Monday, April 6, 2020

A Report on how to Improve Communication Arrangements

Executive Summary This report was commissioned to analyze how Westminster Business School could improve its communication arrangements. The research focuses on the benefits and disadvantages of using new technology for e-learning and compares it with traditional teaching methods.Advertising We will write a custom report sample on A Report on how to Improve Communication Arrangements specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Investigations reveal that e-learning solutions could improve communications within the institution, and enhance the mode of learning in virtual classrooms. Therefore, it is recommended that Westminster Business School take immediate measures to rollout an e-learning system in its learning environment. Introduction Westminster University is one of the most competent colleges in London because it offers a wide range of courses in almost all levels. The institution has been competing with other universities, and it has in creased the number of student admissions over the years. The increase in the number of students has made the management of Westminster Business School to look for alternative ways of dealing with challenges in their communication system. The problem lies in the school’s inability to provide all the facilities required by the students. For instance, the boarding facilities are already congested and thus there should be another way of achieving the same results. In this regard, the college is in pursuit of a better way of transmitting knowledge to the learners. An efficient e-learning system would solve the mentioned problem because the benefits of e-learning, as discussed in this report, outweigh the benefits of traditional learning methods. Discussion Advantages of Traditional Teaching Method Traditional learning methods are still popular in learning institutions. According to Pollard (2002), the teacher is the one who sets the time and duration of lessons and this is appropr iate for freshmen because most of them are not disciplined, and thus if they were left to attend classes as they wished most of them would never show up. In addition, there are no interruptions in the classroom, unlike home based lessons where the learner’s attention can be disrupted by small things like the television and mobile phones. In traditional learning the names of the students who are present during a given lesson are written down and they are referred to while students are sitting for their final exams. This is because it would be inappropriate for a lecturer to allow a student who has missed most of the lessons to sit for an exam with the rest because chances of failure are absolute. Likewise, the lecturers can monitor the progress of their learners easily as opposed to e-learning, because in virtual classes you cannot tell when a learner has understood the lesson or not. Some students require to be guided, and thus this is the most suitable method for such learne rs. Furthermore, the teacher can identify the strengths and the weaknesses of the student and hence help him/her to work on them.Advertising Looking for report on business communication? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More Additionally, the teacher is the one who commands what is to be studied in the classroom. This is logical because he/she is the most knowledgeable and experienced, and thus knows where the examiners draw their questions. Similarly, if the students were left to choose the topics that they should cover on their own they would choose the ones that sound interesting to them, and hence they would end failing in exams. This means that the entire curriculum will not be covered. Again, the lecturer can help learners to understand the topics better by asking them questions at random. The students can also correct one another in the classroom if there is misunderstanding the subjects covered (Petrina, 2001). Disadvantages of Traditional Teaching Method According to Muijs and Reynolds (2005), direct teaching can make the lecturers to lack creativity. This is because they have to stick to the guidelines of the course outline. Without the course outline the lecturers can engineer their own approaches because they know the particular areas that are examined but the course outlines force them to cover areas that are never examined. This is important especially when there is limited time for going through the syllabus. Direct teaching requires the person who is transmitting knowledge to have excellent verbal communication skills. This may sound funny, but it is very sound because there are some lecturers who are highly educated but they lack communication skills, and thus cannot explain the issues that require discussions. In addition, the lack of good communication skills can cause the lecturer to mislead the students. Petrina (2007) argues that at times the lecturer may be biased without knowing, by pay ing attention to only fast learners and leaving the slow learners behind. The smart students may use the classroom to show off their skills to the poor learners, which could demoralize them from attending their classes because they are made to believe they are failures. The students who fail exams often become the laughing stock which would not be the case in e-learning because their results would be confidential, and there would be no time for such nonsense because they do not interact physically.Advertising We will write a custom report sample on A Report on how to Improve Communication Arrangements specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Moreover, there are students who are very selfish such that they cannot share what they know with their classmates because they think by keeping the information to themselves they will be able to lead their faculty in exams. This is wrong because they may be having the wrong answers that could be cor rected if only they could share them with their classmates. In light of this, traditional teaching methods deny the students an opportunity to think because they develop a perception that the lecturer will always guide them on the topics they are supposed to cover. Another shortcoming of traditional teaching method is that the lecturers are most likely to be manipulated by the students to award them the scores that they do not deserve in their final exams. This is very common among female students who engage in casual sex with lecturers so that they can be awarded better grades in exams. Male students also engage in this malpractice but from a different angle because they use money to manipulate the lecturers. In the long run direct teaching is considered expensive by students because they have to pay for their accommodation and transport (Petrina, 2001). E-Learning and Advantages E-learning is carried out virtually on the Internet. All that