[Essay] The Nanotechnology: Present and Future Impact

Nanotechnology is a sub-classification of technology in colloidal science, biology, physics, chemistry and other scientific fields. As a field of applied science, it focuses on the design, synthesis, characterization and application of materials and devices on the nanoscale. It is also used as an umbrella term to describe emerging or novel technological developments associated with microscopic dimensions. (Wikipedia, 2006)

In its broader term, nanotechnology includes the many techniques used to create structures at a size scale below 100 nanometers or 100 billionths of a meter. This includes those used in semiconductor fabrication such as deep ultraviolet lithography, electron beam lithography, focused ion beam machining, nano-imprint lithography, atomic layer deposition and molecular vapor deposition, those used for fabrication of nano-wires and those used at the molecular self-assembly techniques such as those employing di-block copolymers. (Wikipedia, 2006)

Nanotechnology uses two main approaches in its operation processes. First is the bottom-up approach where materials and devices are built up atom by atom. Second is the top-down approach where they are synthesized or constructed by removing existing materials from larger entities. The vastly increased ratio of surface area to volume present in many nanoscale materials is a unique aspect of this technology opening new possibilities in surface-based science such as catalysis. However, this catalytic activity also opens potential risks in their interaction with biomaterials. (Wikipedia, 2006)

Nanotechnology is the new Industrial Revolution. It leaves virtually no business untouched or unscathed. The ability to create materials from building blocks the size of a virus unleashes unprecedented capabilities. Autos and airplanes, chemicals and plastics, computers and chips, cosmetics and drugs and plenty of the other industries face upheavals because of this technology. (Port, 2002)

This technology promises humans’ ways of making systems that are smaller, lighter, stronger and more efficient but cheaper to produce. Some of these current products include chemicals produced with microscopic catalytic particles, sun lotions with invisibly small zinc-oxide flakes to shield against ultraviolet rays, emulsifiers that keep paint from separating and coatings that make eyeglass lenses more scratch resistant or extend the life of industrial tools. More alluring products can be found in nanotechnology company laboratories but many need a year or two to reach the market because new manufacturing systems also must be developed. (Port, 2002)

Professor Mark Welland, head of the University of Cambridge Nanoscale Science Laboratory explained that, “Nanotechnology is not a technology in its own right. It is an enabling technology, so it will appear in many different products”. Welland added that such technology is already appearing in flash memory, computer chips and will increasingly be an enabling technology in other products like coatings and new types of sensors. (as cited in Twist, 2004)

On one hand, because of the very precise way in which their atoms are arranged, nano-materials exploit unusual electrical, optical and other properties. This means that fabrics could change color electronically. Thus, exposing an army uniform to ultra-violet light could activate changes without undressing. But in medicine, nanotechnology offers the most remarkable advances. (Twist, 2004)

"Nano-medicine will provide earlier and better diagnostics. Treatment will also combine earlier and more precisely targeted drug delivery,” said Professor John Ryan, head of the Bionanotechnology Centre at Oxford University. He added that “the possibility of individualized therapy is also on the horizon”. (as cited in Twist, 2004)

Moreover, nanotechnology in the form of flexible films containing miniaturized electrodes is expected to improve the performance of retinal, cochlear and neural implants (Twist, 2004). According to Professor Ryan it could lead to the miniaturization of medical diagnostic and sensing tools which could drive down costs of such kits for developing countries (as cited in Twist, 2004).

Likewise, pharmaceutical companies already uses nanotech to discover and deliver drugs. One of these is the highly sensitive microchips containing intact DNS which can spot interactions between candidate antibiotics and target bugs. The chips are stuffed with 100, 000 times more little chemical labs each of which is 100, 000 times more sensitive. (Port, 2002)

Buckyballs, one of nanotechnology products is used to deliver a drug to a precise target, thus minimizing side effects. The balls are coated with drugs that disrupt the cell’s reproductive cycle and assembled into shapes that fit comfortably into receptors on the surface of specific cells. Such treatments are now in the works for cancer, AIDS and other diseases. Another product is the skin patch for diabetics containing nanotubes which are so thin that they can penetrate the skin without pain. This draws blood through nanostraws to monitor glucose levels and inject insulin when required. (Port, 2002)

Nanotechnology is expected to transform the performance of materials like polymers, electronics, paints, batteries, sensors, fuel cells, solar cells, coatings, computers and display systems. “In five years' time, batteries that only last three days will be laughable. To say that in five years, an iPod will have 10 times its current storage capacity will be conservative”, said Professor Welland. “Similarly, in 10 years' time, the way medical testing is done now will be considered crude”, he added. (as cited in Twist, 2004)

