 2013). The immediate time after discharge is a high risk period for non adherence (Baroletti DellOrfano, 2010), in which 24% of patients dont adhere to their prescribed medication (Jackevicius, Li, Tu, 2008). After six weeks of discharge one forth of patients didnt adhere to prescribed medications (Mathews et al., 2012) and 80% on the long term (DiMatteo, 2004). Non adherence to medication lead to progression of the disease, increase readmission, increase mortality rate, and increase health care cost Smoking is so widespread (WHO,2007), and one of the ten strongest risk factor of IHD (Goff et al., 2013), although non adherence with healthy diet, medication, inactivity all are attributing risk factors for development and progression of IHD, smoking has a significant effect of all risk factor (CDC). Smokers have double to four times to develop IHD than non-smokers (CDC). However quit smoking is the single most effective measure to prevent IHD (Goff et al., 2013). A strong evidence exist about the casual relationship between diet and IHD (Mente, de Koning, Shannon, Anand, 2009). Eating unhealthy diet lead to increase blood cholesterol level, developing of hypertension and diabetes mellitus, obesity, and eventually metabolic syndrome which all are modifiable risk factors for IHD (Goff et al., 2013). However eating vegetables, nuts and mono-saturated fatty acid are among protective habits for prevention of IHD progression (Mente et al., 2009). Non adherence to physical activity in different culture and societies are common (Rodrigues, Joà £o, Gallani, Cornà ©lio, Alexandre, 2013). The proportion of adults who meet the recommended guidelines of American Heart Association (AHA) for regular physical activity has reduced over time (Roger et al., 2012). A recent meta analysis has been shown that an inverse relationship exist between physical activity and increasing risk of IHD; those patients who didnt do physical activity are 10-20 more risky than who do moderate physical activity and 20-30 more risky than who do high physical activity (Li Siegrist, 2012). To decrease the effect of IHD and prevent its progression secondary prevention programs done and rehabilitation centers are found, However few people attend these programs regularly (Bjarnason-Wehrens et al., 2010). Many obstacles hinder the attendance of these programs include logistic barriers like transportation difficulties, financial cost, and embarrassment of attendance (Neubeck et al., 2012). So more feasible, economical, and provide privacy for patient method is required as alternative. Tele-health, which define as the use of different type of modern information and technology to contribute t clinical support and to improve health (WHO,2009), is more economical, feasible, and provide the patients privacy. The use of mobile is growing faster and faster, and many patients have mobiles (Deng, 2013). Many studies done using technology to improve adherence among patients, especially Short Message System (SMS) in high technologic counties (Dale et al., 2014; Khonsari et al., 2014). To my knowledge this is the first study done to assess the effect of use of telehealth in a less technology-dependent countries. So the purpose of the study is: examine the effect of short message system (SMS) on medication, healthy diet, smoking cessation and physical activity adherence among IHD patients. Research hypotheses: patients who will receive reminder message will be more adherent to medication, healthy diet , smoking cessation and physical activity than those who will not. References Baroletti, S., DellOrfano, H. (2010). Medication adherence in cardiovascular disease. Circulation, 121(12), 1455-1458. Bjarnason-Wehrens, B., McGee, H., Zwisler, A.-D., Piepoli, M. F., Benzer, W., Schmid, J.-P., . . . Niebauer, J. (2010). Cardiac rehabilitation in Europe: results from the European cardiac rehabilitation Inventory survey. European Journal of Cardiovascular Prevention Rehabilitation, 17(4), 410-418. Chiuve, S. E., McCullough, M. L., Sacks, F. M., Rimm, E. B. (2006). Healthy lifestyle factors in the primary prevention of coronary heart disease among men benefits among users and nonusers of lipid-lowering and antihypertensive medications. Circulation, 114(2), 160-167. Dale, L. P., Whittaker, R., Jiang, Y., Stewart, R., Rolleston, A., Maddison, R. (2014). Improving coronary heart disease self-management using mobile technologies (Text4Heart): a randomised controlled trial protocol. Trials, 15(1), 71. Danaei, G., Ding, E. L., Mozaffarian, D., Taylor, B., Rehm, J., Murray, C. J., Ezzati, M. (2009). The preventable causes of death in the United States: comparative risk assessment of dietary, lifestyle, and metabolic risk factors. PLoS medicine, 6(4), e1000058. Deng, Z. (2013). Understanding public users adoption of mobile health service. International Journal of Mobile Communications, 11(4), 351-373. Desai, N. R., Choudhry, N. K. (2013). Impediments to adherence to post myocardial infarction medications. [Research Support, Non-U.S. Govt Review]. Curr Cardiol Rep, 15(1), 322. doi: 10.1007/s11886-012-0322-6 DiMatteo, M. R. (2004). Variations in patients adherence to medical recommendations: a quantitative review of 50 years of research. Medical care, 42(3), 200-209. Eckel, R. H., Jakicic, J. M., Ard, J. D., Miller, N. H., Hubbard, V. S., Nonas, C. A., . . . Smith, S. C. (2013). 2013 AHA/ACC Guideline on Lifestyle Management to Reduce Cardiovascular RiskA Report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Task Force on Practice Guidelines. Journal of the American College of Cardiology. Eshah, N., Bond, A. (2009). Acute myocardial infarction survivors experiences: a qualitative literature review. J Med J 43(3), 238-264. Gaziano, T. A., Bitton, A., Anand, S., Abrahams-Gessel, S., Murphy, A. (2010). Growing epidemic of coronary heart disease in low-and middle-income countries. Current problems in cardiology, 35(2), 72-115. Goff, D. C., Lloyd-Jones, D. M., Bennett, G., Coady, S., D’Agostino, R. B., Gibbons, R., . . . Wilson, P. W. F. (2013). 2013 ACC/AHA Guideline on the Assessment of Cardiovascular Risk: A Report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Task Force on Practice Guidelines. Circulation. doi: 10.1161/01.cir.0000437741.48606.98 Heran, B. S., Chen, J., Ebrahim, S., Moxham, T., Oldridge, N., Rees, K., . . . Taylor, R. S. (2011). Exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation for coronary heart disease. Cochrane Database Syst Rev, 7(7). Ho, P. M., Bryson, C. L., Rumsfeld, J. S. (2009). Medication adherence its importance in cardiovascular outcomes. Circulation, 119(23), 3028-3035. Jackevicius, C. A., Li, P., Tu, J. V. (2008). Prevalence, predictors, and outcomes of primary nonadherence after acute myocardial infarction. [Research Support, Non-U.S. Govt]. Circulation, 117(8), 1028-1036. doi: 10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.107.706820 Khonsari, S., Subramanian, P., Chinna, K., Latif, L. A., Ling, L. W., Gholami, O. (2014). Effect of a reminder system using an automated short message service on medication adherence following acute coronary syndrome. Eur J Cardiovasc Nurs. doi: 10.1177/1474515114521910 Li, J., Siegrist, J. (2012). Physical activity and risk of cardiovascular disease—a meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies. International journal of environmental research and public health, 9(2), 391-407. Martin, L. R., Williams, S. L., Haskard, K. B., DiMatteo, M. R. (2005). The challenge of patient adherence. Therapeutics and clinical risk management, 1(3), 189. Mathews, R., Peterson, E., Honeycutt, E., Chin, C. T., Ryan, K., Effron, M., . . . Wang, T. (2012). Medication nonadherence among patients with acute myocardial infarction treated with percutaneous coronary intervention: insights from the Translate-ACS study. Journal of the American College of Cardiology, 59(13s1), E1814-E1814. Mente, A., de Koning, L., Shannon, H. S., Anand, S. S. (2009). A systematic review of the evidence supporting a causal link between dietary factors and coronary heart disease. Archives of internal medicine, 169(7), 659-669. Neubeck, L., Freedman, S. B., Clark, A. M., Briffa, T., Bauman, A., Redfern, J. (2012). Participating in cardiac rehabilitation: a systematic review and meta-synthesis of qualitative data. European journal of preventive cardiology, 19(3), 494-503. Piepoli, M. F., Corra, U., Benzer, W., Bjarnason-Wehrens, B., Dendale, P., Gaita, D., . . . Zwisler, A.-D. O. (2010). Secondary prevention through cardiac rehabilitation: from knowledge to implementation. A position paper from the Cardiac Rehabilitation Section of the European Association of Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation. European Journal of Cardiovascular Prevention Rehabilitation, 17(1), 1-17. Rodrigues, R. C. M., Joà £o, T. M. S., Gallani, M. C. B. J., Cornà ©lio, M. E., Alexandre, N. M. C. (2013). The Moving Heart Program: an intervention to improve physical activity among patients with coronary heart disease. Revista Latino-Americana de Enfermagem, 21(SPE), 180-189. Roger, V. L., Go, A. S., Lloyd-Jones, D. M., Benjamin, E. J., Berry, J. D., Borden, W. B., . . . Fox, C. S. (2012). Heart disease and stroke statistics—2012 update a report from the American heart association. Circulation, 125(1), e2-e220. Saczynski, J. S., Lessard, D., Spencer, F. A., Gurwitz, J. H., Gore, J. M., Yarzebski, J., Goldberg, R. J. (2010). Declining length of stay for patients hospitalized with AMI: impact on mortality and readmissions. The American journal of medicine, 123(11), 1007-1015. World Health Organization. (2011). The top 10 causes of death. Fact sheet Number 310: Geneva: WHO. 1