is needed in this method of learning is a computer and Internet connection. In e-learning both the students and the lecturers are free because they can interact with the learning system from any geographical location since they have Internet access. E-learning helps both the learners and the lecturers to save the money they usually spend on transport because they can both learn and teach at the comfort of their houses. All that is required in this method is time management skills so that the learner has ample time for learning. This means that the learners can engage in other activities without interfering with their learning (Laudon Laudon, 2006). Pollard (2010) explains that e-learning enables the learners to proceed at their own pace without having to rush like for classrooms where they struggle to be on the same level with their peers. This is because they have optical discs that they can always be replayed from time to time to ensure they grasp what they are supposed to learn. This method enables the students to sele ct learning materials that they are familiar to unlike in traditional methods where the lecturers expect one size to fit all.Advertising Looking for report on business communication? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More In addition, E-learning enables the learners to acquire a lot of skills in computer applications because they interact with computers frequnently. This knowledge can later be employed in other areas. E-learning makes students to be creative and make their own decisions without the influence of the lecturer. The students who manage to complete their studies through e-learning are very bold and they believe in their abilities so much because they consider their responsibility to be achievement. E-learning students enjoy an opportunity to interact with their lecturers and fellow students through the chat rooms, thus improving communication between the university and learners. Finally, slow learners are best suited for this method because no one will laugh at them in a classroom, and besides that if they fail in exams no one will get to know it apart from the lecturer. If the student has any weakness the lecturer can assist him/her because the interaction between the two entities is one on one basis. Disadvantages of E-learning E-learning demands a lot of self discipline on the learners and this means they have to avoid any interruptions such as television, phone calls and frequent visitors. For learners who do not know how to plan their time this method of learning may not work for them. This is because there is no one to follow them around hence they may abuse their freedom. The other hindrance to e-learning is access to computers and the Internet. Most students are not able to purchase a computer and pay for internet subscription. In addition, not all students are computer literate and thus they would have to go for computer lessons first which comes with extra costs. Conclusions Westminster Business School should adopt e-learning because it is cost efficient, and students and lecturers would benefit from reduced cost of transport. Westminster Business School should adopt e-learning because it will solve the problem of congestion in its campus. Westminster sho uld emphasize on the need of self discipline among its students to enhance communication in the new system. Recommendations Adopting e-learning will help Westminster to go beyond borders. International students will be able to enroll in this college because learning takes place virtually. Westminster should help the students to acquire computers by giving them soft loans. Most students are interested in this system but then they do not have enough money to buy computers. Westminster should provide computer literacy lessons and make it mandatory to all learners so that there is smooth transition. This is because majority of students lack basic skills in computing and Internet. References Laudon, K. Laudon, P., 2006, Management information Systems: Managing the Digital Firm,. 9th Ed. Pearson Prentice Hall Inc: Upper Saddle River, NJ. Muijs, D. Reynolds, D., 2005, Effective Teaching: Evidence and Practice, London: Sage Publications. Petrina, S., 2001, Advanced Teaching Methods for the Technology Classroom, London: Idea Group Inc. Pollard, A., 2002, Readings for Reflective Teaching, New York: Continuum International Publishing Group. This report on A Report on how to Improve Communication Arrangements was written and submitted by user Carlee U. to help you with your own studies. You are free to use it for research and reference purposes in order to write your own paper; however, you must cite it accordingly. You can donate your paper here.

Sunday, March 8, 2020

buy custom Supervised Machine Learning essay

buy custom Supervised Machine Learning essay The recent technological developments in areas such as the internet, DNA microarray, hyperspectral imagery, database among other notable areas have resulted to the emergency of large amounts of data in wide spectrums of applications. These include areas such as search engines, proteomics, genomic, text categorization, and information retrieval. According to Tan (2007, p. 17), it is estimated that, the total amount of information stored doubles each twenty months. Machine learning thus offers tools to alleviate this problem by analyzing large quantity of data automatically. However, it is notable that, the many applications of features or attributes makes it hard for machine learning to extract all the useful information from a gigantic data streams. Guyon (2003, p. 42) candidly indicates that machine learning provides the necessary tools, through which, large quantities of data may be automatically analyzed. Future selection, which selects a subset of all the most salient features as well as removes redundant, noisy and irrelevant features is the process that usually employed in machine learning in solving highly dimensionally problems. Feature selection focuses the learning algorithms to most useful and crucial aspects of data, thus making learning task more accurate as well as fast. It is notable that in the last five years, feature and variable selection have become one of the main areas of focus in research. This is especially in area of applications for which datasets with hundreds of thousands of variables are present. The objective of feature selections is mainly three fold; offering more coat-effective and faster predictors, developing the prediction performances of all the available predictors, and offering an improved understanding of all the underlying processes, which generated the data. The contributions of the feature and variable selection cover wide range of aspects of the associated problems, such as feature ranking, feature construction, multivariate feature selection, feature validity assessment, as well as offering