Wednesday, August 26, 2020

Sleep apnia Essay Example For Students

Rest apnia Essay Rest ApneaSleep is basic to life; it is one of a few parts, including food and water, which keep the living alive. Nonetheless, a critical level of the human populace has significant trouble coming to and keeping up Stage IV inside their dozing designs, the phase that permits the brain and body to fall into a profound and therapeutic rest, also called REM rest. At the center of this trouble is a condition known as obstructive rest apnea, a genuine, possibly perilous condition that is undeniably more typical than for the most part comprehended (Sleep Apnea). Without a doubt, obstructive rest apnea can be exceptionally perilous in the event that it isn't appropriately recognized and rewarded. What is Sleep Apnea? Examination discoveries show that almost eighteen million Americans endure with the hazardous and depleting impacts of rest apnea, in which certain mechanical and basic issues in the aviation route cause the breaks in breathing during rest (Sleep Apnea). It is significant for the understudy to realize that indications of a potential issue incorporate uproarious wheezing, heftiness, hypertension and a physical blockage of the nose, throat or upper aviation route. Its pervasiveness seems, by all accounts, to be hereditary somewhat; in any case, its appearance in overweight patients likewise demonstrates that its sythesis is established in both hereditary qualities and condition. Rest apnea happens in two separate modes: focal and obstructive, with focal rest apnea being less regular between the two. The cerebrum neglects to impart appropriate signs to the breathing muscles as a methods by which to begin breaths during rest in focal rest apnea. Obstructive rest apnea, then again, is fundamentally progressively Common, coming to pass exactly when air is discouraged from streaming into or out of the nose or mouth, described by monotonous scenes of upper aviation route obstacle that happen during rest, normally connected with a decrease in blood oxygen immersion (Obstructive Sleep Apnea). It is significant for the understudy to realize that an apneic occasion may occur up to twenty or thirty times each hour here and there much more followed by a prominent scene of wheezing. Critical to note is simply the way that wheezing, all by itself, isn't characteristic of rest apnea; rather, it is nevertheless one obvious manifestation (Sleep Apnea). Rest apnea may happen during the innate unwinding related with rest, when the tongue and throat muscles mellow and definitely hinder the aviation route. This unwinding goes much further when the delicate sense of taste muscles and uvula (plump tissue) list over the aviation route too, making the toiled and loud (Sleep Apnea) so promptly connected with the condition. It is significant for the understudy to realize that there are times when this blockage makes breathing stop completely. Strangely, the individuals who endure with rest apnea don't understand it, while someone else commonly hears the frightening commotions and recommends that there is an issue. The victim may show visit scenes of nodding off at work, providing work relates the insight, too. Individuals with rest apnea for the most part arent even mindful they have an issue and may not trust it when told (Sleep Apnea). Because of the fact that rest apnea is possibly dangerous, it is basic that the victim looks for guaranteed finding and treatm ent. Early acknowledgment and treatment of obstructive rest apnea is a basic advance not just in getting a progressively soothing evenings rest, yet additionally in dodging the expected entanglements of sporadic heartbeat, hypertension, coronary episode and stroke. Rest apnea is increasingly common in men and youthful African-Americans; in any case, it has been analyzed during all life stages. It is significant for the understudy to realize that accomplishing legitimate analysis of obstructive rest apnea incorporates conference with an essential consideration doctor, pulmonologist, nervous system specialist as well as other extraordinarily prepared doctor so as to acquire a complete conclusion and start fitting treatment. In spite of the fact that diagnosing obstructive rest apnea is certainly not an essentially simple assignment, while there are heap different purposes behind erratic rest, present day medication has conceived a progression of tests performed at rest focuses that ar e intended to successfully assess the degree to which rest apnea is the reason (Sleep Apnea). Media Violence EssayWORKS CITEDMini Tracheotomy More Tolerable Treatment For Severe Obstructive Sleep Apnea. 19 November 2000http://geocities.com/HotSprings/1837/minitrach.htmlMurray, John B. Childrens dreams. Diary of Genetic Psychology 156, (1995): 303(10). Obstructive Sleep Apnea. 19 November 2000 http://www.asda.org/Sleep Apnea. 19 November 2000 http://www.4woman.org/faq/apnea.htmSuratt PM; et al. Changes in breathing and the pharynx after weight reduction in obstructive rest apnea. Chest 92 (1987): 631-637. Weck, Egon. Why arent you sleeping yet? A sleep time story. FDA Consumer 23, October 1989: 12(4). Willi, Steven M.; et al. The impacts of a high-protein, low-fat ketogenic diet on youths with grim heftiness: body creation, blood sciences, and rest variations from the norm. Pediatrics 101, (1998): 61.

Saturday, August 22, 2020

what i think about psychology Essays - Freudian Psychology

Brain science is one of my preferred courses that I am taking this semester. Prior to taking this course, I thought it was a course intended to show individuals how to manage patients with emotional wellness issues. Obviously I presently know better. Section one was the most noteworthy to me since it shed an entirely different light into what I thought was Human Growth and Development. After each class, I see the truth of what I have quite recently learned in class. A large portion of the parts we examined were exceptionally intriguing to me. Every one of these parts conveyed peculiar and distinctive data that invigorated my considerations about the future, past, and even what is occurring in my life directly at the time I was learning. It was an impression of all the organic, physical, intellectual, socio-social procedures that have occurred in my life time and of which a few, of the qualities will stop, change, and vacillate as I get more established. The one thing that I would do to improve the manner in which this course is instructed is to go on class field outings to a psychological ward at the medical clinic. What I think would improve understudy communication in this course is to have bunch class ventures. The rule that I learned in this course I intend to apply is to have a go at perusing individuals circumstances and mental limits somewhat better. Since at my specific employment I experience a ton of characters and individuals with a ton of dysfunctional behavior. The significant that I seeking after is Computer Information System at Calhoun Community College. This course will help me in my PC field to adjust to a ton of upsetting circumstances that I may experience at work. In the event that I was a clinical analyst in China I would need to comprehend that it may be against their religion to finding a patient it may make a family become pariah in the city. So I wouldn?t successfully cause a family anguish or hardship while I?m treating their relative. In spite of the fact that I delighted in all the parts we have concentrated up until this point, section one is the section I will jump at the chance to appreciate. In this section, I will illuminate the Freudian phases of improvement. As indicated by Freud, individuals create through five psychosexual stages in which the focal point of delight changes. These stages are Oral stage, butt-centric stage, phallic stage, dormancy stage, and the genital stage individually. Every one of these stages has a one of a kind locale of the body that kids center around the mouth, butt-centric stage; kid delight centers around the rear-end, phallic stage; child?s joy relies upon the genital, just to express a couple. This is engaging me since I have seen reality of this announcement somewhat in my two children. In spite of the reality this hypothesis has been amended by various psychoanalytic scholars that came out with a similarity which express that Freud place more accentuation on sexual nature w ithout in regards to social experience of an individual turn of events. I despite everything notice a few bits of truth in his hypothesis in my children. Taking everything into account, I am pleased to state that this course has been in excess of a great deal learning experience for me. It animated another perspective in me and made me mindful of my absence of instinctive and unique pondering the world and its occupants. From the start it was hard for me to comprehend why certain practices, qualities are impossible to miss to a specific age gathering, degrees in sight, hearing in adulthood yet with this course I have come to learn and welcome these distinctions. It has given me data that will assist me with interpretting and examine circumstances that will tag along in my life in a more sensible way than previously. I truly loved this class. I am as yet stunned and astonished at how loose and pleasant and improving the class has been for me.

Saturday, August 15, 2020

Hit the Books! - UGA Undergraduate Admissions

Hit the Books! - UGA Undergraduate Admissions Hit the Books! It is that time of year when I start to transition from entering UGA freshman and current transfer applicants to the next group of students, those who will be looking at UGA for 2012. And as I normally do at this time of year, I want to get on my soapbox and focus on reading. Yes, that type of hitting the books! As my two children can attest to, I am a book lover, and I do my best to make sure they both have at least one book that they are currently reading. My son just finished with one of my favorite books, The Power of One by Bryce Courtenay, and my daughter is currently reading Virals by Kathy Reichs. As well, the wonderful world of summer reading lists will be out soon, and I am guessing it will mean a summer filled with To Kill a Mockingbird for my son (along with a few others), and we will wait to see about my daughters list. Why do I post this on my blog? Why do I push reading? If you want to do better in your English classes, write better, have a stronger SAT Critical Reading, stronger SAT Writing, communicate better, etc, one great way to do this is to dig into books. Read across the spectrum, from non-fiction to thrillers to sci-fi, but no matter what, read! There are a number of other things that a student can do to prepare themselves for college, but this is by far the most available and easiest ones around. So go to your public library, download the latest Nook book, borrow a great novel from a neighbor, but no matter what, read! Alright, now I can climb off my soapbox. And just so you know, the next book I am suggesting for my rising HS freshman son is A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving, a wonderful book that I am planning on re-reading this summer as well (for probably the fourth time). Any suggestions from the blog audience?