Tuesday, August 20, 2019

Carbon Mesoporous Material Hybrid Catalyst

Carbon Mesoporous Material Hybrid Catalyst Facile and clean transformation for synthesizing secondary arylamines through one-pot reductive amination of aniline, using aldehyde catalyzed by the supported nickel and poly(vinyl sulfonic acid) on mesoporous carbon CMK-3 (Ni/PVSA/CMK-3) as a novel acid-metal bi-functional heterogeneous catalyst. Sodium borohydride was used as the source of hydrogen for the reduction of imine. The reaction was performed at room temperature, in a short reaction time, without any by-products. Various characterization techniques including FT-IR, XRD, TG, BET, SEM, TEM, DRS-UV and AAS were employed to reveal the relationship between catalyst nature and catalytic performance. Reaction results demonstrate that the optimized Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 catalyst shows comparable catalytic performance thanks to the nickel metals and the acidic nature of polymer in mesopore channels of CMK-3. This method has several advantages such as, eco-friendly (used water as solvent), moderate to high yields, simple work-up procedure and catalyst filtered easily and reused without obvious loss of activity. 1. Introduction Nowadays, amines are privileged in industry that have found prevalent applications as intermediates for pharmaceuticals, biologically active compounds, rubber, solvents, fine chemicals, dyes, herbicides, and in the manufacture of detergents and plastics. Reductive amination demonstrate one of the most versatile and convenient methods of amine synthesis. This reaction has two steps including formation of an imine during reaction between primary amine and a carbonyl substrate, and reduction of the imine with adequate hydride source. There are two detached approaches for the reductive amination: the direct approach, which uses the in situ-generated imine, and the indirect approach, which uses the prior isolated imine. The former approach has several advantages such as one-pot procedure, increasing yields, having simple setup, easily separated from the product, being stable and compatible reagents, and the mild reaction conditions. To this end, over the past decades, researchers have been reported several studies on reductive amination reaction with several different catalysts, which among them, heterogeneous catalysis are prominent than homogenous catalysis owing to separate and recover capabilities. Moreover, it has been proven that accomplish this reaction needs two character including metallic and acidic; consequently, bi-functional heterogeneous catalysts are useful in this reaction. Recently, several metal nanoparticles acted as a hydride transfer such as Pt, Ni, Cu, and Pd. Despite of the fact that an effective control of particle size and a uniform distribution of nanoparticles in catalytic applications are generally predicted, nanoparticles typically accumulate together in bulk-like materials that hardly reduce selectivity and the activity of catalysts. To overcome with this problem, mesoporous silica, zeolites, polymers or macromolecular organic ligands have been used in order to immobilize metal nanoparticles in their pores. Mesoporous silica materials and zeolites have excellent order and surface area than other materials like polymer and etc.; subsequently, they are sufficient for catalysis approaches. Lately, mesoporous silica used for producing mesoporous carbon (CMK-n) as hard template. These materials contain several benefits compared to mesoporous silica and zeolites for instance, high mechanical stability, high thermal stability in nitrogen atmosphere, superb stability in strong acids and bases, and other engrossing properties such as narrow pore size distributions, high surface areas, and ordered frameworks. In addition, mesoporous carbon materials have hydrophobic nature on their surfaces and it helps to embed nanopolymers in their pores. In our previous studies, it asserts that when polymer embedded into mesoporous materials, they have perfect function. Owing to the fact that they have small particles and subsequently having high surface areas. Moreover, polymer nanoparticles fix in porous and they could not leach from their supporters. Accordingly, in this work, we will introduce a novel heterogeneous organic hybrid catalyst based on a carbon mesoporous material. In this circumstance, mesoporous carbon CMK-3 replicating from mesoporous silica SBA-15 was prepared and used as suitable support for Nickel nanoparticle/poly vinyl sulfonic acid/CMK-3 (Ni/PVSA/CMK-3). Furthermore, the catalyst was used effectively for the one-pot reductive amination of amine compounds using aldehyde in the presence of a small amount of NaBH4 as a mild reducing agent and two sort of solvent containing water and acetonitrile at room temperature without any by-products. 2. Experimental method 2.1. Catalyst characterization The samples have been analyzed by FT-IR spectroscopy (using a PerkinElmer 65 in KBr matrix in the range of 4000-400 cm-1). The thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA) data were obtained by a Setaram Labsys TG (STA) in a temperature range of 30-650 -C and heating rate 10 -C min-1 in nitrogen atmosphere. The X-ray powder diffraction (XRD) of the catalyst was carried out on a Bruker D8Advance X-ray diffractometer using nickel filtered Cu KÃŽ ± radiation at 40 kV and 20 mA. The BET specific surface areas and BJH pore size distribution of the samples were determined by adsorption-desorption of nitrogen at liquid nitrogen temperature, using a Series BEL SORP 18. For the measurement of nickel, a Perkin Elmer AAnalyst 300 atomic absorption spectrophotometer was used. The slit width, linear range and wave length for Ni were 0.2 nm, 2 and ppm232 nm, respectively. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) studies were performed on Philips, XL30, SE detector. Transmission electron microscope (TEM) observati ons were performed on a JEOL JEM.2011 electron microscope at an accelerating voltage of 200.00 kV using EX24093JGT detector in order to obtain information on the size of nickel nanoparticles and the DRS UV-vis spectra were recorded with JASCO spectrometer, V-670 from 190 to 2700 nm. Moreover, X-ray photoelectron spectra (XPS) was recorded on ESCA SSX-100 (Shimadzu) using a non-monochromatized Mg KÃŽ ± X-ray as the excitation source. The products were characterized by 1H NMR and 13C NMR spectra (Bruker DRX-500 Avance spectrometer at 500.13 and 125.47 MHz, respectively). Melting points were measured on an Electrothermal 9100 apparatus and they were uncorrected. All the products were known compounds and they were characterized by FT-IR, 1H NMR and 13C NMR. All melting points are compared satisfactorily with those reported in the literature. 2.2. Catalyst preparation The employed mesoporous carbon (CMK-3) was synthesized following the method reported by Ryoo using SBA-15 as template. 