Information Technology - Questions to be answered Essay

Information Technology - Questions to be answered - Essay Example Expert systems (in general all symbolic systems) and neural networks are two "rival" approaches to Artificial Intelligence, both having different application areas within this scope. expert system design may take months of gathering information and testing. On the other hand, a neural network may be designed and trained in a few days after most examples related with the domain are gathered. A good rule of thumb is if the rules are not well defined and there is a lot of training data then use neural network approach. If there are no examples available then a classical expert system approach may be taken. Apart from this, there are of course other criteria for deciding which approach to follow: Expert system technology is a mature and well expressed technology which is currently available. it can be stated that the desire for increased knowledge has brought expert systems out of the research laboratories into the office. Expert systems are good at procedural types of problems such as strategy, scheduling, and teaching. They are better than manuals because they ask the user only relevant information, they incorporate past experience into solving the problem, and they answer questions about their reasoning process [17]. Data warehousing can ensure that a company remains profitable as... 2. Summarize how a data warehouse might become a survival issue for a company Data warehousing can ensure that a company remains profitable as it can help businesses and consumers cut through the chase and provide a more meaningful service to both consumer and business, or they can be used in such a way as to harm the business, the consumer or both. With this potentially tremendous power comes tremendous responsibility. Companies that choose to engage in data warehousing activities should have in place not only a technical team for implementation, but also a sound data security policy as well as an ethical use policy. These policies should be made available to the consumers whose information is stored within the warehouse. The following table summarizes the seven myths and counter-myths discussed in this paper, organized by value to the consumer, business and society as a whole. Source: (Joseph Cazier and Ryan LaBrie, 7 Myths of Common Data Warehousing Practices: An examination of consumer, business and societal value. 2003) 3. ERP, CRM and other behemoth conceptual information systems represent behemoth physical systems. Compare and contrast whether or not such behemoth conceptual systems inhibit an organization's physical system and its ability to be agile The phrase "agile organization" refers to an organization that can respond in a real-time enough fashion to situations that impact the health and well-being of the organizations and its stakeholders. Becoming "agile" typically involves a combination of process re-engineering as well as the deployment of application, infrastructure and management capabilities with the goal of taking time and cost out of business processes, while improving the quality of these

International environment policy Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

International environment policy - Assignment Example (2) World Bank began its operations at Bretton Woods in 1944; at that time, the Bank intended to assist the European countries to rebuild themselves after the Second World War. Some of the purposes of the bank include: (I) Overcome poverty to spur growth to the poor countries mostly in Africa. (II) To offer reconstruction of the poor countries as they come out of war to end extreme poverty. (III) Spur governments to address communicable diseases international financial crisis, promote free trade, and prevent climate change. (3) IMF opened its doors in July 1944 at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire. Forty-four different countries agreed to create a body to oversee economic cooperation, prevent financial turmoil and currency devaluations. Two years on 46 nations met and agreed to establish IMF that currently has 188 member nations. IMF sets the global monetary policy to foster monetary stability, fix balance of payments issues, and facilitate trade. IMF allows member nations to access short term financing that can reduce the poverty rates. (4) Mission of IMF include: to oversee the international monetary system, promote exchange stability, assist the member states in development agenda, supplement currency reserves using special drawing rights. The organization has $215billion at its disposal and a staff of 2300 from 182 member countries. The mission of World Bank include promote economic development on the poor countries, assist countries using long-term financing, provide the poorest countries with special financial assistance, and encourage the development of private enterprises. The organization has a total of $184 billion with a staff of 7000 from 180 member countries. (5) The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) began its operation during the 1960 Baghdad Conference. The five founding members included Venezuela, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait,