Sunday, May 24, 2020

What Is Time Management - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 5 Words: 1412 Downloads: 1 Date added: 2019/05/31 Category Management Essay Level High school Topics: Time Management Essay Did you like this example? Background What is time management? Time management is a short-range planning, time attitude, long-range planning on academic performance. Unfortunately, there are many temptations around us so that we cannot finish our goal on time. Time management plays a vital role in improving a studentrs academic performance. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "What Is Time Management?" essay for you Create order According to Zhang and RiCharde, 1998, the top three reasons why students drop out of college are the inability to handle stress, lack of commitment, and the realization of the gap between expectations and college realities. As a student in MMU, we like to carry out a study about the impact of time management in academic achievement. From our studies, we found some of the impacts of time management which is the student will have a proper planning, their stress level would be reduced, the student will be more self-efficiency. First, the student would have a proper planning and time management, which is support by Patton (2012). McFadden and Dart, 1992 who reported an influence of total study time on expected grade outcome, support this belief. Some of the MMU students are having a part-time job after their classes, therefore, the amount of total study time will be reduced. It is commonly assumed that students who spent more time studying will receive much better grades than students who have only limited time to study. Due to part-time working job students are suffering from lack of study time, their grades are expected to be lower. Previous studies, which was study by Nonis and Hudson, 2006 and Strauss et al., 2002, explored the relationship between the number of hours worked per week and college students academic. Students often thought that the amount of time they have spent for studying and doing homework will decide whether they will receive good grades or not because they tend to focus on how long they studied instead of how well they remembered the subject or material. Gose, 1998 reported that 39 per cent of college freshman are working 16 hours or more per week, and projected annual increases in the number of students who work while attending school. Nonis and Hudson, 2006 suggested that professors might be expecting less from students in order for them to fulfil multiple requirements and meet good grades. However, the relationship between the amount of time dedicated to working and academic performance is not always clear. Nonis and Hudson, 2006 found no clear influence between hours spent on working and GPA outcomes. Similarly, Light (2001) explored the relationship between workload and grades among college students and found that students who work more hours per week reported higher g rades. Besides that, a good time management can cut the level of stress. If students were too stressed, it can interfere with their ability to interpret and memorize the knowledge that they learnt in their studies as well as achieving a good result in their academic. Schuler (1979) stated that people that have a greater perception of their time and responsibilities are more likely to be less stress. Struthers (2000) shows that the emotional strain and tension causes by college can affect the academic performance among undergraduate. The ability to prioritization of task can keep the studentrs mind from being consumed by stress and the feelings of overwhelmed when studying. By knowing that the students are able to control their time sufficiently can lower the amount of unhealthy stress they felt during the progress of their tasks. Bond and Feather, (1988) stated that these type of students tends to have less psychological issues and involve in all kinds of activities such as clubs or sports. Brown (1985) found that student with a higher perception of time management can increase their concentration on the given task and the amount of time they needed to be spent on each task. Quek (2001) stated that some people, especially the student, face the problem in fighting the urge to procrastinate all their works when they did not have the schedule or strict deadlines on each task. As a result, they are often easy to divert their attention to the distractions around them, preventing them from completing the specific task, and thus increasing the level of stress. Reducing the level of stress can increase the motivation among students that influence greatly in a positive way on their overall academic performance. Furthermore, the time management skill will directly influence students self-efficiency toward their studies. Self-efficiency as a student is the student is able to do their tasks on time, and they could perceive their control over tasks. Previous studies show that decreased stress results in increased self-efficacy. Self-efficacy as ones belief in ones ability to succeed in specific situations or do a task. According to Eccles et al. (1998), student self-efficacy represents their ability to complete tasks well based on how well they perceive control over their tasks. For example, if students have a greater sense of confidence, then they will feel more motivated to complete academic-related tasks with a stronger overall performance. Self-efficacy is often referred to as a strong predictor of higher GPAs among college students which supported by Brown et al., 1989, Hackett et al., 1992, Landy et al., 1991, Miche et al., 2001. An earlier study by Sandler (2000a) suggested self-efficacy as a stronger predictor of student intentions to stay in school than stress because it has a more positive impact on academic performance. In a similar study, Deci et al. (1991) reported that once they have a clear idea of their goals, students can set up measurable objectives to achieve each goal. Chemers et al. (2001) suggest students are more motivated to accomplish tasks associated with achieving their goals, and students who have a higher self-efficacy perceive stressful tasks as challenges than obstacles. Therefore, they possess a greater confidence in their academic performance, which results in an increase in student motivation. As a short conclusion, the time management influence the student, to have a proper planning, and time management to avoid distress becomes imperative, the student will feel lesser stress and the student will be more self-efficiency. Reference Of Terms This report is to study the impact of time management to academic achievement. Our PWC1010 lecture, had requested this report in 20th November 2018 and we start our research at the 2nd week after our topic was approved by our lecture. We need to submit this report in week 14 of trimester 2, 2018 2019 session. Our group is formed by 5 people, which is Chong Feng Bin (1151105476), Seek Chang Yuan (1151105385), Mohamad Syafiq Bin Nasaruddin (1161102250), Nur Afrina Binti Che Azhar (1161101877) and Sim Shan Chuan (1151100486). Purpose The purpose of this report is: to determine the habit of arranging time among student in MMU identity the impact of the time management to the student in academic performance to train the habit of time management to the student in MMU Scope The study aims to determine the comparison to academic achievement among students in Multimedia University Malacca (MMU). The sample of population that are chosen for this study are the Multimedia University Malaccars engineering students, male and female of all races such as Malay, Chinese, Indian and other races. There are more male students than female students that participate in this research because of the number of the male that enrolled in engineering course is larger than the female. The reason is also applied to why the number of Chinese student is more than the other races in this study. The study will takes place in Multimedia University Malacca due to the main purpose of this study is focusing among engineering student in Multimedia University Malacca. The collection of data that are required for this research will be starting from week 5 until week 6. Method The method of data collection that we will be using in this research is survey method. We will be preparing the self- admistered survey questionnaires for our primary data collection. This survey will be carried out in MMU Malacca and we will randomly pick 50 engineering student to help us to complete the questionnaire. Every races will be helping us to complete the survey because we need to know the habit of time management among between different personality, different background etc. The questionnaire will be distribute around FET building in the data collection week. Our group have five member, so each of us will have 10 sheets of questionnaire forms. The forms will be conduct face to face to the person who is doing the survey. This is because we need to confirm our questionnaire could be collect and analyze immediately. Besides that, we will used some of the ideas and information from journals, scientific article to prepare our survey question.

Wednesday, May 13, 2020

Welcome to the Monkey House, Harrison Bergeron, and...

Kurt Vonnegut was a man of disjointed ideas, as is expressed through the eccentric protagonists that dominate his works. Part cynic and part genius, Kurt Vonnegut’s brilliance as a satirist derives from the deranged nature of the atrocities he had witnessed in his life. The reason Vonnegut’s satire is so popular and works so well is because Vonnegut had personal ties to all the elements that he lambasted in his works. Vonnegut’s experience as a soldier in WWII during firebombing of Dresden corrupted his mind and enabled him to express the chaotic reality of war, violence, obsession, sex and government in a raw and personal manner. Through three works specifically, â€Å"Welcome to the Monkey House,† â€Å"Harrison Bergeron,† and Slaughterhouse-five,†¦show more content†¦Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else. All this equality was due to the 211th, 212th, and 213th Amendments to the Constitution, and to the unceasing vigilance of agents of the United States Handicapper General.† (Harrison Bergeron, 1.) The idea behind this opening paragraph is to show how ridiculous government powers have become, as well as warn people that governments are increasingly taking over the freedom and personal attributes of the individual. The same argument and ridicule can be found expressed in the short story â€Å"Welcome to the Monkey House.† Vonnegut introduces the absurd control the government has over the individual in the fictitious society by stating â€Å"So the world government was making a two-pronged attack on overpopulation. One pronging was the encouragement of ethical suicide, which consisted of going to the nearest Suicide Parlor and asking the Hostess to kill you painlessly while you lay on a Barcalounger. The other pronging was compulsory ethical birth control.† (Welcome to the Monkey House, 30.) As a satirist, Vonnegut goes where others don’t dare; he satirizes the future in a cauti onary manner to express concern for the possibility of future government power. Sex is another element Vonnegut satirizes. Perhaps not to caution, but to reveal the twisted ways in which our current society treats sex. No doubt seen in every form of media and in every war, this theme can be found in Slaughterhouse-five andShow MoreRelated`` Harrison Bergeron `` By Kurt Vonnegut1875 Words   |  8 Pagesequal in every which way. Nobody was smarter than anybody else. Nobody was better looking than anybody else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else† (Vonnegut 864). In the futuristic short story, â€Å"Harrison Bergeron† written by Kurt Vonnegut Jr. illustrates a government implemented law of equality forced upon a society. Vonnegut a social commentator utilizes satirical events in the story to illustrate irrational thoughts and ideas from society. Satire is a special form of literature that