2.2.1. Preparation of SBA-15 Mesoporous silica SBA-15 was prepared using block copolymer Pluronic P123 (EO20PO70EO20) template as a structure directing agent and tetraethylorthosilicate (TEOS) as the silica precursor through the addition of H3PO4 by novel method as described in the literature. In a general synthesis, Pluronic P123 (2 g) was dissolved at room temperature in deionized water (75.4 mL) and H3PO4 (4.2 mL, 85%), after that TEOS (4.6 mL) was added to the solution and synthesis was fulfilled by stirring at 35 -C for 24 h in sealed Teflon breakers, and it was consequently placed at 100 -C for 24 h. Afterwards, the solution was filtered, washed with deionized water, and lastly dried at 95 -C for 12 h in air. Template removal was accomplished by calcination in air using two successive steps; first heating at 250 -C for 3 h and then at 550 -C for 4 h. 2.2.2. Preparation of CMK-3 Mesoporous carbon CMK-3 was prepared using mesoporous silica SBA-15 as template and sucrose as the carbon precursor. 1.0 g SBA-15 was added to 5 mL aqueous solution containing 1.25 g (3.65 mmol) sucrose and 0.14 g (1.42 mmol) of H2SO4 (98%). The resulting mixture was heated in an oven at 100 -C for 6 h and next 160 -C for another 6 h. In order to obtain entirely polymerized sucrose inside the pores of the SBA-15 template, 5 mL aqueous solution containing 0.8 g (2.33 mmol) sucrose and 0.09 g (0.917 mmol) of H2SO4 were added again, and the mixture was subjected to the thermal treatment described above one more time. Then, it was carbonized under nitrogen gas flow at 900 -C for 6 h with a heating rate of 5 -C min-1. Finally, the resulting solid was washed with 1 M NaOH solution (50 vol. % ethanol-50 vol. % H2O) twice to remove the silica template, filtered, washed with ethanol until pH = 7, and dried at 100 -C for 4 h. 2.2.3. Preparation of Poly(vinyl sulfonic acid)/CMK-3 2.2.4. Preparation of Ni nanoparticle-poly(vinyl sulfonic acid)/CMK-3 At first, Vinylsulfonic acid sodium was converted into its acidic form using the ion exchange resin (Amberjet 1200 H, 2 equiv. L-1, Aldrich). Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 was synthesized as follows: in the first place, 1 mL aqueous solution of NiCl2.6H2O (0.5 M) was added to the obtained PVSA/CMK-3 (0.1 g) together with 3 mL of H2O. The mixture was heated for 5 h at 353 K. Next, the solution of NaBH4 [0.057 g (1.5 mmol)] dissolved in 5 mL methanol was added to the mixture drop by drop in 20-30 min. Then, the solution was stirred for 3 h. After that, adding the same amount of NaBH4 was repeated and again the mixture was stirred for 3 h. Consequently, the solution was filtered and washed sequentially with deionized water and methanol to remove excess NaBH4 and NiCl2, and was dried in room temperature to yield Ni/PVSA/CMK-3. The Ni content of the catalyst was estimated by decomposing. Known amount of the catalyst by perchloric acid, nitric acid, fluoric acid, hydrochloric acid, and the Ni content was estimated by atomic absorption spectrometer. The Ni content of Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 estimated by atomic absorption spectrometer was 2.1 mmol g−1. 2.3. General procedure for one-pot reductive amination of aldehydes. A mixture of Aniline (2 mmol) and benzaldehyde (2 mmol) in water or acetonitrile (3 mL) was placed in a round bottom flask and stirred for 1 min at room temperature. Afterward, to the resulting mixture, Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 (0.04 g) and NaBH4 (6 mmol) were added and the mixture was stirred at room temperature until TLC showed the complete disappearance of the benzaldehyde. Then, the reaction mixture was quenched with water (10 mL) and the product was extracted with diethylether (2 10 mL). After they finished, the organic phase was dried over anhydrous Na2SO4, filtered and concentrated. In the end, the products were obtained very pure just by extract with diethylether in the majority of the reactions. The product was identified with a melting point, FT-IR spectroscopy techniques, 1HNMR and 13CNMR. 3. Results and discussion 3.1. Catalyst characterization Figure 1 shows the FTIR spectra of CMK-3 (a), PVSA/CMK-3 (b) and Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 (c). A broad band at around 3380-3470 cm−1 was observed in all samples. The O-H stretching vibration of the adsorbed water molecules mainly caused it. Moreover, in the CMK-3 spectrum, there are not any signals belong to organic bonds, resulting from the complete carbonization of sucrose (Fig. 1a). The presence of a new absorption bands at 1041 and 1186 cm-1 attributed to the S=O group of PVS, affirming the existence of the grafted PVSA chains on the CMk-3. In addition, the band at about 1650 cm-1 is attributed to adsorbed water, which is similar to related reports[]. The presence of peaks at around 2940 cm−1 and 1450 cm−1 correspond to the aliphatic C-H stretching and bending in PVSA/CMK-3, respectively (Fig. 2b). The appearance of the above bands shows that PVSA has been attached into mesoporous of CMK-3 and the synthesis of PVSA/CMK-3 has been successful. The profiles of thermogravimetric analysis of PVSA/CMK-3 and Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 under nitrogen atmosphere are shown in Fig. 2. The degradation of Poly(vinyl-sulfonic acid) commences at 150C and this stage continues to a little less than 300C. The next stage involves only a little degradation and occurs over the temperature range of 300 to 500C. These evidence are shown Poly(vinyl-sulfonic acid) cannot tolerant the temperature due to polymers are not protect by any supporter. The TGA curves of PVSA/CMK-3 shows a small mass loss (around 5%, w/w) in the temperature range of 100-330 -C, which is apparently associated with degradation of SO2 and ethylene from PVSA (Fig. 2). At temperatures above 330 -C, PVSA shows one main stage of degradation. The mass loss for PVSA in the second step is equal to 11.5% (w/w) which correspond to the degradation of the methane. In light of the difference between the PVSA and PVSA/CMK-3 curves, it is clear that PVSA/CMK-3 has higher thermal stability and slower degradation rate than PVSAP. Hence, after hybridization, the thermal stability is enhanced significantly that is beneficial for the catalyst application. In addition, Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 shows two separate weight loss steps that are almost similar to the PVSA/CMK-3. The only difference is temperature between 330 and 445 C, which Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 shows slower degradation rate than PVSA/CMK-3 in these range. It asserts that the hybrid Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 had higher thermal stability than PVSA/CMK-3. It may be related to the presence of Nickel nanoparticles in the composite structure. Consequently, it is proper thermal stability is boosted after hybridization because of intense the catalyst application. Figure 1 shows the powder XRD patterns of SBA-15, CMK-3, PVSA/CMK-3 and Ni/PVSA/CMK-3. The low angle diffraction pattern of SBA-15 shows three reflections at 2à Ã‚ ´ values from 0.5 to 2 ° including one strong peak at (100) and two weak peaks at (110) and (200), which corresponds to the well-known ordered arrangement of SBA-15 in the space group p6mm of 2-D hexagonal symmetry. The silica SBA-15 used as template to synthesis CMK-3. As can be seen, the XRD pattern of CMK-3 show three diffraction peaks at 2à Ã‚ ´ = 