Likewise, in the not-so-distant future, a terabit of data equivalent to 10 hours of fine quality uncompressed video will be stored on an area the size of a postage stamp. Clearly, the devices themselves will not be nano-sized. But nanotechnology will play its part in shrinking components and making them work together a lot more efficiently. (Twist, 2004)

We can therefore conclude that nanotechnology is the biggest breakthrough in the present Industrial Revolution. This biggest advance is the new materials and products that are developed and going to be developed. In this respect, nanotechnology could enable developing nations to leapfrog older technologies. Whatever nanotechnology does for the future, it will be an evolutionary process.

References:

Twist, J. (2004, July 28). Myths and realities of nano futures. British Broadcasting Corporation News Online. Retrieved October 30, 2006, from http://news.bbc.co.uk

Port, O. (2002, October 25). Nano Technology: The Tech Outlook. Business Week Magazine.

Wikipedia. (2006, October 30). Nanotechnology. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. Retrieved October 30, 2006, from http://en.wikipedia.org

[Essay] Feminist Critique of Psychoanalysis and Ego Psychology

Basically, psychoanalysis is a family of psychological theories and methods which claim to elucidate unconscious relations in a systematic way through an associative process (www.encyclopedia.com). In addition, the fundamental subject matter of psychoanalysis is the unconscious patterns of life revealed through the analysand's (the patient's) free associations. The analyst's goal is to help liberate the analysand from unexamined or unconscious barriers of transference and resistance, that is, past patterns of relatedness that are no longer serviceable or that inhibit freedom.

Apparently, in a short essay of this type it is hardly possible to give a detailed description of the complex problem which psychoanalysis and ego psychology presents. Basically, the general aim of Psychoanalysis and Ego Psychology with respect to feminist perspective is to bring out a harmonious functioning between the different parts of the personality, between the parts which are likely to create conflicts in the healthy and sick alike. These antagonistic strivings in the emotional life are experienced by everyone.

Since Freud, there have been within psychoanalysis tensions between universalizing and essentialzing claims about theoretical women in the developmental theory and the varieties of observations about clinical women in all their difference, context, individuality, and specificity. Similarly, contemporary feminism points us to the differences among women and to the multiplicities and individualities of gendered subjectivity, as well as to the fragmented, contradictory, multiple, and contextualized partialities of any one person's gendered and sexual subjectivity. Clinical understandings of gender and feminist theory here come together to document individuality and variation against the overgeneralizing, universalizing, and essentializing of psychoanalytic theory.

On the other hand, the fluidity and changeability of emotionally cast transferences in clinical experience make clear the specificity of any person's gendered subjectivity, a subjectivity we cannot capture in terms of monolithic claims about genital structure and function or preoedipal and oedipal developmental patterns. By staying with the clinical, we remember that any particular woman's or man's gender is a continuously invoked project in which self, identity, body imagery, sexual fantasy, fantasies about parents, cultural stories, and conflicts about intimacy, dependency, and nurturance are constructed, and that for each person we need to give an individual developmental, a transferential, and a cultural account fully to characterize these creations and transformations. Each person's gender also has its own emotional tonalities that accompany particular conflictual, defensive, and reparative fantasies.

[Essay] The effect of current exchange policies in Iran and Egypt

The constant search for a practical exchange rate policy can be attributed to various goals that policy makers have attempted to attain through time. These goals differ based on the core objectives of the policy, in relation to the country’s economic growth and inflation, the model of the economy to the minds of the policy makers, or both. Other factors such as world economic conditions, the domestic business cycle, imperfections in the performance of internal markets like widespread price inflexibility, aspects in political economy and academic fads, are also considered by policy makers.

In a number of Middle Eastern and North American (MENA) countries, exchange rate policies in emerging markets have been discussed, more so in the occurrence of the economic crisis in Asia. Several MENA countries have progressed economically through free trade, opened financial systems and implementation of market-based monetary policy mechanisms. Included in these MENA countries are Iran and Egypt.

Iran, for instance had implemented a managed float with a monetary aggregate as the de facto nominal anchor following the unification in March 2002 of officially recognized multiple exchange rates. By intervening in the foreign exchange market, its central bank operates the managed float as the country has practically money markets and the financial rates of return are governmentally controlled. In Iran’s case, oil revenues seems to be the primary cause of fluctuations in the rial’s real effective exchange rate (REER). Hence, an oil stabilization fund was recently created so as to assist the government in resolving the impact of oil price fluctuations. The agreement on the implementation of managed float appears to be appropriate considering the country’s vulnerability to terms of trade shocks, labor market rigidities, ongoing trade reforms, plans of gradual price liberalization and prospects of large capital inflows.