Wednesday, May 6, 2020

MM Theory or Capital Structure Irrelevancy Theory Free Essays

string(60) " positive effect on performance of firms in Nigeria and US\." Modigliani and Miller (1958) stated that MM theory also known as capital structure irrelevancy theory. It stated that financial leverage does not affect the firm’s value in perfect market because without taxes, transactions cost or bankruptcy costs in perfect market and all information are symmetries. (Faruk Ahmeti and Burim Prenaj, 2015) Thus, value of levered firm is same as the value of unlevered firm (Abeywardhana, 2017; Michael, 2017) and financial leverage is direct proposition to cost of equity which risk increase commensurate with high cost of equity. We will write a custom essay sample on MM Theory or Capital Structure Irrelevancy Theory or any similar topic only for you Order Now However, world without taxes were impossible in reality so Modigliani and Miller (1963) introduced Tradeoff Theory of Leverage which emphasised firm’s value increase with leverage in presence of taxes due to tax shield. (Alifani et al., 2013; Borad, 2018) When debt percentage in capital structure increases, WACC can be decreased (Brigham and Ehrhardt, 2010) because interest payment of debt is tax deductible. As a result, ratio of corporate tax is equal to current value of savings from taxes due to WACC decrease whereas firm’s value will increase but high debt may cause high probability in bankruptcy. As we can see that, Ireka’s debt to equity in year 2017 has increased from 13% to 20% in order to deduct more tax from its debt’s interest payment. Thus, WACC can be reduced by issuing more debt and Ireka’s value was increasing as well. However, Ireka’s high degree financial leverage (DFL) is higher than its leader company of industry-Gamuda. Therefore, it caused increasing in bankruptcy cost due to its debt are unable to covered by its total assets. Pecking Order Theory is suggested by Donaldson but modified by Myers and Majluf in 1984. Myers and Majluf (1984) stated that pecking order assumes target capital structure is absence and managers rely on internal funds before they consider issuing any securities (Abosede, Adebiyi Julius, 2012) because managers have more insider information than investors and benefit old shareholders. Some company with less accounting transparency will have high asymmetry of information because investors may not know all information about the firm and caused high risk in company. Information of asymmetries, scrutiny of suppliers of capital and floatation costs can be prevented by using retained earnings to support investment opportunities (Li-Ju Chen and Shun-Yu Chen, 2011) unless its retained earnings is not enough to support the investment. If external funds are required, debt will be chosen before equity to avoid selling under-priced securities and cost of debt is less than equity. (B.T Matemilola and A.N. Bany-Ariffin, 2011) Ireka had retained earning in year 2015 which is RM13,732,811 so Ireka use its internal fund to expand business and support investments but Ireka did not have any retained earnings in year 2016 and 2017. Ireka had accumulated loss in year 2016 and 2017 which is – RM 30,949,239 and -RM 26,754,578 respectively. Thus, Ireka will prefer to issue more debt in year 2016 to raise its source of capital instead of equity because debt’s cost is lower than equity and ownership of Ireka will not be diluted due to bondholder without voting right. Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) is developed by William Sharpe (1964) and John Lintner (1965). CAPM attempts to describe the relationship between the investment risk and the investment expected return in order to decide a suitable price for the investment. (Eugene et al., 2004; Yang, 2013) CAPM is an integral part of WACC as CAPM used to calculate cost of equity (David W, 1982; CFI, 2018) and a project-specific discount rate to use in investment appraisal. CAPM-derived project-specific discount rate is used and caused the project IRR lies below the SML of the CAPM. (ACCA, 2018) Thus, project IRR offers insufficient return to compensate for its level of systematic risk. Hence, project unable to generate profit that can cover its it cost so the profitability of firm will be affected and decrease shareholder’s wealth. Ireka’s rate of return on sales showed that it decreased from -0.57 to -15.03 in 2016. Not only that, ROA and ROE also decrease very much in 2016 due to slow efficient of total assets turnover and receivable turnover. The decrease in total assets turnover and receivable turnover lead to insufficient of fund and profitability issues. Ireka’s inefficient investment in construction projects will cause decrease in sales and directly lower down the profit. The beta of CAPM increase and investors will feel risky, so cost of equity will increase as well due to investors expect more return to compensate the risk. Therefore, high cost of equity will increase the WACC but low IRR unable to cover the WACC so Ireka has profitability issues. Osuji and Odita (2012) studied the effects of capital structure on the financial performance of Nigerian organisations and companies’ capital structure had strongly negative related on firm’s financial performance. (Zeitun et al. ,2007; Omorogie at al., 2010) Not only that, a negative correlation between capital structure and firm performance in US and UK corporation. (Abeywardhana and Krishanthi, 2016) Thus, the higher the capital structure, the poorer the financial performance of firm in developing countries and developed countries. However, Abor (2005) and Saeedi et al. (2011) argued that capital structure has positive relationship with ROA which proxy the firms’ performance in Ghana and Tehran. Effect of capital structure and financial leverage on the performance of Jordanian firms and Canadian firms showed that capital structure was negatively associated with firm performance. (Soumadi et al., 2011; Gill et al., 2011) but it also found that there was no significant difference between high financial leverage and low financial leverage on firm performance. Thus, firms with lower leverage performs better thereby supporting the pecking order theory from the point of view that profitable firms use their earnings to finance their new projects and in so doing reduce their level of debt. However, financial leverage of firm in developed and developing countries will not affect the company profit due to the result show it has insignificant relationship. (Obehioye et al., 2013) On the other hand, some studies argued that financial leverage is has significant positive effect on performance of firms in Nigeria and US. You read "MM Theory or Capital Structure Irrelevancy Theory" in category "Papers" (Gill et al., 2011; Akhtar, et al., 2012; Akinmulegun, 2012) Therefore, it can be indicated that financial leverage will impact the profitability of firms in developing countries and developed countries as well. As we know that, steel is one of the main raw material that used in construction so price of steel play significant role in the cost of the construction project. China as the leader in steel production and China decided to shift away its economy from manufacturing to services in last year. (General Steel, 2018) Thus, China announced that production of steel will decrease more than 165 million tons by 2020 (Lapo et al, 2018) and this will affect the price of steel increases rapidly due to demand exceed supply. World Steel Association stated the price of steel will be increased 8% due to a prediction increase in global steel demand up to 0.5%. As Ireka is a construction and engineering company, all the cost of construction projects will increase due to the increase in global price of steel. Steel can consider as a fixed cost because steel is the main raw material of construction so expenses will increase and profit will decrease slightly. As a consequence, Ireka need to invest in a higher IRR projects to cover the cost or else it will affect the profitability and liquidity of Ireka. Besides that, economy of Malaysia able to affect the real estate price and construction industry. In the past two years, economy of Malaysia was slowing down and ringgit is depreciating due to the high debt and scandal of 1MDB. (Lim, 2016) As the house prices continue to rise, demand for house is dropping. Hence, property transactions and building construction activities are slowing down dramatically. However, economy start to recover and ringgit will start to appreciating again after the election of 2018. Valuation and Property Services Department (JPPH) stated that residential property transactions improved about 4% compared to last year. (Mahalingam, 2018) As economy grow, interest rate falls and demand for properties will increase due to easy to obtain mortgage loan. High demand in properties will encourage Ireka to construct and develop more residential projects. This will increase the revenue and share price of Ireka. Moreover, growth of industry also will affect Ireka Corporation by increasing in constructing more mega projects. The Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB) expected the booming in construction industry in 2018 with the real growth at 9% on the back of Malaysia’s overall GDP growth of 5.3%. (Bernama, 2018) Construction industry’s growth was driven by infrastructure project and follow by residential project and these project will brings positive growth in construction industry then boost the economy. (The Star, 2017) There are numerous mega projects has developed in Malaysia such as Mass Rapid Transit 2 (MRT2), Pan Borneo Highway and Petroliam Nasional Bhd’s refinery and petrochemical. Ireka Corporation also affected by the growth of construction sector which Ireka had bid for a few projects that worth RM1.2 billion. Current construction order book includes Imperia Puteri Harbour in Nusajaya, Johor and MRT Package V7. Ireka Corporation is one of the subcontractors of the MRT project which built from Bandar Tun Hussein Onn to Taman Mesra. According to research analyst InsiderAsia, Ireka’s next major catalyst will be the condominium and RuMa hotel residences project at Jalan Kia Peng in the KLCC area. (The Edge, 2013) This will increase the revenue of Ireka and the stock price may increased as well due to anticipated by the investor towards the future development of the company. Ireka should improve collection of accounts receivable to reduce high financial leverage ratio because prevent risk of bankruptcy. Ireka should communicate with customers about the period of time to make payments and both parties agree to make payment in a certain time. Ireka may implements new policy and regulations where Ireka will give some discount to customers if customers pay their bills within 2 months. Ireka also should remind the customers before the payment date to prevent become bad debt and follow up with customers in order to keep track of the payment of customers. Besides that, Ireka should restructuring debt to reduce the debt to equity ratio. (Maverick, 2018) Company can seek to refinance its existing debt if firm is paying high interest rates on its loans. This will reduce both interest expenses and improve company’s bottom-line profitability. As a result, liabilities can be decreased and capital of investors can be use to invest other assets. One of the strategies to improve profitability of the firm is create business strategies plan and financial plan. Ireka should refer to leader company of industry as a benchmark revenue because the leader company provide a blueprint and strategies to increase the profit. (Amos et al., 2009) Thus, Ireka should amend strategies plan of leader company according to its current situation and include a minimum five-year outlook strategies plan with short and long-term goal. As a construction company, most of its revenue is from project-based so it is crucial to have a clear vision about the type of most profitable projects for its bottom-line growth. Therefore, Ireka need to analyse projects and give up 10% of unprofitable projects in strategic plan so capital. (In.Corp, 2018). Thus, Ireka also should created financial plan so budget of firm can be monitored. Ireka should develop a cost accounting system such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) to determine the rate of required return of projects. This allows Project Managers (PMs) to adjust budget and actual cost on time. (Torrance, 2013) Budget able to keep track on its expense and reduce the unnecessary expenses. Budget also need to be reviewed monthly in order to remain aligned with growth of business. As a result, the profit of firm can be maximized in long-term. Furthermore, Ireka can increase its profit by expanding its market at developing countries such as Indonesia, China and Japan. Ireka enter into joint venture or strategic alliances with their suppliers or customers to market each other’s products. Ireka had joint venture with Beijing-based CRRC Urban Traffic Co Ltd into urban rail projects and they signed share subscription agreement which Ireka holding 51% and CRRC UT holding 49%. (Eusoff, 2017) Ireka partner with CRRC UT to explore more business opportunities in areas of logistics, building materials and specific rail projects. Joint venture able to provide more opportunities to Ireka and reduce the uncertainty risk in the sector that are not familiar by Ireka. Corporate Social Responsibilities (CSR) is another important strategy because CSR able to motivate employees by providing extra training and workshop. Ireka should spend extra time to train and educate its employees in order to increase ability and skills of employees.(Pajo and Lee, 2011; Jones et al., 2014) As a result, employees understand the expectation of firm and become more productive. Although training may increase expenses of Ireka but company can operate well in long-term and increase reputation in return. Furthermore, reward and compensation will encourage and increase motivation of employees.(Caligiuri et al., 2013; Glavas and Kelley, 2014) Ireka should reward employees who have outstanding performance in company by providing promotion or bonus. When employees get rewarded, employees will work harder and increasing the work-ethic within company. As a consequence, high productivity will affect improve profitability and maximised the shareholder’s wealth in long term. Net income will affect retained earning significantly so Ireka should increasing the liquidity by having an effective asset management. Ireka should sell off idle assets and increase the efficiency of assets to generate profit. (Fernandez, 2006) Assets will be depreciated so sell off not useful assets to decrease the losses. Besides that, inventory can take up a very sizable amount of a company’s working capital so Ireka should evaluate their efficiency of inventory being managed which monitor the days sales of inventory ratio (DSI) by reordering inventory when firm are nearing redline level of available and the cash conversion cycle (CCC). (Morah, 2018) In additional, cost of gold sold should be reduced by decreasing the cost of raw material and labour cost. Labour cost can be reduced by outsourcing and replace with part-time workers. As cost and expense decrease, more profit can be generated if assets are fully utilised. As consequence, Ireka’s cash flow is more liquid and retained earning can be increased. How to cite MM Theory or Capital Structure Irrelevancy Theory, Papers