1.04 °, 1.79 ° and 2.05 ° (Fig. 3b). It could be marked to (100), (110) and (200) diffractions of the 2D hexagonal space group p6mm, which is compatible with previous articles. After polymerization by poly (vinyl sulfonic acid), the X-ray diffraction of PVSA/CMK-3 shows the same pattern with CMK-3. This evidence indicates that the structure of the CMK-3 was retained after the polymerization (Fig. 3c). Albeit, the intensity of the characteristic reflection peaks of the PVSA/CMK-3 is found to be diminished (Fig. 1b). Composite contains less CMK-3 due to the dilution of the carbon material by PVSA; subsequently, this dilution can be responsible for a decrease in the peak intensity. By the way, the XRD patterns of CMK-3 and PVSA/CMK-3 are almost similar to SBA-15, which it shows CMK-3 is a accurate replica of the mesoporous silica SBA-15 and the polymerization process does not damage the structure of CMK-3. After immobilize nickel in the PVSA/CMK-3, Ni peak cannot be seen in XRD since the homogeneity of Ni particles in the Ni/PVSA/CMK-3, and it lonely shows an amorphous pattern at 2ÃŽ ¸ values of about 44ËÅ ¡ (Fig. 3, inside). In order to demonstrate the e xistence of Ni nanoparticles in the Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 catalyst was exposed to temperature (400ËÅ ¡C). Meanwhile, amorphous Ni changed to crystalline and appear a peak with low intensity at 2ÃŽ ¸ = 44.29ËÅ ¡, which can be attributed to the small size of nickel nanoparticles and the plane (111) of fcc nickel. Eventually, after immobilize the nickel nanoparticles on composite, structure has not changed and it is represented a successful synthesis of the catalyst. The specific surface area, pore volume and the pore size of the CMK-3, PVSA/CMK-3 and Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 samples are summarized in Table 1. All samples exhibit a type IV adsorption isotherm with an H1 hysteresis loop by capillary condensation at relative pressure around 0.3-0.7 (Fig. 4). It is clear in table 1 that the PVSA/CMK-3 and Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 exhibits a smaller specific surface area, and pore volume in comparison to those of pure CMK-3. Thanks to the successful incorporation of the poly(vinyl sulfonic acid) into the mesoporous carbon. As can be seen, pore diameter increases in the PVSA/CMK-3 and Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 in comparison to CMK-3. This evidence shows the incorporation and growth of hyperbranched polymers and consequently produces the pressure (physical pressure on the wall of the channels) inside the CMK-3 mesoporous. By adding Ni nanoparticles into the PVSA/CMK-3, the specific surface area and pore volume decrease, asserting that nickel nanoparticles are located inside the pores o f the CMK-3. In spite of the fact that there are significant decreases in the pore volume and surface area, the pores of Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 were not blocked by deposition of the hyperbranched homopolymer and nickel nanoparticles. Moreover, the BJH pore size distribution curves of the PVSA/CMK-3 and Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 are exhibited a narrow pore size distribution (Fig. 5). It clarifies that the homopolymer and nickel nanoparticles are satisfactory distributed on the channels of the Ni/PVSA/CMK-3. This result is agreement with TEM analysis and shows the effective role of the hyperbranched polymer to entrap and uniformly disperse nickel nanoparticles. , , Fig. 6 gave the scanning electron microscopy (SEM) photographs of CMK-3 and PVSA/CMK-3 and Ni/PVSA/CMK-3. All the SEM images are shown rod-like morphology, which is attributed to carbon mesoporous. Although, virtually no significant differences observe in surface morphology between CMK-3 and PVSA/CMK-3, it is obvious that after hybridization the surface of CMK-3 is become coarser; indicating the most of polymerization of PVSA occurred in the pores of CMK-3, which was also supported by the decrease in surface area and pore volume as shown in Table 1. In addition, by immobilizing Ni nanoparticles, several spherical beads are seen on the mesoporous carbon. However, most of them are incorporated inside the carbon mesoporous structure, which is not observable in the SEM images. It is necessary to mention that after loading nickel nanoparticles on the surface of CMK-3, the structure of the mesoporous carbon is remained. Moreover, XRD analysis and TEM images confirmed this claim. The PVSA/CMK-3 and Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 were inspected by means of TEM micrographs technique (Fig. 7). The ordered hexagonal p6mm mesostructure of PVSA/CMK-3 and Ni/PVSA/CMK- 3 can be seen, indicating after polymerization and incorporation of PVSA and Ni nanoparticles, the ordered structure of mesoporous carbon is retained. Additionally, the places with darker contrast could be assigned to the presence of Pd particles with different distribution (Fig. 7c-d). As can be seen, the small dark spots could be ascribed to nickel nanoparticles with ∠¼X nm average diameter, presumably located into the mesoporous channels. On the other hand, larger dark spots are shown in fig. 7 c-d, which are corresponded to Ni nanoparticles agglomerate on the external surface with average diameter of ∠¼5-10 nm. Fig. 8 shows the DRS-UV of PVSA/CMK-3 and Ni/PVSA/CMK-3. previous reports were proven that DRS-UV of the cationic nickel have only d-d transitions peaks including 3T1g(P)↠3A2g (F) (368 nm) and 3T1g (F)↠3A2g (F) (576 nm), which these two peak do not show in Ni/PVSA/CMK-3. Moreover, the DRS-UV of Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 shows feature bands around 205 nm and 330 nm, which are attributed to the presence of Ni nanoparticles in these samples. By comparing these data, it can be found that cationic nickels are converted to the nickel nanoparticles by reduction of NaBH4. 3.2. Catalytic activity Synthesized nanocomposite was characterized by different methods in the former section. This section is introduced the application of this bi-functional catalyst to the reductive amination reaction. During two decade, enormous investigation devoted to develop environmental friendly synthesis. Since, using water as a reaction medium in transition metal-catalyzed processes is one of the most essential goal of sustainable chemistry. Water is nontoxic solvent, readily available, an inexpensive, nontoxic solvent and non-inflammable. It provides privilege over organic solvents from an environmental and an economic aspect. Accordingly, the effect of several parameters on the one-pot tandem reductive amination of aldehydes with aniline over Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 as acid-metal bifunctional catalyst was perused in water at room temperature and the outcome are as follows: At the first monitoring of experiments, diverse amounts of NiCl2.6H2O were tested to identify the effect of nickel nanoparticles concentration on the reductive amination reaction. Hence, the amount of NiCl2.6H2O to prepare Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 was changed from 1 mmol/g to 15 mmol/g and then measured by the Atomic Absorption spectroscopy