Egypt on the other hand, linked its currency to the U.S. dollar in 1991. However, in mid-2000, the country had abandoned its fixed peg, resulting to a decline in its external accounts. This eventually led to weakened tourism due to terrorism concerns and currency overvaluation on account of the strengthening of the U.S. dollar against other currencies in the late 1990s. Initially, the authorities resolved the market pressure through intervention and tighter credit policies. After a period of managed floating, an adjustable currency band was adopted in January 2001, wherein currency trades were required to be within a specified band. In the following two years, the band was depreciated on five instances and widened twice ensuing to a 27% cumulative depreciation. In response to the inflexibility of the band regime, the exchange rate was floated by the end of January 2003. As of mid-2003, the exchange rate quoted by banks had not moved to a market-clearing level.

The experiences and effects on both countries’ move towards a more flexible exchange rate policy vary. Iran commenced the exchange rate policy from a position of strength, gaining from high oil prices, renewed reform efforts and a few years of experience with a market-determined exchange rate. Moreover, Iran chose a managed floating system wherein most transactions are carried out through the established interbank foreign exchange market. Also, the country was able to limit the pass-through to prices of the depreciation of the official exchange rate, depending on resources previously accumulated in the Oil Standardization Fund and high oil revenue.

Contrastingly, Egypt shifted to greater exchange rate flexibility since 2000 under market pressures and against a background of a series of negative exogenous shocks. This in turn resulted to substantial currency depreciation. Thus, the integrity of the exchange rate policy has yet been fully stabilized, and a parallel exchange market continues to operate.

While it seems for both Egypt and Iran to move to a more flexible exchange rate arrangement, the challenge is to ensure its adequacy. Both countries need to build up a sustaining institutional framework for monetary and economic policies.

References:

Jbili, A. & Kramarenko, V. (2003). Choosing Exchange Regimes in the Middle East and North Africa, International Monetary Fund. Retrieved June 28, 2004, from http://www.imf.org.

Morande, F.G. (2001). Exchange Rate Policy in Chile: Recent Experience, International Monetary Fund. Retrieved June 28, 2004, at http://www.imf.org.

[Essay] Evolution and Impact of Electronic Banking

Introduction

For the past years, the banking industry is a way that people usually save their money to invest in their future. It is a good habit to save money and lend for the future expenditures. According to the economists, the save and spend are key player in the cycle of money. They are the basic practices on how to keep and spend money in a wise way. The breadwinner of a family must save at least 20% of his income for the future expenses. And the main domain of the banks comes in.

The banking procedures are not that hard to understand and it became an ideal part of one’s livelihood securities. As time evolves and many technologies are introduced, the banking industry became updated in terms of the banking process. The banks let the technology stayed in their system and became part of it. The technology benefited both the bank and their clients.

Evolution of Banking Industry

The first electronic banking product was money transferred via telegraph in the mid 1800’s. To answer various questions about the securities and interest of the clients, the banks lend funds to purchase the ideas of innovation of banking industry. The first process in saving money is through the use of passbooks. But the new generation wants a new system that will help them access to their fund in an ease, and at the same time with security. For the busy people, they find it very time consuming to wait in the line just to withdraw or deposit your cash in the teller of the bank. And some of them became so irritated when they were in the last of the long line and they are in hurry.

But the clients don’t have to worry no more because the era for the banking procedure already absorbed the fast life cycle of every individual. The introduction of the ATM (Automated Teller Machine) Card is just like you have a full amount of money in a thin plastic. It is ideal to carry anywhere, anytime. The features of it make the clients live at peace for it also have a security pin to make the card only available to the one who owns it. Plus, there are called Electronic Card or often named Credit or Debit Card which automatically charges the purchased product.

But still there are many unconvinced clients that are daring the bank to take more advantageous in the time where all the people need convenience. So the start for the Online banking (or Internet banking) came. This allows customers to conduct financial transactions on a secure website operated by their retail or virtual bank, credit union or building society.¹

Advances in microprocessors led to the development of the personal computer which could retrieve both summary and detail bank account information. The personal computer also allowed the user to move funds, which provided greater control of cash.²

The demand for the kind of obscuring and only few people can access to this kind of banking preferences. Although it is very efficient in those people who spend most of their time facing their expensive computer and locked in a same room. It is also applicable for those who stay at home as long as they have a connection in the internet. And it is called Home Banking procedures, for at the same time, a client can track the transactions via phone or internet services. The purpose of the electronic banking is to let the bank go for you, if you cannot go for it.