Monday, May 4, 2020

Costing system of Solar Power Company

Question: Discuss about the Costing system of Solar Power Company. Answer: Introduction Management accounting or costing is being used in the business to determine the cost of manufacturing the products and to know what cast has been occurred to produce per unit of product. Costing help the management to know the overhead cost of production and how these costs can be divided in the product cost so that proper profits can be determined. Mainly there are two major costing systems used to divide the product or service cost, namely traditional costing system and other one is Activity Based Costing System (Besley and Brigham, 2008). In this report Costing system of Solar Power Company (SPC) will be evaluated in detail and recommendations will be provided to improve their costing system. Currently SPC uses traditional costing system to allocate their overheads and to calculate per unit costing. Company is in view to change the system of costing so that proper profit can be divided among panel A and panel B. Use of Activity Based Costing System over traditional or current costing system Conventional or traditional costing system assigns the costs to the different products on the basis of average overhead rate. For example, labor hr rate can be used to assign the overheads costs to the products. According to this system all the indirect costs used in the production or administration are divided equally amount all products irrespectively such products are being part of particular indirect cost. On the other hand activity based costing system, firstly identifies all the activities in the process of production and appropriate cost driver is being used to find out cost pool of activities. ABC system divides the overhead cost according to activity being used in manufacturing the particular product. It helps in identifying the actual cost of product and profit earned during the period (Friedman, 2009). In this report, both traditional and ABC costing system is being used to find out the profits of panel A and panel B, in order to make comments on how accurate the activity based costing is to allocate the overhead cost in panel A and panel B. Calculations are performed on the given product cost data and per unit product cost has been calculated using both traditional costing system and activity based costing system. There has been noted wide difference in method of costing and per unit product cost of panel A and panel B. When traditional or current costing method has been used to calculate the per unit product cost than cost of panel A occur to be $14.75 and cost of panel B occurs to $ 30.00 per unit. This cost has been arrived through allocating the prime cost and per unit overhead cost to both panel A and panel B. The overhead rate has been calculated using the labor hour rate. Through using the activity based costing system it has been found that per unit cost of panel A was $21.50 and that of panel B was $ 25.50. This difference in per unit cost arrives due to proper allocation of each overhead cost when arriving at total cost occurred for panel A and panel B. While estimating the per unit product cost of panel A and panel B using the ABC costing all the overhead costs are divided among the panels as according to their usage of particular activity in their manufacturing process. When calculating the net profit for both the categories of products according to reign through using the current costing method, it has been found that net profit in southern reign for the panels is $13,199.40 and in northern reign it is $4,572.00. On the other hand, when estimating the profits of both the panels for each reign through using the activity based costing it has been found that net profit for southern reign was $17,559.67 and for northern reign it was $212.33. This difference was due to proper allocation of activity cost in each product in activity based costing system (Pratt, 2003). On the other hand in traditional costing system all allocations have been using the labor hour rate. Wrong Decision made by management while using the current costing method It has been found that management has using the traditional costing system to allocate all the overhead cost in both the products. Prime costs are divided directly using the usage of labor hours and raw materials in each products (Drury, 2005). In case of overheads cost all the costs are sum up and are divided using the labor hours used by each product in their manufacturing process. This costing process ignores the actual usage of different activities by each product. Limitations of using the Activity Based Costing System It has seen that there have been many limitations while adopting the activity based costing system. Firstly, it is very expensive to implement the activity based costing system as against using the traditional costing method. In case of activity based costing system there is requirement to breakdown all the business process into activities and division of each activity has to be made according to the usage by each product. It requires huge time and manpower to make such allocation of each activity (Bierman and Smidt, 2007). Conclusion It has been found that while using the activity based costing system, proper allocation of all the cost has been made. Division of cost using the activity based costing system gives actual net profit earned in each reign and it helps to focus on reign that provides low profits. While using the traditional costing all the overhead cost is dividing on single recovery rate and it provide wrong results. It is highly recommended to the SPC Company to use the ABC costing for division of overhead cost. References Besley, S. and Brigham, E. F. 2008. Essentials of Managerial Finance. Cengage Learning. Bierman, H., and Smidt, S. 2007. The Capital Budgeting Decision, Ninth Edition: Economic Analysis of Investment Projects. Routledge. Drury, C. 2005. Management Accounting for Business Decisions. Cengage Learning EMEA. Friedman, M. 2009. Price Theory. Transaction Publishers. Pratt, S. P. 2003. Cost of Capital: Estimation and Applications. John Wiley Sons.

Saturday, March 28, 2020

Language Defines Gender Essays - Social Psychology, Gender Studies

Language Defines Gender Matchmaker.com: Sign up now for a free trial. Date Smarter! Language Defines Gender How do men and women communicate clearly when most of their ways of communicating are so different? In today's society language plays a key role in defining gender by phraseology, vocabulary, and also their nonverbal vocabulary. Each one of these different types of ways of communicating is prominently different between men and women. Webster's defines phraseology as "a choice and pattern of words." Many studies have been done on the differences between men and women's phraseology. It has been noted in many different studies that men tend to talk much more than women do. This was proven true in a study that Lynette Hirshman did in 1974 (Glass 33). It has also been proven that women tend to speak faster than men; this is due to the fact that women tend to be interrupted more often than men are, and also have the ability to speak more clearly, precisely, and more quickly than men can. In one study it was found that women spoke for an average of three minutes describing a painting, as opposed to the thirteen-minute average it took men to describe it. (Glass 33) Women tend to be more detailed when describing events, persons, places or things. Linguist Robin Lakoff states in her book, Language and Woman's Place, women use greater description when describing colors. (Glass 31) Women notice more detail than men causing women to be more perceptive; they notice things such as tone of voice, facial expression, and body language. Being able to pick up on those three types of communicating helps women better understand what is actually being said in a conversation. Men and women's styles of communicating are close to being directly opposites of one another. Men tend to be louder more aggressive speakers; they mumble many of their words and tend to be sloppy in their pronunciation of words. Men tend to use loudness when emphasizing words instead of inflection and pitch to emphasize points. According to Webster's, inflection is "a change in the tone of the voice," or "the change of form in a word to indicate number, case, tense, etc." (Glass 51) Women tend to use pitch and inflection more so than men do. Men have a tendency to speak in a lower tone and rarely change from that tone to any others. Women on the other hand speak in five different tones, which makes them sound more emotional. (Glass 50) Women also speak more fluidly, which makes them easier to listen to, where men use choppier more fragmented sentences. Women are more soft spoken than men are, which allows men to monopolize most conversations. (Glass 51) Men are much less verbose and they are more direct in getting their point across. Women tend to "beat around the bush" when getting a point across; this causes men to become very agitated while listening to a woman tell a story. Men talk much slower than women do and are more silent during conversational lulls. (Glass 52) Men also have a tendency to make more direct accusations and statements. (Glass 51) Men also answer questions with declaration, ("It's two o'clock."), where as women answer with a question. Men are more commanding in their style of speech, however women ask for things to be done in a more polite manner and usually in terms of endearment, ("Honey, would you please..."). (Glass 53) Men also make more declarative statements, instead women tend to make more tentative statements and use " tag endings". (Glass 53) Women would say, "Would you like to go to the beach today, but we don't have to." A man on the other hand would say, "We're goin' to the beach today." This sentence also shows that men have poor grammar, as opposed to women generally have good grammar. (Glass 53) Men also use one-word answers, rarely use conjunctions, and hardly ever use adjectives of adoration. Women tend to have lengthy responses, long sentences that are adjoined with words like"and", "but", "however", etc., and always use adjectives of adoration such as "cute", "adorable", and "sweet", etc. Men use more foul language, slang, and make simpler, more understandable requests, but women do all of these things exactly the opposite. Men, as most people know, lecture and have use more of a monologue, where as women have more of a give-and-take dialogue. (Glass 55) Men and women also tend to have a very different nonverbal way of communicating, which can also make it very hard for one another to understand what the opposite