The Guy Code Essay Example for Free

The Guy Code Essay To be a man in many cultures to this day still means the same as it did years ago, it has not changed much due to men still wanting the power, respect, and holding on to that image of being better than the other man. It all begins when the young boy is taught to be a man and is no longer able to cry or show emotion. He then will be interested in wanting to be better and stronger than his fellow classmates. This turns into having the pressure not only from your father but from society in general to prove your masculinity. In some cases just to prove one the young men result in different kinds of acts of violence if not to them self’s then towards others. All in all some resort to other measures as to hold the act of silence just to fit in and feel they are holding on to what is said to be the guy code. Whatever it may be growing up in todays society being a man is not as simple as I assumed it once to be. I do believe there is a strong feeling of competing between most men, ranging from playing the best sports, having the most muscles, better jobs, nicer cars, etc. You would think it would be most likely to impress the ladies but I’m afraid it is more of trying to impress other males. Proving ones masculinity is rather quite interesting, being a woman I always saw these things happening I just never really looked into it till now. As we begin to ask ourselves where this battle begins in a young boys life that he is shown to start to act like a man, psychologist like William Pollack argue that from an early age boys are taught to refrain from crying to suppress their emotions, never to display vulnerability. With that being said when a boy is 4 or 5 he is still attached very much so to his mother which it completely normal, knowing that it is ok to cry when he gets a scrape or a cut to show emotion during a storm. It is when the child is around 9 years of age that he begins to hear those dreadful words â€Å"Be a man† that usually come from the mouths of the father/ father figure in the young boys life and his angle of seeing things takes a turn. He then is confronted with other boys in school, the teasing and the act of fitting in begins to take a major role in the boy’s life, it pushes the young boy to want to be tougher or cooler than the other boys in his school. It turns into somewhat of a ri sk as to what choice the young boy will take to begin to prove his manliness. We should not be shocked as to hear where most of these boys get these ideas from, most will get it from there fathers, others from coaches, teachers, uncles, etc. Maybe when they hear things coming from their fathers it seems to have a deeper effect on these young boys, trying to prove himself to the eyes of his father and make him proud of his little boy. The tougher and stronger you are the better you will be in life is how most males think in different cultures. As to coaches or P.E teachers putting ideas into the kid’s heads, push harder, throw further, swing faster! Giving them the impression that the tougher you are the more of a man you are, some coaches have gone as to extremes to call the boys wimps, sissys, feeling forced to take the hits and not showing emotion, just because that’s what men do. So they try harder to be better to prove them self’s to these older, influential men in their lives. There will always follow the pressure of a guy proving to himself as well as to his peers how much of a man he is. No guy wants to be called gay or any other word that will affect his masculinity obviously when he is trying to prove how much of a man he is. So they make sure they wear the right clothes, play the right sports, talk enough, and listen only when necessary. Basically anything that has to do with showing to much emotion goes out the window. If you ask a teenage boy what is the common put down he would most likely say the answer is that is so gay Not necessarily does this mean homosexuality but by being called gay is being used as a kind of way to say you are not masculine enough. In the article it mentions that most men despite them proving there masculinity to impress a woman they strive to out show themselves in front of other men more. It’s like they want to have each other’s approval more than anything. Some guys take proving there masculinity very serious and when they feel the respect or taunting of their masculinity is at risk they turn to desperate measures that most times involve an act of violence. Regardless if it may be towards the person challenging their manhood or towards themselves, in some young men being bullied about their sexuality sometimes results in them taking their own lives. I’ve herd of young boys having had enough with the teasing and bullying and decide to take their lives just to not go another day with other boys teasing them. When in other situations some men feel they need to prove just how powerful they are and seek a fight, while others watch just to show everyone just how strong they are resulting in them getting respect. This act of violence you will mostly see in thugs or gangsters. Others preform horrible acts of sexual violence among fellow members of a group, team or fraternity; this is what is called hazing the new members. At times takin g things too far and the frat guys end up hurting or even sending them to the hospital with savvier injuries. There is far worse scenario when these college guys preform sexual acts toward woman and others watch but go by the act of silence and not report the crimes and are lead to believe that they are men and shall not tell on one another. If one as parent raised their young boy different maybe things would be easier on him. One would think but in today’s society what is taught at home will only do so much before the young boy is exposed to the reality of how men are in this world. I could go on and on to my son about how he can be his own man and express himself in the manner he chooses to, but once he steps out the door he will be confronted with other kids and that is when the urge to want to be better the only way he will be taught through these boys. So instead maybe one as a parent kind of ends up having no choice but to start at home and hope that what we teach our boys will guide them to be a good man with good standards. In conclusion proving you are a man in today’s society seems to be very stress full and at times might take a toll on a few of these young boy’s. Maybe it is wrong how society is and the pressure these young boys face. It has been this way for many years and I highly doubt the presumption of what it takes to be a man will change any time soon. It was interesting to learn how the minds of guys think. The power, respect, and pride in these men just to follow the so called â€Å"guy code† is very amazing but just how far will these boys and men go to prove there masculinity? Leaves me to think how my son’s will be and grow up to become after having had lived through school, college and work experiences.