Impact of Electronic Banking

For most customers, it is a convenience that they have grown accustomed to the electronic banking. And for the large commercial customer, processing thousands or even millions of payments and/or sales a day – it would be impossible to live without the attachment on it.³

The following can be the impact in the Banking Industry as well as with the consumers.⁴

The banks can become technology providers by spinning off technology resources to start up new business streams, they can become content providers for information regarding products, indices etc, they can become context providers for setting-up e-market spaces, and also enablers by providing back bone systems to support multiple payment system alternatives.

The online channel enables banks to offer low-cost, high value-added financial services and also benefit from the promotional opportunity to cross-sell products such as credit cards and loans.

The online transaction costs can be as low as 1% of an equivalent off-line transaction, rapidly increasing the popularity of the online option with consumers, as well as banks. In saving time and money for users, banks offer online banking as a less expensive alternative to branch banking. In addition, on-line banking enables banks to acquire information on consumer habits and preferences, for later marketing purposes. An expanding customer base and transaction cost savings are major benefits for banks.

Although there is an awesome acceptance coming from the consumers, there are findings that sometimes, the electronic banking doesn’t work all the time.⁵

1) The banks have showed that they completed the technological infrastructure for electronic banking services, internet and intranet in particular and the development of banks web sites. (Additional to this, the microwave signal cannot reach some bank sites, and that’s inconvenient for those people who use to travel).

2) People prefer to provide electronic banking services through the internet but not converting the bank to be a total electronic bank.

3) The environment is no completely ready for electronic banking services and there is no strategy to have electronic banks on the internet.

4) The high cost of electronic banking services on the short run due to the training of employees, and the costs of the electronic infrastructure. This means, that in the short run electronic banking service will have a negative effect on the bank’s profitability.

With respect to the above findings, the bank that offers electronic banking services can realize benefits as well as the following:

1. Electronic Banking services have a positive effect on banks profitability.

2. There is a direct relation between increment of clients needs for banking services and bank’s distinction in providing electronic business.

3. The operation of providing electronic banking services is influenced by bank readiness and availability of electronic software and qualified man power.

4. Confidentiality and privacy have clear impact on protecting clients and bank from risks, and consequently the framework has an impact on banks information systems and its management upon providing banking services though Internet.

Conclusions

The evolution of electronic banking products has made day to day banking operations faster and more efficient. The increased productivity gained through the use of electronic banking products has allowed businesses to do more with less. Businesses that do not use some form of electronic banking products will not grow. With research, cost benefit analysis and appropriate security controls, practically any business can benefit form electronic banking products.

The growth of electronic banking has not been limited to advances in information reporting. Electronic payments have become a force majeure. With increased acceptance and advances in technology, the use of electronic banking products will continue to increase. For organizations to stay competitive and to grow, they must embrace electronic banking products.

The banks are using the Internet as a strategic weapon, leveraging it as a distribution channel to offer complex products at the same quality they can provide from their physical branches, at a lower cost, to more potential customers, without boundaries.

But Internet widespread has deepening the concept of electronic business and considering it as promotion, bank service marketing method and successful method to improve banks relation with clients, informing them with available banking abilities through Internet in spite of small size of Internet community in some certain areas, which is used mostly by youth group who have high income or more than the middle approximately, which will reduce the importance of Internet and number of users.

For most of the hours passed, the money that a person might have is starting to crawl toward his pocket. All the process that he must do is to save in whatever manner he wants to. Online banking is popular but like the others, it needs securities.

References:

1. Online Banking (Re-directed from Electronic Banking) [Online] Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online_banking [Accessed 04 Aug 2009].

2. Electronic Banking [Online] Available at: http://www.gscpa.org/Content/Files/Pdfs/Conferences/SEAS08/B6-Electronic%20Banking.pdf [Accessed 04 Aug 2009].

3. Electronic Financial Services (n.d.). Principles of Bank Operation [Online] Available at: http://www.accd.edu/sac/business/bbeshea/bnkg1303/intro%20to%20banking%20-%20session%2013.htm [Accessed 04 Aug 2009].

4. Role of the Electronic Banking Services on the Profits of Jordanian Banks (2006) American Journal of Applied Sciences 3 ISSN 1546-9239 [Online] Available at: http://www.scipub.org/fulltext/ajas/ajas391999-2004.pdf [Accessed 04 Aug 2009].

5. Ibid.,