technique (AAS) which are shown in Table 2. It is clear that the activity of catalytic steadily improved by increasing NiCl2.6H2O form 1 mmol/g to 5 mmol/g. According to the catalytic reaction mechanism, nickel nanoparticle mediated electron transfer from BH4- ion to the imine intermediates (Scheme 1). Subsequently, the amounts of H- sites on the catalyst surface are grown by increasing nickel nanoparticles. Thus, larger amount of hydrides can be transferred to the imine groups through the catalyst. On the other hand, by further increasing the amount of NiCl2.6H2O (more than 5 mmol/g), the catalytic activity was diminished, which can be attributed to after a certain amount of nickel chloride increases, a larger amount of nanoparticles is loaded on the surface of the CMK-3 that may have caused the mesopore channels to narrow. In Fact, the nanoparticle size will increase by increasing the amount of NiCl2.6H2O. Therefore, in some places, the pore size will narrow and it is able to lessen the rate of reactants diffusion into the porous. In one word, lower performance of the catalyst produced with higher NiCl2.6H2O concentration will be anticipated. Despite of this fact, it does not mean the pores are throughout clogged. According to these results, the catalyst provided by 5 mmol/g NiCl2.6H2O presented the best catalytic activity. To identify the effect of NaBH4 amount (as a hydride donor) on the reductive amination the reaction was carried out using various amounts of NaBH4 in the presence of Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 as catalyst. As shown in Table 3, the yield was increased by increasing the amount of NaBH4 (until 6 mmol). The excess values did not have any effect on the reaction. Therefore, 6 mmol NaBH4 was the best value to perform reductive amination reaction. The influence of the solvent on catalytic activity was investigated in the reductive amination reaction using Ni-PVSA/CMK-3 catalyst and NaBH4 as hydride donor, at room temperature. The results are gathered in Table 4. Four vital factor acts to fulfil reductive amination reaction including dielectric constant, dipole moment, solubility in NaBH4, hydrophobic effect, protic and aprotic solvent effect. The results revealed that the reaction time in ethanol solvent is slow due to NaBH4 hardly solving in ethanol and the reaction rate is tardy. In addition, the reaction rate in water solvent is slow because although dielectric constant and solubility of water in NaBH4 is high, carbon mesoporous CMK-3 have hydrophobic nature. It causes substances and catalyst cannot have perfect interaction together. The hydrophobic nature of acetonitrile and oxolane are higher than other solvent that presented above; thus, these two solvent have more similarity to hydrophobic nature of CMK-3. Moreover, dipole moment of acetonitrile is higher than other solvent. Thanks to this feature, the reaction rate increase. Whereas the methanol solvent has mediate circumstance of dielectric constant, solubility in NaBH4, and hydrophobic effect aspect, the reaction time diminish. It is noteworthy to mention that the combination of all these factors together cause this process. Regarding these situation, water and acetonitrile were finally selected as the solvent for the reaction because of their environmental friendly and highly efficient, respectively; and all other optimization and reaction separately accomplished by these two solvent. The effect of the amount of catalyst was defined for reductive amination reaction (Table 5). Due to the fact, the catalyst synthesized is worthy, it is decided that the amount of catalyst optimize by decreasing down to the 0.04 g, nevertheless the reaction time were increased. However, reducing the amount of catalysts until 0.02 g was not sufficient. Since, the quantity of 0.04 g for both solvent was found to be the best weight of catalyst. The reusability of the catalyst was studied by using Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 in water and acetonitrile solvent (Chart 1). After each cycle, the catalyst was filtered off, washed with water (10 mL) and ethanol (3 mL 5 mL). After that, catalyst dried at 60 ËÅ ¡C and reused in the reductive amination reaction with a fresh reaction substances. It might be noted that after each run, a slight amount of the catalysts were lost in the filtration process. Herein, to overcome this problem, after each experiment the amount of remaining catalyst was specified and the molar ratio of the reactants was adjusted according to the remaining amount of the catalyst. The catalyst was reused up to 5 times. The catalyst that react in acetonitrile solvent have serious loss activity. In further investigation, it recognized that the catalyst used in acetonitrile solvent was somewhat destroyed. It can be attributed to the interaction between acetonitrile as a solvent and PVSA/CMK-3 composite. In other cases, not o nly the reusability of the catalyst that performed in water was adequate, but also the catalyst exhibit high stability in this status. This result obtained by SEM and XRD characterization, which can be seen in Figure 9 and 10. As shown in SEM images of reused catalyst in water as reaction solvent is well retained, which is very essential for the catalyst applications. Similarly, the XRD pattern shows a diffraction peak at low angle (1.04 °). It display that the catalyst structure remain. Because of this fact that the reusability in the heterogeneous catalysts is fundamental, water in reductive amination reaction chosen as a compatible solvent. The catalytic activity of the Ni/PVSA/CMK-3 in the reductive amination was compared with CMK-3, PVSA/CMK-3, and without a catalyst. The results are available in Table 6. The consequences affirm the significance role of the acid-metal heterogeneous catalyst in sort of reaction. As shown, the reaction dose not fulfil up to 5% without catalyst. There is the important issue that NaBH4 function as a mild hydride donor agent, which is incapable reagent for reducing imine groups solely. In a similar manner, this result obtained by using CMK-3 due to the fact that mesoporous carbon CMK-3 does not have any active sites to carry out the reaction. By using the PVSA/CMK-3, with improve acidic feature of the mesoporous carbon the carbonyl group activated and thus the yield moderately increased to 40% and 35% in acetonitrile and water solvent, respectively. In addition, using Ni/PVSA/CMK-3, the reaction efficiency was increased to 97% in 35 and 63 min in acetonitrile and water solvent, respectivel y; Because of the role of nickel nanoparticles as species to transfer hydride ions from NaBH4 to imine groups. The interesting point in catalyst investigation is heterogeneous nature. In this regard, the catalyst was separated from the reaction mixture at approximately 50% conversion of the starting substances by filtration and then centrifugation. The reaction progress in the filtrate circumstance was monitored (data not shown). No further reductive amination reaction occurred even at addition times, representing that the nature of reaction process is heterogeneous and there is not any progress for the reaction in homogeneous phase.