Comparative Genomics Research Benefits

Comparative Genomics Research Benefits ABSTRACT The rapidly emerging field of comparative genomics has yielded dramatic results. Comparative genome analysis has become feasible with the availability of a number of completely sequenced genomes. Comparison of complete genomes between organisms allow for global views on genome evolution and the availability of many completely sequenced genomes increases the predictive power in deciphering the hidden information in genome design, function and evolution. Thus, comparison of human genes with genes from other genomes in a genomic landscape could help assign novel functions for un-annotated genes. Here, we discuss the recently used techniques for comparative genomics and their derived inferences in genome biology. INTRODUCTION Comparative genomics is the study of the relationship of genome structure and function across different biological species or strains. Comparative genomics is an attempt to take advantage of the information provided by the signatures of selection to understand the function and evolutionary processes that act on genomes. While it is still a young field, it holds great promise to yield insights into many aspects of the evolution of modern species. The sheer amount of information contained in modern genomes (750 megabytes in the case of humans) necessitates that the methods of comparative genomics are automated. Gene finding is an important application of comparative genomics, as is discovery of new, non-coding functional elements of the genome. Human FOXP2 gene and evolutionary conservation is shown in a multiple alignment (at bottom of figure) in this image from the UCSC Genome Browser. Note that conservation tends to cluster around coding regions (exons). Comparative genomics exploits both similarities and differences in the proteins, RNA, and regulatory regions of different organisms to infer how selection has acted upon these elements. Those elements that are responsible for similarities between different species should be conserved through time (stabilizing selection), while those elements responsible for differences among species should be divergent (positive selection). Finally, those elements that are unimportant to the evolutionary success of the organism will be unconserved (selection is neutral). SCOPE OF COMPARATIVE GENOMICS One of the important goals of the field is the identification of the mechanisms of eukaryotic genome evolution. It is however often complicated by the multiplicity of events that have taken place throughout the history of individual lineages, leaving only distorted and superimposed traces in the genome of each living organism. For this reason comparative genomics studies of small model organisms (for example yeast) are of great importance to advance our understanding of general mechanisms of evolution. Having come a long way from its initial use of finding functional proteins, comparative genomics is now concentrating on finding regulatory regions and siRNA molecules. Recently, it has been discovered that distantly related species often share long conserved stretches of DNA that do not appear to code for any protein. One such ultra-conserved region, that was stable from chicken to chimp has undergone a sudden burst of change in the human lineage, and is found to be active in the developing brain of the human embryo. Computational approaches to genome comparison have recently become a common research topic in computer science. A public collection of case studies and demonstrations is growing, ranging from whole genome comparisons to gene expression analysis. This has increased the introduction of different ideas, including concepts from systems and control, information theory, strings analysis and data mining. It is anticipated that computational approaches will become and remain a standard topic for research and teaching, while multiple courses will begin training students to be fluent in both topic. Chromosomes from two genomes are drawn: human chromosome 1 (drawn with a global zoom factor of 50x) and mouse chromosomes 1-19, X, and Y with mouse chromosome 3 drawn enlarged 10-fold. Syntenic regions between human chromosome 1 and the mouse genome are connected by coloured curves (A), whose geometry and properties can be adjusted dynamically. Thus, all syntenic relationships with mouse chromosome 4 are coloured in orange (B), and all relationships falling within the 80-90 Mb region on human chromosome 1 are coloured in blue (C). Other relationships with alignments larger than 5 kb are coloured dark in grey (D) and all others are shown in light grey. The lines are drawn layered with light grey lines below all others, then dark grey, then blue and then orange. Although approximately 44,000 syntenic relationships are drawn, the use of a selective colour scheme maintains legibility. The outer track (E) is a histogram of the log density of syntenic regions over 100 kb windows on human c hromosome GENOMES ARE MADE OF Although living creatures look and behave in many different ways, all of their genomes consist of DNA, the chemical chain that makes up the genes that code for thousands of different kinds of proteins. Precisely which protein is produced by a given gene is determined by the sequence in which four chemical building blocks adenine (A), thymine (T), cytosine (C) and guanine (G) are laid out along DNAs double-helix structure BENEFITS OF COMPARATIVE GENOMICS Using computer-based analysis to zero in on the genomic features that have been preserved