Saturday, March 7, 2020

Man with the Movie Camera and the Male Gaze Essays

Man with the Movie Camera and the Male Gaze Essays Man with the Movie Camera and the Male Gaze Paper Man with the Movie Camera and the Male Gaze Paper Essay Topic: Invisible Man Man with the Movie Camera: The Male Gaze Between every audience and a film there will always lay a camera; this camera may seem transparent or not visible, but nevertheless there is a camera and a cameraperson filming the scenes. Laura Mulvey, within her essay Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, coins the term â€Å"male gaze,† where the intermediary, the camera, is metaphorically transformed to the eyes of a male, changing how we view cinema, as well as both men and women immortalized on the silver screen. Dziga Vertov, a Soviet director, wrote and directed an avant-garde, silent documentary film called Man with the Movie Camera in 1929. Despite being famous for its anti-narrative cinematical elements, the film includes a number of narrative developments of human movement in the Soviet Union, which portray power struggles between the government, men, and women. Vertov’s Man with the Movie Camera reflects Mulvey’s psychoanalytic male gaze by abstaining from the use of a visible subject or actors, its use of a wide and unusual variety of cinematic camera techniques, and a male perspective. Man with the Movie Camera lacks a clear or constant visible subject or actor, and thus supports Mulvey’s theory of the male gaze in cinema. The film, instead of having recognizable characters or actors, attempts to capture the life of a camera man, very much from the camera’s perspective. Vertov includes shots of the titular camera men within the film, but many of the scenes are montage or unstaged clips of daily life. By not utilizing strongly developed characters, the audience does not have a particular perspective to view the film, other than the exclusively male cameramen, but, by including the cameramen, with their cameras, filming within the film, as well having the audience view another audience watching the same movie, Vertov brings attention to the gaze itself; that there is, in this case, a man looking through the camera and creating the scene. Mulvey says that â€Å"There are circumstances in which looking itself is a source of pleasure, just as, in the reverse formation, there is pleasure in being looked at† (200). The male gaze in the example of scenes of cameramen filming with the film itself represents this pleasure of looking and of capturing a moment. Mulvey goes on to say that: â€Å"At first glance, the cinema would seem to be remote from the undercover world of the surreptitious observation of an unknowing and unwilling victim. What is seen of the screen is so manifestly shown. But the mass of mainstream film, and the conventions within which it has consciously evolved, portray a hermetically sealed world which unwinds magically, indifferent to the presence of the audience, producing for them a sense of separation and playing on their voyeuristic fantasy† (201). Man with the Movie Camera seems to counteract the illusion of cinema by drawing attention to the act of filming and the cameramen themselves and a lack characters. Furthermore, because the film is a silent documentary, though an orchestral soundtrack was produced to accompany the film, the characters that are present have no voice or audible connection to the audience, thus without a consistency of characters nor a voice attached to any of the subjects within the film the audience becomes aware that the camera can ultimately be an intermediary between the cameramen and them, and the illusion of narrative cinema is lost. Mulvey states that in film women are typically the objects, rather than the possessors, of gaze because the control of the camera, and thus the gaze, comes from the assumption of heterosexual men as the default target audience for most film genres, in this case, as a result of the male cameramen present in the film (200). Though there are no consistent human characters with Man with the Movie Camera, the camera itself seems become a subject itself. In the opening scene of the movie one of the various cameramen is positioned, by being superimposed, on top of another large, mountainous camera. In later scenes within the film, Vertov seeks to emphasize the power of the visual reach of the camera; it can go anywhere and be anywhere. For example, Vertov creates scenes in which the film superimposes a cameraman inside a glass of, women waking up and getting dressed, and a woman giving birth, and the baby being bathed. In another scene the camera is subject to simple animation in which it even evolves human movement like its cameramen. These scenes portray the gaze of the camera, thus the gaze of the man behind the camera – a literal male gaze, as having the power to film and objectify anything, from this the camera itself becomes the subject amongst a lack of actors. Man with the Movie Camera utilizes an unusually broad range of cinematic technique and staging, which reflect Mulvey’s male gaze of cinema. A majority of the scenes in the film appear to be completely not staged, as the audience is aware that the cameramen being filmed are simply attempting to gain shots of people of the Soviet Union in their everyday life and routine. By creating a seemingly realistic shot, Vertov changes â€Å"the function of film†¦ to reproduce as accurately as possible the so-called natural conditions of human perception. Camera technology†¦ and camera movements†¦, combined with invisible editing†¦ all tend to blur the limits of screen† (204). In one clip, Mikhail Kaufman, one of the cameramen, as well as Vertov’s editor, sets his camera up in a train car to film passengers sitting in a train car. Despite the people in the train car appearing staged, one child waves to the camera shyly, making the scene lose its formal, undisturbed feeling. In a similar way to voyeurism and the male gaze, Mulvey says â€Å"that of the spectator in direct scopophilic contact with the female form displayed for his enjoyment (connoting male fantasy) and that of the spectator fascinated with the image of his like set in an illusion of natural space, and through him gaining control and possession of the woman within the diegesis† (204). In the case of Kaufman filming what we presume as a diegesis of natural space, according to Mulvey the male gaze of the camera, the cameramen, and the audience creates a spectacle of the natural, or unstaged, world, which, as Mulvey puts in Freudian terms, creates a voyeuristic male fantasy. The film itself does contain sexual imagery, concurrent with the male fantasy. Scenes of a camera set up in a room continuously films women waking up and getting dressed, then undressed later, which literally fulfills the fantasy of voyeuristic male fantasy. Similar to the concept of the’ peeping to,’ The Man with the Movie Camera creates an unstaged world which entertains the male gaze. Amongst other cinematic techniques include many scenes involving track shots. Track shots, so named because the camera is usually set along a track in order to control its movement, mirror a gentle progression of movement, not entirely unlike human walking or running. In this sense, the film once again recreates a natural world through comparably human movement. Other techniques, such as extreme close ups, for example of people sitting in the audience viewing the movie, the same film, within the movie in the heater present the audience with another scene in which the viewer is associated with the active subject; the camera and its gaze – or the gaze of the titular characters, and the passive, objectified individuals, as well as the masses. Lastly, Vertov’s Man with the Movie Camera reflects Mulvey’s male gaze through it s portrayal of men and women through objectification. The basis of this argument comes from the assumption that the audience will take the perspective of the cameramen seen filming within the movie, whom are the only consistent characters, thus the audience will take on the gaze of the male. Mulvey says â€Å"the man controls the film fantasy and also emerges as the representative of power in a further sense: as the bearer of the look of the spectator, transferring it behind the screen to neutralize the extra diegetic tendencies†¦ as spectacle† (204). One of the first scenes in which women are visible on screen, is a montage of footage of cameramen working to achieve difficult or risky shots, such as sitting in front of a moving train or filming in a moving vehicle, spliced with scenes of women putting on pantyhose and braziers. This comes as a reflection of the male gaze by objectifying women through the comparison between men working with cameras and taking dangerous shots and women’s legs. In one, the men are usually facing the camera or their faces are at the very least visible to the viewer whilst they are filming, yet for the women their faces are never visible throughout this montage, only their bodies. This works on different levels to support a male gaze; it solidifies the association of the audience with the male by both showing men’s faces, and their gaze, and their relationship with the camera; women are not shown to be even capable of a gaze nor able to be equals with the male gaze by meeting it with their own. According to Mulvey, the male gaze is based upon the theory that â€Å"the paradox of phallocentrism in all its manifestations is that it depends on the image of the castrated woman to give order and meaning to its world. An idea of woman stands as a linchpin to the system: it is her lack [of a phallus] that produces the phallus as a symbolic presence; it is her desire to make good the lack that the phallus signifies† (198). Through this reasoning, The Man with the Movie Camera, no matter how artificial this montage may be interpreted, objectifies women as both a threat of castration and sexual objects, and portrays men as the both the men behind the camera and connected to the actively looking audience. Despite much of the film being nstaged, The Man with the Movie Camera contains a few scenes in which the events are staged or choreographed. The scene mentioned earlier, of the women getting dressed, is one of the few obvious examples of staging within the film, as well as a scene in which chess pieces are being collected in the middle of the chess board. By having scenes that are obviously staged or choreographed, especially amongst a vast majority of film that is natural, or, Vertov emphasizes such objectification. Dziga Vertov’s Man with a Movie Camera comes to the viewer as a reflection Laura Mulvey’s psychological male gaze by having no consistent characters or narrative development, unusual cinematic and plot techniques, and by utilizing an objectifying male gaze. Vertov’s film, much like a majority of film of the silver screen from Hollywood’s day and age, clearly had examples of a male gaze a theory from Mulvey, a much more contemporary writer, despite many of its non-traditional, anti-narrative structure.

Wednesday, February 19, 2020

Silentos Criticism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Silentos Criticism - Essay Example Old philosophers did not feel confident about their opinions even after they had sufficiently addressed the concerns of the critiques. The philosophers looked for opportunities to move further understanding that it is not quite possible to outgrow the fear. The contemporary philosophers began with the arrival of such venerable figures so that they might move ahead.2. Silento’s criticism regarding the period of 1840s is fundamentally directed towards the fact that ideas then were sold rather than promoted for the wellbeing of the society. Everything had become business. The philosophers of 1840s were too shallow in their analysis of the subjects and did not evaluate the objectivity of their claims by doubting their theories unlike the philosophers of the past e.g. Descartes that gave the self doubt so much importance that they would spare even the most obvious facts because of a life-long cultivated doubt.

Tuesday, February 4, 2020

Risk management practices in the service Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Risk management practices in the service - Essay Example 14). The manual further defines the fire department's mission as "managing risk for others" (FEMA, 1996, p. 23). In carrying out this mission, the manual lists ways a fire department can manage individual risks or "things that go wrong when departments attempt to deliver services that define this mission" (FEMA, 1996, p. 24). The areas discussed include personnel, fire inspection precautions, administration and communication. Next, the manual discusses application of risk management. Recommendations are given regarding assessment of risk and bravery in the face of risk. Bravery may be accepted to save lives but it is inappropriate to risk one's life, "when there are no lives to be saved" (FEMA, 1996, p. 64). The manual describes public expectations, occupational safety and health, principles and development of incident action plans, incident commander responsibilities, and roles in the firefighting organization. Examples are given with regard to unoccupied buildings, unusual situational risks, time factors, unacceptable risks, strategies, communication, personal protective equipment, experience, judgment and training. The manual also emphasizes the importance of pre-incident planning and management of information. Even with this focus on concept and application, the manual is missing key elements that could reduce fatalities among firefighters.