improved definition of the available objective functions. As indicated above, the rapid developments of applications and novel technologies having large as well as more complex accumulation of data, mainly at unprecedented speeds, there has been collection of large and unknown quantities of candidate features, usually collected to represent data. Tan (2007, p. 18), indicate that although the features, which are irrelevant may fail to add anything to the target concept learning through the learning machine as well as the redundant features, they raise the computation costs of the overall learning process. There are four main advantages of using feature selection in supervised machine learning. First, feature selection reduces computational complexity of prediction and learning algorithms. Most of the well-known learning algorithms have become computational intractable, especially in the presence of huge numbers of features. This applies in the prediction step and training step. Therefore, preceding step of feature selections can enormously solve this problem. Feature selection greatly saves on the costs of measuring non-selected figures. Once a smaller set of the features, which allow good predictions of all the labels are established, one does not have to measure the other features. The other advantage of feature selection, e specially in supervised machine learning, is higher levels of improved accuracy. In most circumstances, feature selection can enhance the accuracy of predictions by improving signals to noise ratio. Generally, in most of the real word tasks, the dimensionality of the data is very high such that it is practically prohibitive or computationally costly for machine learning. Most of the traditional learning algorithms have failed to scale o the large size problems as a result of the curse of the dimensionality. In addition to this, the existence of the noisy features highly degrades the performance of learning algorithms. Feature selection techniques are thus crucial in solving this problem in machine learning. There are two types of machine learning, supervised and unsupervised machine learning as indicated on the diagram below. In the supervised learning, all the class labels of training data are well known. The training example is well represented as pairs of input objectives as well as its desired output, such as class label. The main task of supervised learners is to establish functions to approximate the mapping between the training data to their classes, in order to predict the classes of the new data. Some of the algorithms and approaches that have been proposed for the supervised learning include k-nearest neighbor, decision trees, nave Bayers classifiers, SUVs (Support Vector Machines) and random forests. Guyon (2003, p. 40) supervised learning can be termed as the machine learning duty of inferring a function a labeled (supervised) training data. The training data mainly consists of sets of training examples. In a supervised learning, every example is a pair consisting of an input object, typically a vector, and an output value, also known as the supervisory signal. Supervised learning algorithm an alyzes procedures and training data an inferred function, which is known as a classifier, if the output data is discrete, or a regression function, if the output data is continuous. On the other hand, unsupervised machine learning can clearly be distinguished from the supervised machine learning due to the fact that the class labels used for training data are not usually available. The unsurprised learning method mostly decides which objects can be grouped together in one class. Put in other words, they mostly learn class by themselves. The K-nearest neighbors, self-organizing as well as data clustering algorithms, such as fuzzy c-means clustering and K-means clustering are mostly used for the unsupervised learning tasks. It is crucial to note that good representation of the input objects is crucial due to the fact that the accuracy of the entire learned model enormously depends strongly on the way input objects are indicated typically, the entire input object is changed into a vector of attributes or features, thus being used to describe the object. 1.1 Objectives There are different feature selection algorithms having various objectives to be attained. Some of these objectives include: Finding the minimally sized feature subset sufficient and necessary to the target concept. Selecting a subset N features from a set of M features such that M , such that all the values of the criterion function is fully optimized, over all the subset size N Selecting a subset of features aimed at improving the accuracy of prediction or reducing the size of the structure, without substantially reducing on the accuracy of prediction of all the classifiers, built by using only the features selected. Selecting small subset such that, the resulting class distribution, is very close to the original class distribution if all feature values are given. 1.2. Feature Selection Procedure As indicated above feature selection, also known as feature reduction, variable selection, variable subset selection or attribute selection is a method of selecting a subset of the relevant features, useful for building a robust learning model. Guyon (2003, p. 40) argues that feature selection is critical in problem understanding. This is due to the fact that the selected features can offer great insights on the nature of the problem being tackled. This is enormously crucial, since in most circumstances, the ability to point out the important informative features is necessary as compared to the ability f making good predictions in itself. The main goal of the feature selection is to select small sublets of feature, such that recognition rate of all classifiers do not decrease substantially. Liu and Yu (2005, p. 32) argues that the feature selection method depends on the way in which subsets are generated as well as the evaluation function employed in evaluating all the subsets under examination. There are numerous types of feature selection procedure based on generation procedures of all the subsets as well as the evaluation functions employed to evaluate them. However, a typical feature selection procedure consists of four basic steps, namely: Subset generation Subset evaluation Stopping criterion, and Results validation The flow chart below briefly indicates the four notable processes The process starts with the generation of subset that employs a particular search strategy in order to give rise to a candidate feature subsets. This is followed by evaluation of each candidate subset according to a particular evaluation criterion and then compared with the best subset. If it is better, the previous best one is replaced. It is notable that the process of generation and evaluation of the subset is then repeated until a certain stopping criterion is attained. Finally, the selected best feature subset is carefully validated by the test data or prior knowledge. Liu and Yu, (2005, p. 20) argues that search strategy as well as evaluation are the key points when studying feature selection. 