in multiple organisms over millions of years, researchers will be able to pinpoint the signals that control gene function, which in turn should translate into innovative approaches for treating human disease and improving human health. In addition to its implications for human health and well-being, comparative genomics may benefit the animal world as well. As sequencing technology grows easier and less expensive, it will likely find wide applications in agriculture, biotechnology and zoology as a tool to tease apart the often-subtle differences among animal species. Such efforts might also possibly lead to the rearrangement of our understanding of some branches on the evolutionary tree, as well as point to new strategies for conserving rare and endangered species. Comparative Genomics Goals Complete the sequence of the roundworm C. elegans genome by 1998. Complete the sequence of the fruitfly Drosophila genome by 2002. Develop an integrated physical and genetic map for the mouse, generate additional mouse cDNA resources, and complete the sequence of the mouse genome by 2008. Identify other useful model organisms and support appropriate genomic studies. METHODLOGY Genome correspondence Genome correspondence, the method of determining the correct correspondence of chromosomal segments and functional elements across the species compared is the first step in comparative genomics. This involves determining orthologous (genes diverged after a speciation event) segments of DNA that descend from the same region in the common ancestor of the species compared, and paralogous (genes diverged after a duplication event) regions that arose by duplication events prior to the divergence of the species compared. The mapping of regions across two genomes can be one-to-one in absence of duplication events; one-tomany if a region has undergone duplication or loss in one of the species, or many-to-many if duplication/loss has occurred in both lineages. Fitch et al., developed a method called BBH (Best Bidirectional Hits), which identifies gene pairs that are best matches of each other as orthologous. Tatusov et al., further enhanced this method, which matches groups of genes to groups of genes. Understanding the ancestry of the functional elements compared is central to our understanding and applications of genome comparison. Most comparative methods have focused on one-to-one orthologous regions, but it is equally important to recognize which segments have undergone duplication events, and which segments were lost since the divergence of the species. Comparing segments that arose before the divergence of the species may result in the wrong interpretations of sequence conservation and divergence. Further, in the presence of gene duplication, some of the evolutionary constraints that a region is under are relieved, and uniform models of evolution no longer capture the underlying selection for these sites. Thus, our methods for determining gene correspondence should account for duplication and loss events, and ensure that the segments we compare are orthologous Applications Gene identification Once genome correspondence is established, comparative genomics can aid gene identification. Comparative genomics can recognize real genes based on their patterns of nucleotide conservation across evolutionary time. With the availability of genome-wide alignments across the genomes compared, the different ways by which sequences change in known genes and in intergenic regions can be analyzed. The alignments of known genes will reveal the conservation of the reading frame of protein translation. The genome of a species encodes genes and other functional elements, interspersed with non-functional nucleotides in a single uninterrupted string of DNA. Recognizing protein-coding genes typically relies on finding stretches of nucleotides free of stop codons (called Open Reading Frames, or ORFs) that are too long to have likely occurred by chance. Since stop codons occur at a frequency of roughly 1 in 20 in random sequence, ORFs of at least 60 amino acids will occur frequently by chance (5% under a simple Poisson model), and even ORFs of 150 amino acids will appear by chance in a large genome (0.05%). This poses a huge challenge for higher eukaryotes in which genes are typically broken into many, small exons (on average 125 nucleotides long for internal exons) in mammals. The basic problem is distinguishing real genes those ORFs encoding a translated protein product from spurious ORFs the remaining ORFs whose presence is simply due to chance. In mammalian genomes, estimates of h ypothetical genes have ranged from 28,000 to more than 120,000 genes. The internal coding exons were easily identified using Comparative analysis of human genome with mouse genome. Regulatory motif discovery Regulatory motifs are short DNA sequences about 6 to 15bp long that are used to control the expression of genes, dictating the conditions under which a gene will be turned on or off. Each motif is typically recognized by a specific DNA-binding protein called a transcription factor (TF). A transcription factor binds precise sites in the promoter region of target genes in a sequence-specific way, but this contact can tolerate some degree of sequence variation. Thus, different binding sites may contain slight variations of the same underlying motif, and the definition of a regulatory motif should capture these variations while remaining as specific as possible. Comparative genomics provides a powerful way to distinguish regulatory motifs