Monday, January 27, 2020

Fluoroquinolones for Infectious Diseases Treatment

Fluoroquinolones for Infectious Diseases Treatment 1.10 Pharmaceuticals 1.10.2 Fluoroquinolones Fluoroquinolones are extensively used for treatment of various infectious diseases. [[1]]. Because of their extensive Gram negative treatment, quinolone antibiotics were initially used for the treatment urinary tract related diseases. Higher drug concentrations promote their effectiveness in the treatment of urinary infections. lomefloxacin, levofloxacin ciprofloxacin, ofloxacin, enrofloxacin, and gatifloxacin have higher renal clearance to analyze the activity of the kidney and urine concentration test measures the ability of the kidneys to excrete water. Fluoroquinolones enter the environment by different routes including municipal and industrial wastewater effluent. The recent studies show that from many parts of the world reported the presence of fluoroquinolones in surface water bodies at concentrations ranging from non-detectable to around 50 ng dm-3 [[2]]. The existence and addition of fluoroquinolone antibiotics in aquatic environments, at very low concentrations, may cause affect to the ecosystem and human health. They require development of the different oxidation methods for the transformation of fluoroquinolones in water during water treatment. Disinfection processes (e.g., chlorination, oxidation, and UV irradiation) appear to result in considerable addition of fluoroquinolone and their transformation during municipal treatment of waste before to release into water stream [[3]]. An added disinfectant may undergo transformation reactions with antibacterial agents during water treatment. Sodium hypochlorite is a commonly intended for chlorination of water during disinfection process, and also potassium permanganate may be also used for disinfection processes[[4][5]]. Considering the occurrence of chlorine in municipal wastewater and drinking water disinfection processes, reactions with aqueous chlorine species likely play a particularly important role in the environmental fate of fluoroquinolones. Levofloxacin Levofloxacin is in a class of antibacterial agent called fluoroquinolones. It is used for the treatment of certain bacterial infections. Levofloxacin is used to treat certain infections such as urinary tract, chronic pneumonia, bronchitis, kidney and skin infections. Levofloxacin may used to prevent anthrax in people who may have been open to anthrax germs in the air. It works by destroying bacteria that causes infections. Antibiotics will not work for viral infections, flu, colds, or other diseases. Lomefloxacin Structure of Lomefloxacin (LMF) Lomefloxacin is also class of fluoroquinolones antibacterial agent.This used to treat a wide range of bacterial infections. It is used to treat bacterial infections including bronchitis and urinary tract infections. Lomefloxacin is associated with photo toxicity and central nervous system adverse effects [[6]]. 1.10.3 Oxazolidinones The oxazolidinones, a new class of synthetic antibacterial agents have a distinctive mechanism of to contorol bacterial protein synthesis. The oxazolidinone to be approved for clinical use, show in-vitro activity against many important resistant harmful organisms. Clinical trials verified the action in the setting of pneumonia soft-tissue, and skin infections, and infections due to vancomycin-resistant. [[7]]. Linezolid Linezolid is an antibacterial agent used to treat certain serious bacterial infections that have not taken action from other antibacterial agents. Linezolid is not only used to treats bacterial infections, but also for viral infections. Unnecessary use or over use of any antibiotic can lead to its reduces effectiveness. Linezolid is a relatively safe drug; it can be used in patients of all ages and in people with poor kidney function or liver disease [[8]]. The current study was undertaken to elucidate reaction products, kinetics, and mechanism between free available chlorine (FAC) or permanganate with fluoroquinolones class of antibacterial agents such as levofloxacin (LFC) Lomefloxacin (LMF) and oxazolidinone class of antibacterial agent linezolid (LNZ). Which are the most popular for disease control and prevention in the recently are used. 1.10.1. Routes of pharmaceuticals entering into the environment The figures 1.4.a. and 1.4.b. and figure 1.5 shows that a large fraction of clinically prescribed antibiotic dose is discharged into municipal waste water systems due to incomplete metabolism of antibiotics within the human body. (Rain) runoff water carries the hospital wastes to rivers and contaminates the river water. In recent years, there has been growing concern about the presence of pharmaceuticals in the aquatic environment. Continuous exposure of antibiotics to bacterial communities, promotes the bacteria to develop antibiotic resistance. Possible induction of antibiotic resistance in bacteria is directly related to human health. The action of antibiotics during water treatment process clearly plays a significant role in this regard. Antibacterials and other pharmaceutical are having the tendency to persist contaminants in the water supply is of increasing concern in the field of environmental toxicology. Several national and international bodies have reported the presence of antibacterials in surface water, ground water, drinking water, and waste water [[9]]. Antibacterials were primarily observed as â€Å"wonder medicines† mainly because they were introduced from surgical drains or spontaneous cure were available to treat serious bacterial diseases. Many classes of these antibacterial agents were discovered in the last five to six decades. These include penicillins, sulfonamides, trimethoprim, chloramphenicol, cephalosporins, colimycins, tetracyclines, lincosamides etc, [[10]]. Understanding the fate and transportation of antibacterial agents in the aquatic environment is vital to properly assess the risk associated with these emerging contaminants [[11]]. What happens to these antibacterial agents during municipal water treatment? Municipal water treatment essentially involve following processes; The steps involved in conventional water treatment method are shown in the above flow diagram. The aeration process is carried out to remove the odor from the water. The filtration is the removal of the solids, specially suspended matter, by passing the water through a granular media (sand, coal, diatomaceous earth, granular activated carbon). The colloidal particles pass through the filtration process and removed using coagulants in the flocculation process. The micro contaminants, which are dissolved in water, can easily pass through aeration, filtration and flocculation processes but they may react with the disinfectants in the last process. What are the commonly used disinfectants? Chlorine: Chlorine gas, NaOCl, Bleaching powder, Conventional water treatment Chloramines: Weak disinfectant and low rate of reaction Ozone: Costly UV/H2O2: Costly Not suitable for Municipal water treatment KMnO4: Potassium permanganate is usually applied for waste water treatment 1.11 Disinfection Disinfection is the process of killing pathogenic organisms like bacteria and viruses in the drinking water supply. It is the last step in the treatment and is necessary to supply a â€Å"bacteriologically free† drinking water for the general public usage. Disinfection is the necessary step before the public water supplies. Chlorination is the treatment technique of killing harmful microorganisms in water supplies. 1.11.1 Chlorination An added layer of complexity in this problem lies in the potential bio-transformation antibacterial agents can undergo during drinking water chlorination. Chlorination, in the form of sodium hypochlorite, is a common mechanism of drinking water disinfection. [[12]]. Chlorination has been shown degradation of certain parent drugs in drinking water [[13]]. The effect of chlorination has been studied for several non antibacterials. However, these studies are few in comparison to the variety of pharmaceutical contaminants our environment faces [[14]]. A long-term objective of this research work is to know the fate of antibacterial in the water supply when they are exposed to chlorination and oxidation in the drinking water treatment process. Microorganisms can be found in raw water like rivers, lakes and groundwater. Some microorganisms may cause diseases in human and are called pathogens. These pathogens existing in water can be transmitted through a drinking water distribution system, causes water related diseases. The use of chlorine in the water treatment process was originally directed to the primary function of disinfection. Chlorination is one of the methods that can be used to make germ-free water. This method was first used over a hundred years ago, and is still it is continued. It is a chemical disinfection method that uses various types of chlorine or chlorine-containing substances for the oxidation and disinfection of what will be the potable water source. 1.11.2 Importance and benefits of chlorination of water Many investigations and studies have been carried out to make sure success in new treatment plants using chlorine as a cleaning agent. An important benefit of chlorination is that it has effective against viruses and bacteria. The three most common types of chlorinating agents used in water treatment are: Ca (OCl)2 (calcium hypochlorite), NaOCl (sodium hypochlorite), and Cl2 (chlorine) gas, Any type of chlorinating agent is added to water during the water treatment process will lead to form of hypochlorous acid (HOCl) and hypochlorite ion (OCl), which are the main disinfecting species. Of the two disinfecting species, hypochlorous acid is the most effective. The amount of each compound present in the water is dependent on the pH level of the water. At lower pH levels, the hypochlorous acid will dominant. The quantity of chlorine that is required to disinfect water is depends on the impurities in the water. The amount of chlorine that is required to satisfy all the impurities is termed the ‘chlorine demand. Once the chlorine demand has been reached is called breakpoint chlorination i.e., the addition of chlorine to water until the chlorine demand has been fulfilled. After the breakpoint, any extra chlorine added will result in free chlorine residual, residual chlorine can react with a number of different contaminants present in raw water The main purpose of chlorination is to disinfect water, but it also has many other benefits. Unlike some of the other disinfection methods like ozonation and ultraviolet radiation, chlorination is able to provide a residual to reduce the chance of growing pathogens in water storage tanks or the water distribution system. 1.11.3 Types of chlorinating agents 1.11.3 .1 Chlorine Gas Chlorine gas is good disinfectant, but it is toxic to more than just waterborne pathogens; it is also toxic to humans. When chlorine gas (Cl2) is added to the water (H2O), it hydrolyzes rapidly to produce hypochlorous acid (HOCl) and the hypochlorous acid will then dissociate into hypochlorite ions (OCl) and hydrogen ions (H+). Because hydrogen ions are produced, the water will become more acidic (the pH of the water will decrease). The amount of dissociation depends on the original pH of the water. If the pH of the water is below a 6.5, nearly no dissociation will occur and the hypochlorous acid will dominate. A pH above 8.5 will see a complete dissociation of chlorine, and hypochlorite ions will dominate. A pH between 6.5 and 8.5 will see both hypochlorous acid and hypochlorite ions present in the water. Together, the hypochlorous acid and the hypochlorite ions are referred to as free chlorine. Hypchlorous acid is the more effective disinfectant, and therefore, a lower pH is preferred for disinfection. 1.11.3.2 Calcium hypochlorite Calcium hypochlorite Ca (OCl) 2 is made up of the calcium salts of hypochlorous acid. When treating water, a lesser amount of calcium hypochlorite is needed than if using chlorine gas. When calcium hypochlorite is added to water, hypochlorite and calcium ions are produced. Instead of decreasing the pH like chlorine gas does, calcium hypochlorite increases the pH of the water. However, hypochlorous acid and hypochlorite concentrations are still dependent on the pH of the water; therefore by decreasing the pH of the water, hypochlorous acid will still be present in the water. As a result, calcium hypochlorite and chlorine gas both produce the same type of residuals. 1.11.3 .3 Sodium hypochlorite Sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl) is made up of the sodium salts of hypochlorous acid and is a chlorine-containing compound that can be used as a disinfectant. It is produced when chlorine gas is dissolved into a sodium hydroxide solution. It is in liquid form, clear with a light yellow color, and has a strong chlorine smell. Sodium hypochlorite is extremely corrosive and must be stored in a cool, dark, and dry place. Sodium hypochlorite will naturally decompose; therefore it cannot be stored for more than one month at a time. Of all the different types of chlorine available for use, this is the easiest to handle. Like calcium hypochlorite, sodium hypochlorite will also produce a hypochlorite ion, but instead of calcium ions, sodium ions are produced. NaOCl will also increase the pH of the water through the formation of hypochlorite ions. To obtain hypochlorous acid, which is a more effective disinfectant, the pH of the water should be decreased. In drinking water, the concentration of chlorine is usually very low and is thus not a concern in acute exposure. More of a concern is the long term risk of cancer due to chronic exposure to chlorinated water. Chlorination is a very conventional method of water disinfection that has been used from several years. It is efficient for destroying viruses and bacteria. 1.12 Aqueous chlorination chemistry In water treatment, gaseous chlorine Cl2 or hypochlorite are commonly used for chlorination processes. Chlorine gas (Cl2) hydrolyzes in water according to the following reaction: Fig.1.5. Relative distribution of main aqueous chlorine species as a function of pH at 25 ËÅ ¡C and for a chloride concentration Where k1 and k-1 values, calculated at  µ=0 M and 25ËÅ ¡C from Wang and Margerum, are 22.3 s-1 and 4.3Ãâ€"104 M-2 s-1, respectively. For temperatures between 0 and 25 1ËÅ ¡C, KCl2 ranges from 1.3Ãâ€"10-4 to 5.1Ãâ€"10-4 [[15]]. Hypochlorous acid resulting from reaction (1), is a weak acid which dissociates in aqueous solution: With KHOCl reported in literature between 1.5Ãâ€"10-8 (pKaHOCl,0ËÅ ¡C = 7.82) and 2.9Ãâ€"10-8 (pKaHOCl,25ËÅ ¡C= 7.54) for temperatures between 0 and 25 ËÅ ¡C [[16]]. Under typical water treatment conditions in the pH range 6–9, hypochlorous acid and hypochlorite are the main chlorine species. Depending on the temperature and pH level, different distributions of aqueous chlorine species are observed. Fig. 1.6. Shows the distribution of HOCl and ClO as a function of the pH at 25ËÅ ¡C and for a chloride concentration of 5Ãâ€"10-3 M (177.5mgL-1). For these high chloride concentrations, Fig. 1 6. shows that Cl2 hydrolysis is almost complete at pH >4. Therefore, Cl2 can usually be neglected under typical drinking water treatment conditions [[17]]. References 1 [1]. P.C.Sharma, A. Jain and S. Jain, Fluoroquinolone antibacterial: a review on chemistry, Microbiology and therapeutic prospects, Acta Poloniae Pharmaceutica-Drug Res, Vol. 66 , 2009, pp. 587-604. [2]. P.Wang, Y.L. He and C.H. Huang, Oxidation of fluoroquinolone antibiotics and structurally related amines by chlorine dioxide: Reaction kinetics, product and pathway, Eval. Water res. vol.4 4, 2010, pp.5989-5998. [3]. M.C. Dodd , A.Shah ,U. V.Gunten and C. H.Huang, â€Å" Interactions of Fluoroquinolone Antibacterial Agents with Aqueous Chlorine: Reaction -Kinetics, Mechanisms, and Transformation Pathways† Environ. Sci. Technol. Vol.39, 2005, pp. 7065-7076. [4]. S. D. Richardson and T. A. Ternes, Emerging contaminants and current issues,† â€Å"Water analysis, Analytical Chemistry, vol. 77(12), 2005, pp. 3807–3838. [5] .J. Gibs, P. E. Stackelberg, E. T. Furlong, M. Meyer, S. D. Zaugg, and R. L. Lippincott, â€Å"Persistence of pharmaceuticals and other organic compounds in chlorinated drinking water as a function of time,† Science of the Total Environment, vol. 373(1), 2007 ,pp. 240–249. [6]. E.Rubinstein, History of quinolones and their side effects.† Chemotherapy 2001,47 (Suppl 3): 3 [7]. D.J. Diekema and R.N Jones. Oxazolidinone antibiotics. Lancet. 2001, 358 (9297):1975-82. Review. Pub Med PMID: 11747939. [8]. A.E. Barnhill, M.T. Brewer and S.A. Carlson. Adverse effects of antimicrobials via predictable or idiosyncratic inhibition of host mitochondrial components. Antimicrob. Agent. Chemother., 2012,Vol.56 (8):pp. 4046–4051. [9]. T C. Melton and S. D. Brown, Hindawi Publishing Corporation International Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, Vol. 2012, pp.1-6. [10] .S. H. Zinner, Antibiotic use: present and future, New microbiologica, Vol.30, 2007, pp. 321-325. [11] .H.C. Zhang, W. R. Chen and C.H. Huang Kinetic Modeling of Oxidation of Antibacterial Agents by Manganese Oxide, Environ. Sci. Tech., Vol. 42(15), 2008, pp. 5548–5554. [12]. S. D. Richardson and T. A. Ternes, â€Å"Water analysis: emerging contaminants and current issues,† Anal. Chem., Vol.77 (12), 2005, pp. 3807–3838. [13]. J. Gibs, P. E. Stackelberg, E. T. Furlong, M. Meyer, S. D. Zaugg, and R. L. Lippincott, â€Å"Persistence of pharmaceuticals and other organic compounds in chlorinated drinking water as a function of time,† Sci. Tot. Environ. Vol. 373(1), 2007, pp. 240–249. [14]. Z. Li, H. Fenet, E. Gomez, and S. Chiron, â€Å"Transformation of the antiepileptic drug oxcarbazepine upon different water disinfection processes,† Water Res., Vol. 45(4), 2011, pp. 1587– 1596. [15]. T.X. Wang and D.W.Margerum,. Kinetics of reversible chlorine hydrolysis: temperature dependence and general-acid/ base-assisted mechanisms. Inorg. Chem. Vol.33, 1994, pp.1050–1055. [16]. J.C.Morris, The acid ionization constant of HOCl from 5 to 351. J. Phys. Chem. Vol.70, 1966, pp.3798–3805. [17]. M. Deborde, U.V. Gunten, Reactions of chlorine with inorganic and organic compounds during water treatment—Kinetics and mechanisms: A critical review, water res., Vol. 42, 2008, pp.13 – 51.