1.2.1 Subset Generation As indicated by Ng (1998, p. 14), subset generation is first a process involving a heuristic search, with every state in the search space having a certain candidate subset for the purpose of evaluation. It is notable that the nature of this process is enormously determined by two basic issues. To start with, one must make a decision on the search point or points that will in turn going to influence the direction. The search process may start with a set that is empty and successively add features (forward) or begin with a full set of and then successively remove features (backward). The search can also begin with both points and then successively add and remove features (bi-directional). Further, search can also begin with a subset that is randomly selected. This is crucial as it avoids the subset being trapped in local optima (Liu and Yu, 2005, p. 16). Secondly, one must decide on a search strategy to be used. For a data set having N features, then there exists candidate subsets. For an exhaustive search the search space is exhaustive, even where N is moderate. There are other search strategies, which have been explored. This include complete, random and sequential search. 1.2.1.1 An exhaustive Search This method guarantees to establish all the optimal results as dedicated by the evaluation criterion adopted. In other words, exhaustive search is complete as no any optimal subset is missed. For instance, for a data set having five parameters, X1 X4, X5 there can be a number of combinations of the independent variables as indicated on the table below. (Rogati and Yang, 2002, p. 44) Note: For a given dataset having Y independent parameters, exhaustive search method will have 2^Y-1 regression models to selected from. This type of search is said to be exhaustive due to the fact that the search is guarantee to generate all the reachable states, prior to it terminate with failure. Liu and Yu (2005, p. 12) candidly indicates that an exhaustive search always build a regression model, with each possible combination of the parameters. However, it is crucial noting that, if a search is complete this does not mean that it must have been fully exhaustive. This is based on the fact that various heuristic functions may be used, in order to reduce the selected search space without necessarily jeopardizing any chances of establishing the optimal results. Though the order of the selected search space is O, smaller number of subsets can be evaluated. An exhaustive search may be performed, on the condition that the numbers of variables are not too large. A wide variety of search strategies, such as branch-and-bound, best-first, genetic algorithms, simulated annealing among others, may be used. Some of the notable examples include branch, bound and beam search. The branch and bound procedure performs an exhaustive search that is done in an orderly fashion, such as search tree, but it halt the search a long a given branch, if bound or limit is exceeded. This can be done if sub-solution fails to look promising. In spite of the time complexity, this search method is usually fast for some given problems. 1.2.1.2 Sequential Search This method gives up completeness, therefore risks loosing the optimal subsets. There are various variations to the greedy hill-climbing method. Some of them include sequential backward elimination, sequential forward selection, as well as bi-directional selection. Sequential forward selection begins with a feature subset that is empty. For all iteration, exactly one of the features is added to the subset. In order to determine the feature to be added, the algorithm exactly adds to the existing candidate feature subset one of the feature, which is already selected as well as tests the accuracy of the classifier build on the tentative subset. Sequential backward deletion is almost similar to the forward selection, but this one begins with all the features as well as tries to remove the feature, resulting in the highest levels of accuracy gain. In some instances, a greedier version of the sequential search method can be implemented where there is the possibility of deleting or adding m ore feature o very iteration. In supervised machine learning, the greedier version is faster, due to the fact that, it examines reduced number of candidate feature subset. It is notable that these methods add or remove some features each at a time. The other method is to add or remove p features in a single step and adding or removing q features in the proceeding step (p q) (Liu and Yu, 2005, p. 15) It is simple to implement algorithms having sequential search. It is also fast to produce results. This is due to the fact that, the order of the sequential search space is mostly O, or even less. 1.2.1.3 Random Search Random search usually start with a subset that is randomly selected and then proceeds into two distinct ways. One ways is to follow sequential search, thus injecting randomness into the sequential approach. Examples include simulated annealing and random-start hill-climbing. The other way is to generate the subsequent subsets in completely random manner, a method that is known as Las Vegas algorithm. According to Tan (2007, p. 21), random search evaluates large sets of random feature subsets and the returns the best feature. Based on this, it is crucial to implement more complex strategies of selection, such as the genetic feature selections or as initialization of the greedy search. For instance, bad choices that are done on the early stages of greedy search usually become hard to be undone, while forward search mostly suffers if all the features, which are judged individually, are poor. Generally for all the approaches, the use of randomness significantly helps in escaping local op tima in the given search space. Further, the optimality of the selected subsets largely depends on all the available resources. 1.2.1.4 Individual Search Liu and Yu (2005, p. 13) argues that the individual search method evaluates every feature separately. The main advantage of this is the fact that it is a high speed search method s compared to others such as exhaustive, random, sequential search among others. As a result of this, individual search is used in for pre-selection of candidate feature subsets from large sets of feature. However, it is crucial to note that, individually, poor features can yield to a high class of separability when they are used together. In individual search, it is possible for one to provide additional test sets using test options. 