from non-functional patterns based on their conservation. One such example is the identification of TF DNA-binding motif using comparative genomics and denovo motif. The regulatory motifs of the Human Promoters were identified by comparison with other m ammals.Yet another important finding is the gene and regulatory element by comparison of yeast species. Applications of comparative genomics to wheat A number of important major traits requiring elucidation in wheat are essentially non-polymorphic. Thus there is no prospect of creating a mapping population which is the starting point of all positional cloning strategies in most species to date. Moreover given the size of the wheat genome, many traits lie in regions where the gene density per BAC is one or two, making it difficult if not impossible to walk from one wheat BAC to the next. The Ph1 locus (controlling chromosome pairing in wheat) is one such example, in which the starting point was wild type wheat and a mutant carrying a deletion of more than 70Mb (almost the size of the whole Arabidopsis genome). Its phenotype is not easy to score. My group wished to characterise this locus. We created three different types of mutagenised populations, sequenced the equivalent rice Ph1 region, built BAC libraries (all are now available free of IP) for Brachypodium (a small genome species more closely related to wheat), sequenced Brachy podium Ph1 equivalent region, built a hexaploid (CS) (737,000 clones) wheat in collaboration with INRA (providing a further 500,000 clones), exploited Jorge Dubcovskys Tetraploid wheat BAC library, sequenced wheat BACs and defined the tissues in which the Ph1 phenotype is expressed. I will discuss the approaches adopted and resources created. Application of comparative genomics to the analysis of vertebrate regulatory elements Gene regulatory regions (also known as cis-regulatory modules) in vertebrates are poorly understood and annotated by comparison with protein-coding sequences. The short and degenerate sequences of regulatory elements and their distribution over large intergenic and intronic regions pose a major challenge to genomics scientists. Comparative genomics can be used to identify putative regulatory regions, and to analyse regulatory regions into their constituent transcription factor binding sites. There is need for high throughput assay systems to analyse the function of predicted vertebrate gene regulatory regions Other applications Comparative genomics has wide applications in the field of molecular medicine and molecular evolution. The most significant application of comparative genomics in molecular medicine is the identification of drug targets of many infectious diseases. For example, comparative analyses of fungal genomes have led to the identification of many putative targets for novel antifungal. This discovery can aid in target based drug design to cure fungal diseases in human. Comparative analysis of genomes of individuals with genetic disease against healthy individuals may reveal clues of eliminating that disease. Comparative genomics helps in selecting model organisms. A model system is a simple, idealized system that can be accessible and easily manipulated. For example, a comparison of the fruit fly genome with the human genome discovered that about 60 percent of genes are conserved between fly and human. Researchers have found that two-thirds of human genes known to be involved in cancer have counterparts in the fruit fly. Even more surprisingly, when scientists inserted a human gene associated with early-onset Parkinsons disease into fruit flies, they displayed symptoms similar to those seen in humans with the disorder, raising the possibility that the tiny insects could serve as a new model for testing therapies aimed at Parkinsons. Thus, comparative genomics may provide gene functional annotation. Gene finding is an important application of comparative genomics. Comparative genomics identify Synteny (genes present in the same order in the genomes) and hence reveal gene clusters. Comparative genomics also helps in the clustering of regulatory sites, which can help in the recognition of unknown regulatory regions in other genomes. The metabolic pathway regulation can also be recognized by means of comparative genomics of a species. Dmitry and colleagues have identified the regulons of methionine metabolism in gram-positive bacteria using comparative genomics analysis. Similarly Kai Tan and colleagues have identified regulatory networks of H. influenzae by comparing its genome with that of E. coli. The adaptive properties of organisms like evolution of sex, gene silencing can also be correlated to genome sequence by comparative genomics. CONCLUSION The most unexpected finding in comparing the mouse and human genomes lies in the similarities between junk DNA, mostly retro-transposons, (transposons copied from mRNA by reverse transcriptase) in the two species. A survey of the location of retrotransposon DNA in both species shows that it has independently ended up in comparable regions of the genome. Thus junk DNA may have more of a function than was previously assumed. High performance computing tools help in comparing huge genomes. Because of its wide applications and feasibility, automation of comparing genomics is possible. Such Comparisons can aid in predicting the function of numerous hypothetical proteins. REFERENCES en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative genomics www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov www.springer.com