Monday, August 19, 2019

Hobbes: Credited through Religion :: social issues

Hobbes: Credited through Religion Although the Catholic faith states that Baptism removes the penalty for past sins including the original sin, it doesn't remove the effects of original sin. It doesn't keep you from sinning. If one is a human being, they sin and thus they are considered â€Å"bad†. This is a fact and it is supported by Biblical texts. Three instances of such will be listed here along with the location of more. The first is Ecclesiastes 7:20 (NKJV) reading â€Å"For there is not a just man on earth who does good and does not sin.† The second is similar and is spoken by Jesus himself (Mark 10:18 NKJV) â€Å"†¦Ã¢â‚¬ËœWhy do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God.’ This statement is made in response to a man calling Jesus â€Å"good† or blameless or pure. The third is from I John 1:8 (NKJV). It states â€Å"If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.† This means that it is untruthful to say that we, humans, may are without sin. More instances of this assertion may be found in I King 8:46, II Chronicles 6:36, Psalms 14:3, Psalms 53:3, Romans 3:12, Romans 3:10, and I John 1:10. By a Merriam-Webster dictionary, one antonym of the adjective, good, is evil. Through this, we may determine that all humans are evil because of their sinful nature. â€Å"†¦God is greater than our heart, and knows all things.† (1 John 3:20, NKJV) God is omniscient; He knows all that has been, is, and will be. One example of this is as such: Before God created Adam and Eve, He knew, in His infinite knowledge, of all that has been and will be, that Satan would tempt Eve and cause her to eat the forbidden fruit. Since He does not change free will, He did not change the out come. He made His divine plan around this happening. Whether you happen to believe this, the Mormon and a â€Å"heretical† view on Adam and Eve, this is a Biblical example of determination—a belief that everything that happens was predestined or that everything that happens was meant to happen. Another Biblical example of determination would be predestination—the belief that since God knew everything that would happen before it happened, He knew who was going to heaven before they lived. These are just two beliefs held by

Sunday, August 18, 2019

Sara Lee Essay -- essays research papers

Businessman Nathan Cummings bought the C.D. Kenny Co., a Baltimore coffee, tea, and sugar wholesaler, in 1939. Cummings soon purchased several grocery firms and later changed the company’s name to Consolidated Grocers—1945. The operation went public in 1946 and was renamed Consolidated Foods Corporation in 1954. Two years later CFC bought the Kitchens of Sara Lee, a Chicago bakery founded by Charles Lubin 1951. Introduced in 1949 and named after Lubin’s daughter, Sara Lee cheesecake had become his most popular product. Soon after, CFC began building its international markets with its first European acquisition in 1962. Subsequent to that purchase, it expanded its global presence with the purchases of Douwe Egberts (coffee, tea, and tobacco; the Netherlands; 1978), Nicholas Kiwi (shoe care and pharmaceuticals, Australia, 1984), and Dim (hosiery and underwear, France, 1989). Using one of its most respected brand names to enhance the public’s awareness of the company, CFC changed its name to Sara Lee in 1985.1 While cheesecake might have brought the company fame, it’s the underwear and hot dogs that bring in more than half of Sara Lee’s sales. The company operates five separate business units in the U.S. and abroad, these include: Sara Lee Foods--a major U.S. packaged-meat processor with brands such as Ball Park and Jimmy Dean, Sara Lee Bakery Group--the number two bakery company in the U.S. (behind Interstate Bakeries) and responsible for fresh bread as well as frozen cheesecakes, The Branded Apparel group—which tops in U.S. intimate apparel and hosiery (Hanes L’eggs, Playtex, and Wonderbra), its Coffee & Tea Worldwide group—that creates beverage sales worldwide, while the Household & Body Care group sells Endust furniture cleaner, Kiwi shoe polish, and body care products in non-U.S. markets. Chicago-based Sara Lee Corporation is a global manufacturer and marketer of high-quality, brand-name products for consumers throughout the world. They have three lines of businesses: Food and Beverage, Branded Apparel, and Household Products. Sara Lee has operations in 58 countries, with products in nearly 200 nations and has 150,400 employees worldwide. Some may wonder how one company, with thousands of employees in numerous locations, makes sure everyone is basing his or her decisions on the corporation’s values. These are questions Sara Lee executives and em... ...Lee’s decentralized structure, for this problem. Although COO McMillan has worked to change this, by centralizing 10 separate meat companies into one, they still have remnants of these decentralized firms. This is why the corporation is currently depending on their newest addition to the firm, Brenda Barnes. Sara Lee is banking on Barnes to bring her operational and branding skills to her new position. Barnes’ resume is filled with successes at well-known consumer product companies, which include Pepsi-Cola North American division. Although Barnes will be starting from behind when she takes over Sara Lee’s day-to-day operations and segmentation strategy, the corporation remains optimistic in her attempt to get Sara Lee cooking.6   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Sara Lee's mission is to feed, clothe and care for consumers and their families the world over. Keeping this in perspective is what Sara Lee will need to remain focused, and reclaim their throne as one of the most successful retailers in the industry. Though this accomplishment may not come easy, with hard work and strategic planning, Sara Lee has the ability to become number one in its class.