1.2.2 Subset Evaluation As indicated above, every newly generated subset requires to be evaluated carefully by a given evaluation criterion. It is crucial to note that the goodness of the selected subset is usually determined by a particular criterion. That is, an optimal subset selected using a certain criterion may fail to be an optimal according to the other give criterion. One of the paradigms, which have been dubbed as filter, operates independently of any of the learning algorithm. This is due to the fact that all the undesired features are filtered out of the data prior to the commencement of learning. These algorithms mostly use heuristics based on the general characteristics of data to evaluate merits of the feature subsets. The other school of thought indicates that, the bias of the given induction algorithm ought to be taken into account before selecting a feature. This method is known as wrapper method. It uses an induction algorithm along side a statistical re-sampling technique, such as the cr oss-validation in estimating the final accuracy to all feature subsets. Generally, feature selection algorithms can be divided in three broad categories namely wrapper, hybrid and filter. 1.2.2.1 Filter Method Independent of all the other induction algorithms, the filter method filters out all redundant, noisy, or irrelevant features in the processing steps before induction takes place. Liu, Liu, and Yu (2005, p. 10) argues that filter method select a feature set for any of the learning algorthms to be used when leraning concepst from the training set. The bisaness of all the future selection alogrithms as well as the learning alogrithm do not intearct. The search usually proceeds until pre-specified number of the feature is obtained or some thresholding criteria is met. The key advantage of the filter method as comapred to other methods, such as wrapper method among others, is the fact that this method is fast as well as the ability to scale to the large database.Unlike other methods, such as wrappers, filters usually utilizes the intrinsic properties of the data in evaluating feature subset. In general, the featurse are mostly assesed using their discriminatory or releavnces powers in re gard to the target classes. 1.2.2.2 Wrapper Method In wrapper methods, the performances, such as prediction or classification accuracy, of an induction algorithm is used for the feature subset evaluation as indicated o the figure below. In most of its general formulation, the wrapper method consists in the usage of prediction performance of a certain learning machine, in order to assess the overall usefulness of all the usefulness of the subsets of variables. When applying the wrapper method one should define, the How to search all the usefulness of the subset of variables How to assess the prediction performances of learning machine, in order to guide the search as well as halt it Which predictors will be employed Wrappers are usually criticized due to the fact that they are seen as a brute force method, which require massive amount of computational, though this is not necessarily the case. Greedy search strategies are usually seen as computational advantageous as well as robust against over fitting. In forward selection, wrappers are useful in estimating the accuracy of adding every unselected feature to all the feature subset as well as choosing the best feature to be added according to this kind of criterion. The method usually terminates when the estimated accuracy of adding any of the feature is less as compared to the estimated accuracy of the feature set already selected. Generally, for every generated feature subset S, the wrappers usually evaluates its applicability by using induction algorithms to dataset using the features present in the subset S. Wrappers may easily find features subsets within the high level of accuracy. This is due to the fact that the features match well with al l the learning algorithms (Liu, and Yu, 2005, p. 12). 1.2.2.3 Hybrid Method In order to improve the classification performances as well as fasten feature selection, it is advisable to build a hybrid model. This is due to the fact that it takes the advantage of wrappers and filters by employing both independent criteria and the learning algorithms in measuring feature subsets. Filters offers an intelligence guide for the wrappers, like reducing search space, offering a good start point or shortening the search path, all of which are crucial in scaling wrappers to the larger size problems. Hybrid method employs the independent measures in deciding the subset that is best for any given cardinality (Liu, and Yu, 2005, p. 13). 1.2.2.4 Feature Ranking Among the entire proposed feature selection algorithm, the aspect of feature ranking methods, which rank or score features by a particular criterion. The use rankings of the features as base of selection mechanism are mostly attractive due to their scalability, simplicity as well as the good empirical success. Computationally, the feature ranking is efficient due to the fact that it needs only the computation of M scores as well as sorting all the scores. With regard to ranks of the features, the subsets of important features may be selected in order to build classifiers or predictors. 1.2.3 Stopping Criterion It is important to note that a feature selector should be able to decide when to stop searching through the space of the feature subsets. Depending on evaluation strategies which are available, a feature selection may remove or adding features, when none of the alternative improves on the merits of the current feature subsets. Alternatively, algorithm may continue to revise feature subset as long as the merit has not degraded. Based on this argument, a further option may be to continue with generation of subsets until reaching the other end of search. The best subset is then selected. In most cases, the test is not able to measure the distance existing between the last iterate and the true solution. Generally, a feature selection process may terminate if: The search is complete A predefined size of the feature subset has been selected A predefined number of iterations have been executed A sufficiently good or an optimal feature subset has been obtained, or When the change of feature subset does not result to a better subset (Tan, 2007, p. 23). 1.2.4 Result validation In some of the applications, all the relevant features are usually known beforehand, thus allowing one to validate the results of feature selection. However, in many real-world applications it is hard to understand the features that are relevant. Hence, one has to rely on some of the indirect methods through monitoring the change of the mining performance with all the changes of features (Liu and Dash, 1997, p. 23). Buy custom Supervised Machine Learning essay

Friday, February 21, 2020

The questions below are of a generic nature Essay