The Rate Law for Chemical Reaction Among Hydrogen Peroxide, Iodide, and

The Rate Law for Chemical Reaction Among Hydrogen Peroxide, Iodide, and Acid To determine the rate law for a chemical reaction among hydrogen peroxide, iodide and acid, specifically by observing how changing each of the concentrations Experiment 3 Chemical Kinetics Objectives 1. To determine the rate law for a chemical reaction among hydrogen peroxide, iodide and acid, specifically by observing how changing each of the concentrations of H2O2, and H+ affects the rate of reaction. 2. To observe the effects of temperature and catalyst on the rate of reaction. Introduction Generally, two important questions may be asked about a chemical reaction: (1)How far do the reactants interact to yield products, and (2) how fast is the reaction? â€Å"How far?† is a question of chemical equilibrium which is the realm of chemical thermodynamics. â€Å"How fast?† is the realm of chemical kinetics, the subject of this experiment. In this experiment we will study the rate of oxidation of iodide ion by hydrogen peroxide which proceeds according to the following reaction: H2O2 (aq) + 2 I-(aq) + 2H+(aq) I2(aq) + 2H2O(l) By varying the concentrations of each of the three reactants (H2O2, I- and H+), we will be able to determine the order of the reaction with respect to each reactant and the rate law of the reaction, which is of the form: Rate = k [H2O2]x[I-]y[H+]z By knowing the reaction times († t) and the concentrations of H2O2 of two separate reaction mixtures (mixtures A & B), the reaction order of H2O2, x, can be calculated. x = log(† t2/ † t1) / log ( [H2O2]1/[H2O2]2 ) The same method is used to obtain the reaction order with respect to I- (mixtures A & C) and H+ (mixtures A & D). Procedures Part I) Standardization of H2O2 Solution 1. A stand, a burette clamp and a white tile were collected to construct a titration set-up. 2. A burette was rinsed with deionized water and then with 0.05 M Na2S2O3 solution. 3. The stopcock of the burette was closed and the sodium thiosulphate solution was pour into it until the liquid level was near the zero mark. The stopcock of the burette was opened to allow the titrant to fill up the tip and then the liquid level was adjusted near zero. 4. The initial burette reading was recorded in Table 1. 5. 1.00 cm3 of the ~0.8 M H2O2 solution was pipetted into a clean 125 ... ...te of a reaction by providing an alternative pathway for the reaction, usually with a pathway of lower activation energy than that of the uncatalyzed reaction. There are some improvements in this experiment. First, hydrogen peroxide is unstable, it decomposes to water and oxygen by time. Therefore do the titration as quick as possible. 2H2O2(aq) 2H2O(I) + O2(g) Second, the concentration of iodine increase is due to the iodide can be oxidized by oxygen which promoted by acids. Therefore do the titration as quick as possible. 4I-(aq) + O2(g) + 4H+(aq) 2I2(aq) + 2H2O(aq) Third, as for the human error, the problem can be minimized by performing the titration by the same person. So, the reading can be taken by the same person and the color change can be observed by the same person. Conclusion In the experiment, the reaction was found to be zero order respect to (H+), it is first order respect to iodide, (I-) , it is first order respect to hydrogen peroxide, (H2O2). Hence the rate law is Rate = k[H2O2][I-]. The rate of reaction is increase when the temperature is increase and the rate is increase when a positive catalyst is added to the reaction.