Sunday, January 19, 2020

Future of Fashion

Fashion. A word that defines a world in itself. Fashion encloses everything surrounding our environment. There is fashion everywhere. From the pen that a person uses to write to the paper that is used to write on. But more than anything, fashion is about how we dress up and cover our bodies. Fashion is an art, a passion and a science. The art of transforming mere fabrics into clothing and fabulous creations. A passion that drives people to think out of the box and design garments that make our daily if not special occasions more beautiful.A science about how the body works, reacts with and looks in it. But today in 2013, more than ever, Fashion has power. Enough power to make a whole population think and consider. And the future seems brighter for Fashion and it gets stronger and stronger. By 2020 Fashion will†¦ According to sic-if movies, spandex suits will be the norm. Uniformity will be the new trend. Same suit every day. Basically gloomy and no fashion anywhere. But uniformi ty is also boring if repeatedly everyone wears the same outfit and that too everyday. And generally speaking not everyone will look nice in spandex.Fortunately designers such as Guiltier for the Fifth Element painted a different futuristic fashion. This is according to the movies. According to me, it will be the opposite. People will thrive to be different and non-conformity will be respected, if not individuality. Designers will have more respect as consumers will be more conscious about who designed the garment, where it is manufactured and how. People will have more awareness about what they wear and also the impact it implies. Consumers will start having their own vision and will even start creating.Designing will be a highly regarded profession and this will be the only point that will differentiate professionalism. Cut, fabrics and techniques. With this will eventually come a more dignified consumer behavior. The need for something exclusive will grow even more. Things are not going to be made for the masses much longer. They will be made for you, individuals. There is a new obsession with the in-between. The latest ‘squelched' of fashion. If future fashion was to be summed up in a word, that would be androgynous.Anyone, or anything, who pushed the boundaries of sexual identity seemed to click the right notes. What was once seen as freakish, and even taboo, has gone mainstream. The fashion world is obsessed with androgyny. An ability to exude both masculine and feminine traits is like gold to designers and editors. And they do create a buzz and consumers are sure to remember. The vogue for unisex fashion – Oxford shirts, man-style brogues and boat shoes, chinos, military Jackets and skinny shares – has also been touted as one of the reasons for the rise in popularity of transgender style.Ambiguity is something that attracts†¦ As fresh materials become harder to come by and/or less sustainable, the need to recycle existing fabrics becomes more important. Already recycling is gaining a lot of ground and some impasses are making special collections bearing recycling in mind. Some independent designers are already making a big name by converting simple things of daily life into marvelous creations which are actually wearable. This trend will continue on till the forthcoming years and will become bigger as designers really think now that there is a niche for recycling.People will be very much concerned about the environment. This generation will also be more close to the environment. Ethical behavior and moral in terms of production and consumption will be valuable assets. True value and mere cost will be two different things. People will want better quality and the question will be more quality-wise more than ever. The go green concept will be stronger than ever. With the changes in the climate and temperatures reaching phenomenal points, this generation will be most concerned about the environment and fashion will undoubtedly play a big role for the people.This will show their support towards sustainability. Researches about environment friendly materials are also being made and notable breakthrough already is the discovery of bacterial-celluloses fibers to replace fibers from plants or animals. A statement. Already big companies like Inedited have signed the convention for chemical free production starting from 2020. Is that a sign of the rising responsiveness of both consumers and producers? Since a long time ago there were lots of predictions for the year 2000.Spandex suit, end of the world, flying cars, end of the world but ultimately, nothing that drastic has happened. The black little dress will still be the black little dress. Only the shell will change. The environment around us is changing, and our fashion can respond to that in artful or informative ways. Definitely Science and Fashion will be a winning team or 2020. There will be a strong collaboration with technological advan ces and researches. The current dominance of cotton and polyester fibers in the market is unsustainable; together they account for over 80% of the world's clothing output.This lack of diversity has led to growing problems such as excessive water consumption, pollution, loss of soil fertility and biodiversity and an over dependency on oil. Fabrics that offer innovative alternatives are part of a better future – one in which we are able to manage our resources wisely and cost effectively. Changes will occur in the trials used to make the garments. Already the introduction of artificial fibers and improvement in the production of existing fibers such as cotton and wool has already made it easier.Nanotechnology advances will also play a major role for fashioning the future. Already the heat sensitive fabrics, sweat absorbing micrometers have changed a lot in the mindset of people and now we know that there does exist a way where fashion and science can bond. Where a surface meets the sun, solar energy can be captured. Already, brands such as Unique have been dabbling in tech-enhanced looting, such as the retailer's Hatched tops and leggings made from material that turns moisture evaporating from the body into heat.Almost any amount of electronic functionality can be associated with something without necessarily affecting its form. The human body is no different, and plenty of fashion designers have hopped on board this growing technology. More researches are being conducted to make clothing fabrics to become more technologically innovative, responsive and effective. Later on our clothing will become like ‘second-skin' mostly protecting us and making us more comfortable. From room temperature to sounds and even tastes. Not Just this, researches being made are already making it clear that fashion can help to create energy.Scientists are making big steps towards developing a shirt that can help convert our daily energy used to move into electricity to po wer electronic devices. We are the energy. Technological advances in textile research are starting to redefine the boundaries of fashion. There is also the other side of science-fashion mix. The more drastic ones. The ones that will drastically change our habits and even the clothing industry. The ‘Fabric' s as the name suggests, nearly as fabric in a can. How to use it? Simply Just spray it on the body. Manuel Tortes did trials and it worked perfectly.Non woven fabrics will be later used to cover our bodies. The thousands of fibers that are sprayed from the can Just bind together taking the shape of the body to create a nearly tailor made outfit but of a disposable nature. Such researches will surely revolutionize the world of fashion. After the term fast-food', fast-fashion' seems to be on the way. This is the craziest and perhaps most expensive side of Fashion's ongoing progress. Ever heard of the Twitter dress, LED dress or the AD printed dress worn by Data Von These? The Twitter dress and LED was developed by Francesca Rosella.Basically everyone got the message or rather the tweet'. Fashion and Technology are the new couple. But unmistakably, the biggest breakthrough is the AD printed dress, showing that wearable technology is Just around the corner. AD printing technology is still in its infancy, but it has already made its way to the world of fashion. Everything from shoes to bikinis have gone under the lathe off AD printer. AD printers are actually renters that print using resin instead of ink on paper. Obviously this is a work of art and it is so visible to the eye.The process already looks very confusing and the huge amount of work put in it can be felt. Going the different parts, ‘powdered nylon'. Architecturally mind-blowing. The cost is certainly unimaginable but some designers have tried it out and nylon being not so expensive, the design is certainly not cheap but is worth it and for the individuality perk. Research for the near futu re will be to have this kind of a printer that will Just pop out the design as a complete piece. Designers of the mainstream typical futuristic fashion scene such as Iris Van Herpes inspire.She always give a glimpse of her world, the unknown and the unpredictable. These designers are helping to shape the future of fashion by experimenting and helping the industry to take the big leap. Hopefully the AD printing technique will see significant breakthroughs that will help to make it a more accessible and viable way to create clothing. Fashion in the 2020 will be more likely functional as well as creative and environment friendly. Some future designs won't be as functional as they will be visually impacting, but such has always been true about the clothes we wear.And only fashion can make anything beautiful and valuable. Examples are LED dresses with encrusted lights. This is a notable inspiration for other designers and it is very refreshing to get inspiration from other eras of the ti me except from the past. Fashion sometimes needs to change its face, Just to be more inspiring. It is testament to the power of fashion that Google chose the US designer Diane von Frequenter's New York show last year to premiere its Google Glass augmented-technology specs hat feature cameras and use voice recognition and share their videos on Google+.Social media is very anchored in the fashion world now. Using social media in the fashion world comes down to more than Just what designers share on Mainstream and coverage of Fashion Week. It is becoming more and more about consumer directly connecting with the brands as well as with each other. Sites like Power allow its users to check out the latest trends and create style boards for their own inspiration as well as to share with the rest of the fashion community. Change is certainly in the air and there are some concrete evidences.The changing mentality of consumers, producers and designers, the amazing advances in technology and th e continuous enriching history of our world, all are contributing towards a ‘different future'. But I soon realized that the future fashions are only a perception of the future. When I look back fifty years at what the previous generation thought the future (now the present) would be like, it is vastly different from our time. Everything seems a filtered down versions from fantasy, to designer, to high street. Because that does happen and it is a mere shadow of the former design, something hat hardly resembles this aesthetic at all.As I say, the little black dress will remain the little black dress. I'm talking about a drastic change in fashion's aesthetic, something that will inevitably happen, Just as it has over the centuries. Only time will be witness to the changes if any will occur, and drastic as well. Predictions are Just as trends some might Just hit the bull's eyes others are Just brushed aside with a scorn. The most ironic thing is that none of us will ever know wha t the distant future holds and what the progression, even evolution of fashion will bring.