The questions below are of a generic nature - Essay Example However, according to many experts the situation is not yet under control. The world is still passing through the worst economic and financial times. Stock markets are showing sluggish movements and recently there have been sharp decline in the international stock markets. Large financial institutions have collapsed which has been the biggest shock to the financial world. Rescue of these banks have involved huge amounts of money for bail outs. The government of the respective countries have provided lump sum amount of money (that have run upto many trillion dollars in the United States alone) to these failed banks for rescuing them. In the United States the Federal Government has followed the Keynesian theory of economics. As recession set in, policymakers have not left the economy to the forces of the market that might autocorrect the market and improve the condition of low aggregate demand. They have intervened with fiscal and monetary policy changes, so as to augment economic acti vities in the country. Interest rates were reduced as an immediate response to the crisis (Velde, 2008). This paper looks at the causes of the GFC and the responses of the government to this crisis. The main aim of this article is to research the protectionist activities of the governments in reflex to the harm caused to these economies by recessionary pressure. In this light the preventive measures of the governments have been studied to understand the course of action adopted by the global economy to prevent the recurrence of a situation similar to the Great Depression of the 1930s. Causes of the GFC The causes of the GFC are manifold and analysts have not come to any particular agreement about the actual reasons that have eventually led to the financial crisis of such a huge dimension. Yet it is commonly agreed that GFC has occur due to the combined effect of the shocks faced by the real estate market in the United States and the European countries on one hand, and the increasing risk premia for the corporate firms and the investment banks on the other (Stoeckel, 2009). The shocks in the global financial market have potentially created strong contractions in international trade. The root to the financial crisis can be traced to the collapse of a number of large and influential financial institutions in the United Sates and the Europe. Among them, the most notable mortgage bank failures are Lehman Brothers, Northern Rock and Bear Sterns. As these banks filed for bankruptcy, a wave of apprehension ran through the most established financial markets of the western world. In this situation, banks curtailed their lending facilities to other banks which increased the risk premium on interbank borrowing. This rate increased steadily from near 0 to 5 per cent. On corporate bonds this risk increased to more than 6 per cent. In spite of efforts by the government to increase liquidity levels in the market, the financial markets crashed inevitably. The economic slowdown started with the shelving of big corporate projects. Therefore, the primary borrowers in the economy (i.e., the large corporate firms) stopped lending money from the banks. On other side of the coin, obtaining credit for commercial purposes became difficult. This causes the great financial crisis. Since credit facilities dried up, corporate firms had to revise their investment decisions. They faced a

Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Colonization of Asia and Africa from the 19th Century into the 20th Essay

Colonization of Asia and Africa from the 19th Century into the 20th - Essay Example Colonialism was thus a very important element during the late centuries and in which different nations had been colonized. Having been colonized, there were great chances of having a change of nationalism, and hence it was upon the people of such countries to manage to over the colonialists through their nationalism. In this paper, we will examine how and Western European nations began colonizing Asia and Africa from the 19th century into the 20th. This is achieved through responding to various questions on the subject. There are several steps that Europeans took in order to keep colonized people under control in Africa. History has been able to give a number of developments which have been able to give the steps that Europeans used to keep colonized people under control. From a literal perspective, it is clear that colonialism in the past years was known to take a varied number of forms. These forms included the political aspect, the legal approaches, the cultural structures, the ec onomics, and even the social structures (Pouwels & Adler, 2007).This saw a number of people being influenced by their colonizers. This resulted in a number of issues and differences which saw a great change. The Europeans employed different strategies and policies to maintain colonized people under their control. For instance, the policy of assimilation guaranteed that the colonies were obedient to their masters, thus being able to put them under control. Moreover, the divide and rule strategy ensured that all colonized people remained with no unity, and therefore promoting easy control by the Europeans. Following the Treaty of Versailles, England and France made various claims about colonized people and had a certain plan for eventually giving colonized people their independence. With reference research, the Treaty of Versailles was coiled to create peace between the five countries; that is, the U.S, Germany, France, Australia, and Britain after WWI (Pouwels & Adler, 2007). Buildin g on research, it is clear that France and England made various claims about colonized people. Such claims were that the colonized people deserved acquiring their freedom and restoring their lost glory and resources. Based on the fact that France and England did not focus on obtaining resources from the colonized nations, they decided that giving the colonized people their independence was the most beneficial thing that would define their development. Despite the above point of view, France and England had ideological differences with other colonizers. Such ideological differences defined their stand to fight for freedom for all people regardless of their color, race, and ethnicity. Undeniably, there was an effort that the European made between WWI and WWI to start moving colonies toward eventual independence. The continued oppression and slowly engraving of understanding that their resources and freedom were being compromised saw the great need of coming with movements through whic h they would safeguard their sovereignty and be able to achieve a great deal of freedom which had been greatly suppressed by the colonialist powers (Pouwels & Adler, 2007). In most of the countries that were being colonized, it has been shown that there was a great connection when it came to colonial attributes and the need of fending for the people’s nationalism. In order to be able to restore their once glory and become free once again, majority of the colonists decided to employ diverse means of engagement which would play a big role towards maintaining their freedom and nationalism. However, it is worth noting that all the above was founded on the efforts of the Europeans. The Arabs