Corporate Bankruptcy Essay -- Business Management

Corporate Bankruptcy Building a successful business is very difficult and when doing so some may encounter financial hardship. The law has established a process that can help rescue businesses. This is called bankruptcy. What is bankruptcy to a company? How does bankruptcy rescue businesses? The reader will understand the meaning of bankruptcy to a corporation, be familiarized with types of proceedings, and identify with businesses that have been rescued by bankruptcy proceedings. Bankruptcy is a federal system of statutes and courts which permits persons and businesses which are unable to pay debtors or in some cases face potential insolvency, to place their financial responsibilities under the control of the bankruptcy court (www.law.com). The way this works is that when the business's debts exceed its assets or is unable to pay, the business can file a petition with the bankruptcy court. This called filing for voluntary bankruptcy. If a business does not file for bankruptcy the unpaid creditors can file an "involuntary" petition to force the business into bankruptcy (www.law.com). It is better and most common for businesses for file voluntary bankruptcy (www.law.com). There are three types of petitions: Chapter 7, Chapter 11 and Chapter 13 (www.law.com). The most popular is for business to petition is under Chapter 7 (www.law.com). In Chapter 7, businesses are appointed a trustee by the court (www.law.com). The trustee is like a financial wizard. The trustee counts up the businesses assets with the plans of keeping them from the bankruptcy, pays debts the business owes with paying taxes first (www.law.com). The trustee then focuses on paying secured debts such as mortgages and lastly unsecured debts (www.law.com). Then the court officially declares the business bankrupt and discharges the unpayable debts, this is a lost for the creditors (www.law.com). Filing a bankruptcy petition will suspend all existing legal actions like foreclosure and other imposition of judgment. Businesses cannot file for bankruptcy again for seven years (www.law.com). Chapter 11 bankruptcy allows a business to reorganize and refinance to prevent dislocation of the organization (www.law.com). Most of the time there is no trustee appointed, but the business is given time to present a plan of reorganization (www.law.com). This does not always work well for busines... ...mart.com). This is new recovery and Kmart has a long way to go according to ABC news. In conclusion, bankruptcy is a way for businesses to rescue themselves when in financial hardship. Not every company will make it. Some may be lost, but the law provides every business the opportunity to fight for it's survival. 3M, NationsRent, and Kmart have all made it through and they are looking for a promising future. Work Cited 3M Company web page. Http://www.3m.com Company News; Citing Weak Demand, 3M Says it is Cutting 125 Jobs, New York Times, 2003.Section C. P.4. Http://www.newyorktimes.com Law Dictionary, http://www.law.com Lorrie Grant. Kmart should exit Chapter 11 quietly, expert say. USA Today. April 2004 Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing Company (3M)" International Directory of Company Histories, Vol. 26. St. James Press, 1999. Reproduced in Business and Company Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale Group. 2006. Http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/BCRC NationsRent Company web page. Http://www.nationsrent.com Troy Bryant. NationsRent, Hoover.com, http://www.hovers.com/nationsrent/--ID_57275--/free-co-factsheet.xhtml. retreived July 12, 2006

Bless Me Ultima Essay

What will Antonio become when he grows up? A priest? A vaquero? A curandero? A farmer? Antonio’s future is not clear because, at the end of the novel, he has finally decided to choose his own path. Instead of listening to the beliefs of his mother or the desires of his father, he will fulfill Ultima’s encouragement to follow his heart. With this in mind, it seems likely that Antonio will probably become a man of learning according to Ultima, Whether or not this means that Antonio will become a priest as well is uncertain. Considering his questions about religion and morality and his anxieties about sin, it seems as if the life of a priest is not for him. However, no matter what he decides to do when he becomes an adult, the most important thing is that he has learned to make his own path. â€Å"I had more time to spend with Ultima, and in her company I found a great deal of solace and peace.† (Anaya 223) If Antonio found solace and peace with Ultima because of what she did (being a curandera). So why should he give up his solace and peace once she was gone? If becomes a curandero he would give himself solace and peace because of what he would do like Ultima. â€Å"I dropped to my knees; bless me, Ultima† (Anaya 260) Antonio asked to bless him right before she died. Antonio did not ask her to bless him in the name of God but a being a curandera. This seems to make Antonio not believe in God but in the powers of curandera. â€Å"I bless you in the name of all that is good and strong and beautiful, Antonio. Always have the strength to live. Love life, and if despair enters your heart, look for me in the evenings when the wind is gentle and the owls sing in the hills. I shall be with you†(Anaya 261) Ultima’s final blessing to Antonio Her statement also gives Antonio a idea with which to understand her death by offering a sequence of physical objects that he can see as symbols of her life and through which he can continue to feel her presence. Antonio will be without Ultima and will have to make his own choices without her guidance from now on, but she makes it clear in this blessing that her spirit will endure with him and that the lessons she has taught him will still serve him well even after she dies.