Saturday, January 11, 2020

Human Factors in Aviation Essay

A large number of flight accidents occur mostly due to lack of efficient vision of the surrounding environment. Traditional visionary systems rely on synthetic vision or specifically vision of the existing environment devoid of mist, fog and other abnormalities. Real scenarios require the ability to provide reliable vision overcoming natural hindrances. Humans learnt the art of flying when they abandoned the idea of flapping of wings. Similarly, the latest developments of enhanced vision systems have sidestepped the existing traditional vision systems to ensure flight safety. In recent years, Controlled Flight into Terrain (CFID) has posed a significant risk in both civilian and military aviation. One of the aviation’s worst accident occurred in Tenerife, when two Boeing 747’s collided as one aircraft was attempting to take off while the other was to land. The risk of CFID can be greatly reduced with the aid of a suite of Radar and collision avoidance equipment commonly termed as Enhanced Vision systems (EVS). Rationale One of the primary causes for many runway accidents is reduced visibility. One solution to this limitation lies in the use of infrared sensing in aviation operations. All objects on earth emit infrared radiation and their emissions and features can be detected through total darkness as well as intervening mist, rain, haze, smoke and other scenarios, when the objects are invisible to the human eye (Kerr, 2004). The first EVS system was targeted for production in 2001 as standard equipment on Gulf Stream GVSP aircraft. The system was developed in part by Kolesman Inc under the technology license from Advanced Technologies, Inc. utilization of EVS addressed critical areas like CIFT avoidance, general safety enhancements during approach, landing and take off, improved detection of trees, power lines and other obstacles, improved visibility in brown out conditions, improved visibility in haze and rain, identify rugged and sloping terrain and detect runway incursions. Enhanced Vision Systems Enhanced visibility system is an electronic means to provide a display of the forward external scene topology through the use of infrared imaging sensors. They are a combination of near term designs and long term designs. Near term designs present sensor imagery with super-imposed flight symbology on a Head up display (HUD) and may include such enhancements as runway outlines, other display argumentations like obstacles, taxiways and flight corridors. Long term designs include complete replacement of the out-the window scene with a combination of electro optical and sensory information. Infrared Sensors EVS uses Infrared (IR) sensors that detect and measure the levels of infrared radiation emitted continuously by all objects. An object’s radiation level is a function of its temperature with warmer objects emitting more radiation. The infrared sensor measures these emission levels which are then processed to produce a thermal image of the sensor’s forward field of view. EVS IR sensors operate in the Infrared spectrum (Kerr, 2004). The different types of spectrum are Long wave IR, Medium wave IR and Low wave IR. Two variants of this technology are currently in aircraft use. A single sensor unit operating in the long wave, maximum weather penetration band has significant far penetrating capability. Short wave sensors have the ability to enhance the acquisition of runway lighting. A dual sensor variant composed of short and long wave bands used for both light and weather penetration fuses both sensor images for a full spectrum view. Image sensors operating in long wave Infrared spectrum are Cyro-cooled. Models of EVS One of the commonly used EVS systems is EVS 2000. The operation of the model EVS 2000 dual image sensor is given in figure 1. Long Wave Infrared sensor provides best weather penetration, ambient background and terrain features. Similarly, the Short Wave Sensor provides best detection of lighting, runway outline and obstacle lights. The signal processor combines the images of both the sensors to display a fused image picturizing the current environment (Kerr, Luk, Hammerstrom, and Misha, 2003). (Source: Kerr et al, 2003) Boeing Enhanced Vision System Boeing’s EVS enhances situational awareness by providing electronic and real time vision to the pilots. It provides information at low level, night time and moderate to heavy weather operations during all phases of flight. It has a series of imaging sensors, navigational terrain database with a virtual pathway for approach during landings, an EVS image processor and a wide field of view, C-through helmet mounted display integrated with a head tracker. It also consists of a synthetic vision system accompanying the EVS to present a computer generated image of the out-the window view in areas that are not covered by the imaging sensors of the EVS. The EVS image processor performs the following 3 functions. It compares the image scanned by the ground mapping Radar and the MMW sensor with a database to present a computer generated image of the ground terrain conditions. It is accompanied by a Global Positioning System (GPS) to provide a location map during all phases of flight. The IR imaging sensors provide a thermal image of the front line of view of the aircraft. Typical HUD symbology including altitude, air speed, pressure, etc is added without any obscuration of the underlined scene. The SV imagery provides a three dimensional view of a clear window site with reference to the stored on board database. Figure 2 gives the Boeing’s EVS/SV integrated system. The projection of SV data should be confirmed by the EVS data so that the images register accurately. The system provides for three basic views i. e. , flight to view or the normal view, the map views at different altitudes or ranges and the orbiting view or an exocentric/ownership from any orbiting location from the vehicle (Jennings, Alter, Barrow, Bernier and Guell, 2003). (Source: Jennings et al, 2003) EVS Image processing and Integration Association Engine Approach This is a neural net inspired self organizing associating memory approach that can be implemented in FPGA based boards of moderate cost. It constitutes a very efficient implementation of best match association at high real time video rates. It is highly robust in the face of noisy and obscured image inputs. This means of image representation emulates the human visual pathway. A preprocessor performs the feature extraction of edges as well as potentially higher levels of abstraction in order to generate a large, sparse and random binary vector for each image frame. The features are created by looking for 0 crossings after filtering with a laplacian of guassian filter and thereby finding edges. Each edge image is then thresholded by taking the K strongest features setting those to 1 and all others to 0. For multiple images, the feature vectors are strung together to create a composite vector. The operations are performed over a range of multi resolution hyper pixels including those for 3-D images. FPGA provides a complete solution by offering the necessary memory bandwidth, significant parallelism and low precision tolerance. Figure 3 provides an illustration of an association engine operation (Kerr et al, 2003). Fig 3: Association Engine Operation (Source Kerr et al, 2003) DSP Approach One approach to perform multi sensor image enhancement and fusion is the Retinex algorithm evolved at the NASA Langley research center. Digital signal processors from Texas instruments have been used to successfully implement a real-time version of Retinex. C6711, C6713 and DM642 are some of the commercial digital signal processors (DSP) used for image processing. Image processing which is a subset of digital signal processing enables fusion of images from various sensors to aid in efficient navigation. Figure 4: EVS Image Processing (Source: Hines et al, 2005) Image processing architecture and functions of EVS, Long Wave Infrared (LWIR) and Short Wave Infrared (SWIR) processing can be done simultaneously. The multi spectral data streams are registered to remove field of view and spatial resolution differences between the cameras and to correct inaccuracies. Registration of Long Wave IR data to the Short Wave IR is performed by selecting SWIR as the base line and applying affine transform to the LWIR imagery. LaRC patented Retinex algorithm is used to enhance the information content of the captured imagery particularly during poor visibility conditions. The Retinex can also be used as a fusion engine since the algorithm performs nearly symmetrically processing on multi-spectral data and applies multiple scaling operations on each spectral band. The fused video stream contains more information than the individual spectral bands and provides the pilot a single output which can be interpreted easily. Figure 4 illustrates the various processing stages in fusing a multi spectral image (Hines et al, 2005). Design Tradeoffs LWIR based single image system is no panacea for fog, but reduces hardware requirements. It is also a low cost solution with lower resolution. An image fusion system provides active penetration of fog and better resolution but comes at a higher cost. Increasing the bandwidth provides better size and angular resolution and satisfactory atmospheric transmission but costs high. Basic diffraction physics limits the true angular resolution but can be overcome by providing sufficient over sampling. Sensitivity vs. update rate and physical size vs. resolution have traditionally been issues with passive cameras. Fortunately, dual mode sensors overcome these trade offs (Kerr et all, 2003). A successful image capture of landing scenario is given in figure 5. Figure 5. EVS view Vs. Pilots view (source: Yerex, 2006) Human Factors Controlling the aircraft during the entire period of flight is the sole responsibility of the pilot. The pilot seeks guidance from the co-pilot, control tower and inbuilt EVS to successfully steer the aircraft. The pilot controls the aircraft based on a representation of the world displayed in the cockpit given by the inbuilt systems and may not see the actual out-the-window visual scene. Visual information is presented but may not otherwise be visible. Some of the information may be lost due to limitations of resolution, field of view or spectral sensitivities. Therefore, with EVS, the world is not viewed directly but as a representation through sensors and computerized databases. More importantly, the essential data for pilotage should be available on the display. Though EVS systems gives a representation of the exact view of the flight environment, its accuracy plays a significant role in flight safety. Thus human factor are vital for flight control.