Tuesday, January 28, 2020

Overview Of General Motors And Toyota

Overview Of General Motors And Toyota With the global economic crisis and energy crisis, automotive sales fell to their lowest per-capita levels, putting automakers under enormous financial pressure. All automotive manufacturers have been severely affected, with most reporting significant losses in the last two year. This affects all automotive producers including global automotive giants like General Motors (GM) and TOYOTA. If we consider GM and TOYOTA alone, both companies lost a great deal of sales and had to adjust themselves according to these unexpected conditions. Especially GMs liquidity fell rapidly to levels below those needed to operate the company. At the same time, because of TOYOTAs well defined production processes and their high quality production, TOYOTA could provide healthier competition over General Motors, which facilitate TOYOTA to take over the global industry leadership from GM. As the main objective of this report is to carry out a detailed analysis in relation to the above mentioned situation and come up with some feasible international strategic movement that can be used to take back the industry leadership from TOYOTA by General Motors. Overview Overview of General Motors General Motors, founded in 1908 September by William C. Duran. General Motors Corporation (GM) is more than one century year old Multinational Corporation, which has been maintaining the automobile industry leadership over the last 80 years. GM employs approximately 244,500 people around the world, across all its brands. General Motors provides a wide range of vehicle priced from US$10,000 to US$100,000+ catering to various customer segments all over the world from middle to luxury class automobiles. Chevrolet, GMC, Pontiac, Cadillac, GM Daewoo, Hummer and Opel brands are some of their best brands. At the turn of the 21st century, it was prevalent that the environment needed to be preserved. General Motors began creating vehicles that were more environmental friendly. GM has innovated itself by creating fuel-efficient vehicles, bio fuels and hybrids. Since its inception, it has expanded to sell cars and trucks in 140 countries across North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa. In 2008, GM sold 8.35 million vehicles. GMs largest national market is the United States, followed by China, Brazil, the United Kingdom, Canada, Russia and Germany. Below table represents GMs Global Vehicles sales and Market share in 2008: Overview of TOYOTA The TOYOTA Motor Corp. (TMC) was established in 1933. The founder of TOYOTA was Kiichiro Toyoda. As the main operational difference, TOYOTA is a process-oriented company whereas most companies are results-oriented, focused on how much they can make or sell or how much money they can make in a quarter. TOYOTA sells its vehicles in more than 170 countries and regions. TOYOTAs primary markets for its automobiles are Japan, North America, Europe and Asia. Continued Success of TOYOTA As you see in the Figure 1, TOYOTA had a continuous growth over the last few years. TOYOTA designed their vehicles with a greater customer satisfaction and sales satisfaction by focusing quality, price, design, performance, safety, reliability, economy and utility. Figure 1 TOYOTA continuously introduced various innovative success models such as environmental friendly Hybrid Luxury Cars to expand their vehicle range. TOYOTAs market growth drastically resulted to decline GMs sales within the US market as well as in the global market and ultimately TOYOTA could become the global industrial leadership by defeating the global automobile giant, General Motors. Why GM Failed? General Motors Faced Problems General Motors (GM) lost their industry leadership and faced the worst economic downturn during the last two years. Consumers have had to contend with illiquid credit markets, rising unemployment, declining incomes and home values, and volatile fuel prices. Industrys competition provided a major contribution towards the GMs failure. In addition to this immense competition from the other global automobile companies, following two economic and industrial issues provided a radical pressure towards GMs comedown. 1. Global Economic Decline The global financial crisis really started to show its effects in the middle of 2007 and into 2009. Around the world stock markets have drastically fallen, large financial institutions have collapsed or been bought out, and governments in even the wealthiest nations have had to come up with rescue packages to bail out their financial systems. New car purchases dropped significantly in U.S. in the final quarter of 2008. The US auto sales for 2008 stood at 13.2 million down 18 percent from 16.1 million in 2007. Because of this General Motors faced significant slump in their revenues. 2. Automotive Industry Crisis The automotive industry crisis of 2008-2009 was a part of a global financial downturn. The crisis primarily affected the American automobile manufacturing industry other than to the Asian and European markets. Further the automotive industry was weakened by a considerable increase in the prices of automotive fuels because of the energy crisis. By 2008, the situation had turned critical as the credit crunch placed pressure on the prices of raw materials. Blunders of General Motors (GM) Other than to the above 2 global economic and industrial issues, General Motors further made following internal blunders as well: a). Unstylish Design GM customers were not satisfy with the last 10 years GM car models, basic reason was GM primarily wanted to keep the costs low, they compromised the design. b). High Cost Production GM has not utilized their plant capacity for maximum benefit. The other reason was the high labor cost especially because of the high employee salaries and given benefits, GM had to spend a large amount of production cost along with the high maintenance cost of their plants in United States. c). Wrong Pricing Strategies After the crisis happened, GM radically cut their prices with bottomless discounts, which resulted to increase their sales around 25 27k units per year, but there after the quantity stayed until the cars demise. How TOYOTA Won the Game? TOYOTAs Improved Production Process TOYOTAs automobile production process provided an enormous push towards the company success. First they methodically reduced the setup time in the automobile