Representations of Women in Ike Oguine A Squatters Tale :: Squatters Tale Essays

Representations of Women in A Squatter’s Tale Women can be perceived or looked at in many ways. They are depicted not only as mothers, but also as friends, companions, and even prostitutes. Today’s society has a variety of images of what they feel women should be and what they actually are. Likewise in Ike Oguine’s A Squatter’s Tale, women are portrayed through various roles such as mothers, girl friends or companions, and prostitutes to reflect the society. First, mothers are backbones of the family. When hard times are experienced, they are the ones who keep the family together. Women provide more than financial support to the family. They are the sense of hope and encouragement to keep the household running smoothly. In A Squatter’s Tale, Obi’s mother is the one who, even in hard times, keeps holding on trying to get through the difficulties. The love she has for her family is what gives her the strength to give all she can to her family. When Obi’s family move from their Yaba house to a three-bedroom flat in the outer reaches of Isolo, as a result of the sudden retirement of Obi’s father, their struggles for survival increase. Obi’s mother would drive everyday from Isolo to her shop in Yaba. The drive she endures everyday is very long and tiring. Obi knows his mother is enduring a lot for the family as Oguine establishes this sense of hardship by stating in Obi’s words, From our new home my mother had to do a hellish drive to her shop in Yaba every morning (leaving behind two disabled men – my father and me – brooding in the living room all day in front of the shiny black Sony Trinitron 21† TV I bought when I was treasury manager in BTF) and another hellish drive back every evening through the most chaotic traffic in the whole of Lagos. (113-114) The struggle of the drive alone is hard for Obi’s mother. When her car breaks down after ten years, the battle against hardships is about to be lost, because, in addition to working extremely hard, she is being put through hell. Obi realizes what the struggle is doing to his mother the day she comes home after her car has broken down.

Saturday, August 17, 2019

Cisco Systems Architecture Essay

Cisco is a company with a clear vision and an ambitious goal of becoming the global Internet expert. The company set its sights on challenging the norm of the time and working on making voice calls over the Internet free. Established in 1984 by two Stanford graduates, Cisco became the most valuable business on earth by March 2000. The company’s strategy is to provide a complete solutions offer to its customers through offering a wide product range and growing the business through acquisitions and business alliances. From its original core technology of routers, the company is now focusing in three independent networks of phone, local and wide area and broadcast networks. The turnaround point for the company was its database failure and forced two-day shutdown in 1994. This event highlighted the need to change company’s approach to systems replacement and the need to integrate all of company’s applications. The company decided to adopt new practices and retrain its staff rather than mirroring the â€Å"old and tried†. The decision was made to collaborate with Oracle to develop a single ERP solution to replace all current systems. The project was a success and was followed by replacement and standardization of all company’s platforms and applications worldwide. Further to this project, Cisco web-enabled all its applications, resulting in customer service, HR and supply chain efficiencies. Cisco’s success continues and is being made possible by its growth through acquisitions and strategic alliances (such as that with KPMG). The company is where it is today largely due to its effective integrated Internet business systems, resulting in great efficiencies for the company and its various stakeholders. 1) Cisco – Information Age Company. Cisco is far from being an Industrial Age Company. The main reason for this is that the company has been able to recognise the value in IT and use it to better their performance and achieve the desired growth. According to Weill & Ross (2009), it is a characteristic of an IT Savvy firm. To be more specific, through integrating their processes and applications into an ERP solution and then to proceeding to full replacement of all of its IT solutions worldwide, Cisco moved to a digitalized platform. According to Weill & Ross (2009), digitalized platform is an integrated set of electronic business processes and technologies. This would hardly be a characteristic of an Industrial Age company. Further to that, Cisco’s approach to implementation of its ERP solution and deciding not to mirror known and learnt old approaches but to make a bold move and rather retrain its people in new systems, demonstrates forward thinking and innovation, which is critical to get significant value fro m IT. Again this is a more fitting characteristic of an Information Age company rather than an Industrial Age company. In implementing the ERP system, the company successfully identified where it lacked necessary expertise and was not scared to outsource their needs analysis to KPMG and then the ERP project to Oracle, who had significant knowledge and experience in the solutions Cisco were after. The â€Å"outside the square† thinking allowed the company to focus on own competences and keep them in-house while tapping into the expertise of others through outsourcing and alliances. This is a definite characteristic of an Information Age company. Finally, keeping communication lines open across functional divisions and getting an input from across the business to avoid making the project an IT-only initiative and to ensure it addresses the real needs is another reason why Cisco is an Information Age company. 2) IT contribution to the company’s strategy IT greatly contributed to the company’s strategy to provide comprehensive one-stop-shop business networks solution for its customers, to set industry standards for networking, to systemize acquisitions and pick the right partners. Firstly, it was the company’s IP-based IT Architecture that enabled them to effectively and smoothly handle business acquisition and fully integrate these new acquisitions in a short period of time. Secondly, ERP implementation and application of web-enabled IT allowed Cisco to meet its goals of streamlining its internal processes and improving productivity, to improve customer satisfaction through the provision of online technical support, to pioneer net commerce and set industry standards and to achieve an extremely efficient supply chain. IT and systems implemented were at the heart of executing the company’s strategy. Thirdly, IT is an integral part of Cisco’s information system. According to Picolli (2008), information systems satisfy firm’s information needs and thus improve firm’s efficiency and enable it to achieve its goals. Being an important part of this efficiency improvement process makes IT a significant contributor to Cisco’s strategy. 3) The role of CIO Pete Solvik Pete Solvik’s role was integral in Cisco being able to derive significant value from IT and recognise it as a strategic asset as opposed to a liability. Prior to Cisco’s defining moment, it had the ambitious goals but the company was running standard operations not being able to support what it aspired to become. Solvik brought fresh visions and innovative thinking to the company. His initiatives were to redefine how IT was viewed internally and depart from finance cost centre reporting perception of the department. He was also able to see the limitations of Cisco’s systems and the potential of improvements. According to Weil & Ross (2009), when IT systems are deficient you need to first change the entire approach to IT. Only once this is accomplished can the digitalized platform be implemented. Solvik did manage to do that. Weil & Ross (2009) emphasize the need to strong leadership in turning IT into a strategic asset. And this is ultimately what Solvik’s role was in Cisco’s transformation.

Friday, August 16, 2019

Exhibit Advertisement Essay

Please join the Rhode Island School of Design in exploring a blast from the past! Our annual art exhibit will be celebrated January 22, 2012 in RISD’s auditorium. This year will showcase art work from the Early Chinese and Early Japanese Civilizations. During this free exhibit your entire family will be able to explore the very fascinating masterpieces from ancient Chinese and Japanese artist. Throughout the exhibit you will see different forms of art with each piece reflecting on their culture, history, and religious beliefs. Please take some time to read about some of the artwork that will be displayed, and its roots. Understanding these amazing art forms can be comprehended by first taking a look on how all forms of art was greatly influenced by Early Chinese Civilization. There are many connections between culture, religion, and spiritual beliefs. Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism were religions that greatly affected Chinese artist. These religions and philosophies represented social responsibility, responsibility towards nature, practical and mystical relations, along with healthy life balance. In addition to religion the admiration of nature played a very special part in art whether it is sculptures, calligraphy scrolls, or architecture. The wide array of art forms can be traced back to the Chinese culture. In the first preview you will notice a bronze horse; this artwork was created during the Han Dynasty. A horse for many was means of transportation however the Chinese valued the horse, especially due to their location. The breed of horses that were available to the Chinese were considered â€Å"flying horses† due to their speed. Many emperors along with citizens valued animals and nature because of their spiritual beliefs. Chinese men also valued the horse understanding that in time or war horses were an essential part to defeating enemies. Another art form that can be viewed at our annual exhibit is the representation of Yin and Yang. Yin and Yang represent the equal balance of life. This is most commonly represented by black and white, although the Chinese understood that life would not always be black and white. The Chinese understood that no part of life could be relevant without the other and appreciated the good with the bad and believed in things being equal. Japanese art form absorbed many of the influences from the Chinese Civilization. Japanese art in its own way is a concentrated form of Chinese work and cultural beliefs. There were Taoist and Confucius influences however the Shinto and Buddhist society were also heavily acknowledged. The love and respect for spiritual peace in addition to nature can be easily identified in Japanese art. Much like the Chinese, the Japanese also valued family, life balance, and elder wisdom. In the above image one can sense the importance of religion and spiritual finding. The Shaka Triad displays in the center Buddha. This art work was a direct influence of Buddhism, which later became to influence the court life of the Japanese. (Benton & DiYanni, 2008) This piece of art was directly influenced by the Chinese sculpture traditions especially those of pre-Tang period.

Thursday, August 15, 2019

Fill in the Blank Summer Final Exam

Sociology 101 Fill in the Blank Summer Final Exam Directions: This 50 question exam covers Chapters 1 through 15 and is due no later than noon Friday, 7/29. Each question is worth 3 points for a total of 150 points for this exam. There could be as many as 3 words necessary for the answer. The answer will be counted incorrect if all words are not exact and spelled correctly. This is an open book exam, but please do not share answers with your classmates. Remember that the integrity of the learning environment requires our honesty. Provide the number and the answer only and post in the message box located below these questions. Be sure to click on Submit when finished. 1. The ability to see how our personal troubles are connected to public issues and social structures is called the sociological imagination. 2. Structural functionalism addresses the question of social organization or structures of society and how it is maintained or functions. 3. Value-free sociology concerns itself with establishing what is, not what ought to be. 4. Empirical research is research based on systematic, unbiased examination of evidence. 5. Manifest functions or dysfunctions are consequences of social structures that are intended or recognized. . Conflict theory addresses the points of stress and conflict in society and the ways in which they contribute to social change. 7. Symbolic interaction theory addresses the subjective meanings of human acts and the processes through which people come to develop and communicate shared meanings. 8. The experiment is a method of research strategy in which the researcher manipulates indepen dent variables to test theories of cause and effect. 9. Social-desirability bias is the tendency of people to color the truth so that they sound more desirable and socially acceptable than they really are. 0. Replication is the repetition of empirical studies by another researcher or with different samples to see if the same results occur. 11. Content analysis refers to the systematic examination of documents of any sort. 12. The way of life shared by members of a community that includes language, values, symbolic meanings, technology and material objects is called culture. 13. Ethnocentrism is the tendency to judge other cultures according to the norms and values of our own culture. 14. Cultural relativity requires that each cultural trait be evaluated in the context of its own culture. 5. Cultural diffusion is the process by which aspects of one culture or subculture are incorporated into another. 16. Norms associated with fairly strong ideas of right and wrong that carry a moral connotation are called mores. 17. Counterculture are groups whose values, beliefs, interests, and lifestyles conflict with those of the larger culture. 18. Assimilation is the process through which individuals learn and adopt the values and social practices of the dominant group, sometimes giving up their own values in the process. 19. When one part of culture (usually technology) changes more rapidly than another, sociologists call this cultural lag. 20. The process of learning the roles, statuses, and values necessary for participation in social institutions is called socialization. 21. The process of learning to view ourselves as we think others view us is called the looking-glass self. 22. Primary socialization is personality development and role learning that occurs during early childhood. 23. An institution is an enduring social structure that meets basic human needs. 24. Dramaturgy is a version of symbolic interaction that views social situations as scenes manipulated by the actors to convey the desired impression to the audience. 25. The norm of reciprocity is the expectation that people will return favors and strive to maintain a balance of obligation in social relationships. 26. McDonaldization is the process by which the principles of the fast-food restaurants–efficiency, calculability, predictability, and control—are coming to dominate more sectors of American society. 27. Anomie is a situation in which the norms of society are unclear or no longer applicable to current conditions. 8. Differential association theory says that people learn to be deviant when more of their associates favor deviance than favor conformity. 29. Stratification is the institutionalized pattern of inequality in which social statuses are ranked on the basis of their access to scarce resources. 30. The world-systems theory is a conflict perspective of the ec onomic relationships between developed and developing countries, the core and peripheral societies. 31. Environmental racism refers to the disproportionately large number of health and environmental risks that minorities face daily in their neighborhoods and workplaces. 2. Double jeopardy means having low status on two different dimensions of stratification. 33. Sexism is a belief that men and women have biologically different capacities and that these form a legitimate basis for unequal treatment. 34. The manufacturers of illness are groups that promote and benefit from deadly behaviors and social conditions. 35. Marriage is an institutionalized social structure that provides an enduring framework for regulating sexual behavior and childbearing. 36. Propinquity is spatial nearness. 7. Exogamy means choosing a mate from outside one's own racial, ethnic, or religious group. 38. The hidden curriculum is the underlying cultural messages that schools teach to socialize young people into obedience and conformity. 39. Tracking occurs when evaluations made relatively early in a child's career determine the educational programs the child will be encouraged to follow. 40. Secularization is the process of transferring things, ideas, or events from the sacred realm to the nonsacred, or secular, realm. 41. The Protestant Ethic refers to the belief that work, rationalism, and plain living are moral virtues, whereas idleness and indulgence are sinful. 42. Authoritarian systems are political systems in which the leadership is not selected by the people and legally cannot be changed by them. 43. The power elite comprises the people who occupy the top positions in three bureaucracies—the military, industry, and the executive branch of government—and who are thought to act together to run the United States in their own interests. 44. Capitalism is the economic system based on competition, in which most wealth (land, capital, and labor) is private property, to be used by its owners to maximize their own gain and profit. 45. Socialism is an economic structure in which productive tools (land, labor, and capital) are owned and managed by the workers and used for the collective good. 46. Alienation occurs when workers have no control over the work process or the product of their labor. 47. Collective behavior is spontaneous action by groups in situations where cultural rules for behavior are unclear. 48. A social movement is an ongoing, goal-directed effort to fundamentally challenge social institutions, attitudes, or ways of life. 49. Relative-deprivation theory argues that social movements arise when people experience an intolerable gap between their expectations and the rewards they actually receive. 50. Frame alignment is the process used by a social movement to convince individuals that their personal interests, values, and beliefs are complementary to those of the movement. Instructions: Enter or paste your written work and/or click â€Å"Attachments† to upload your files.