assembly line and trained an efficient assembly line work force. In parallel to this they continuously improved the quality of each completed process independently. Initially this quality improvement mechanism was so challenging but with the proper process designing and employee expertise, error rate began to drop dramatically. Once the setup time and assembly line was improved, then TOYOTA implemented JIT (Just-In-Time) to reduce the buffer stocks and inventory levels during the production process. This resulted to accelerate and increase the efficiency of production assembly line process without maintaining surplus inventory. In order to do this TOYOTA maintained a better supplier base by entering in to long-term relationship with major suppliers. From the beginning itself, TOYOTA closely worked with their suppliers, providing them by sharing engineering/management expertise, and even with capital to finance for new investments. As a result of these improvements, TOYOTA could reduce the cost of production along with the high labor productivity and the quality which ultimately gave a greater competitive advantage over the other global automotive competitors. Next step of TOYOTA was to further increase the customer satisfaction. Therefore, TOYOTA continuously conducted customer surveys by using various techniques; they estimated and identified the exact customer preferences. These finding were directly incorporated with their actual automobile design process. TOYOTAs Distribution and Global Expansion After 1983 TOYOTAs first successful joint venture with General Motors, by 2006 TOYOTA represented more than 60% of the total North American sales. In parallel to the US market expansion, TOYOTA made their move in European market as well. By now with TOYOTA has overtaken General Motors and become the largest automobile industry leader in the world. How GM Become the Leader Again? SWOT Analysis of General Motors To have a strategic approach first of all we need to understand companys capabilities clearly. So below I have conducted a SWOT analysis to get a clear picture about the company. According to Capon, (2004:393) SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. The strengths and weaknesses of an organization arise from its internal environment, namely resources and their use, structure culture and the tasks carried out by the four functions of business. Which strengths an organization decides to build on and which weaknesses it seeks to minimize depends on the impact of opportunities and threats from the external environment. Below I have categorized the internal and external environment factors for GM. Strengths World-wide Market coverage and Technology potential. Sols with packagers (for different needs). Utilization of core competencies to meet the requirements of specific customer needs. Weaknesses Failure to Make Technology Work Product Design Problems-public Acceptance. For every car that GM sells, $2500 of the profit will go towards paying for the benefits of retired Employees. Still much to Learn about Lean Production-High Cost Production. Opportunities Use of knowledge gained from Joint Ventures. Continue to Build Customer Confidence. Almost all the automotive firms facing the same Economical challenges. Changing Consumer Demand for New Model Types and Styles. Threats Domestic and Foreign Competitors and Other Competitors Fuel Efficient Cars Global Economic Crisis. Unions are powerful and Drive a Hard Bargaining. High R D Cost. By considering the obtainable strengths and opportunities, still GM has several avenues to take over TOYOTA and become the number one in the automobile industry again. But for that, according to my analysis GM has to carefully perform several internal restructuring activities and adjust them to face to the immense competition. Below I have listed down some important steps that GM could follow to get back to the right track during the next 5 years. Products Improvement (Fuel Efficiency Improvement) General Motors (GM) today offers about 20 models with average 30 miles per gallon or more on the highway more than any other manufacturer. General Motors is also considered as the world leader in flex fuel technologies. GM should concentrate following areas during the overall products improvements. Vehicle Quality Improvement General Motors is focused on delivering high-quality and exciting cars, crossovers and trucks to their consumers. GM has substantially overcome the quality gap compared to many competitors. Further improvements especially in warranty problems per vehicle (relative to competition) are expected and such improvements should be taken in to account during the vehicle development process. Design Improvement GM should not cut cost on their products design because customers still expect to look good their vehicles. Further GM can systematically conduct their target market surveys so that they can identify the exact design preferences of their customers. Improve Fuel Efficiency GM should concentrate more Hybrid Cars production. Because by now, gas-electric hybrid cars have now become a practical choice for consumers and it offers so many efficient, innovative and affordable options. Improve Engine Reliability GM had to face number of complaints (especially electrical problems) about recent unreliability vehicle designs. So they must make sure to design their vehicles safety features at least above the average level. Most importantly, especially due to oil crisis and continuous oil prices increments, there is a very good potential market for Extended-Range Electric Vehicles. So if GM could further focus on development of advanced batteries, power electronics, systems integration and manufacturing methods, there would be high chance to dominate these types of new customer segments all over the world. Marketing Strategies At present, GM competes with 8 brands in the United States and out of them Chevrolet, Cadillac, Buick, and GMC represent the companys core brands, accounting for approximately 83% of current sales. So GM should focus considerably all of its product development and marketing resources in support of these core brands. This will result in improvements in awareness, sales, and customer satisfaction for these 4 core brands. Retail Operations (Locations) The other important consideration is GM should take necessary steps to strengthen and further consolidation of GMs dealer network, which will result to get to a more profitable and stronger dealer network. As a distribution issue GM has approximately 6450 dealer locations right now, but the problem is most of their positioning is limited to serve in metropolitan and suburban areas. So GM should reinforce rural areas distribution network as well, which is a significant competitive advantage. Further GM should intend to have the right number of brands, sold by the right number of dealers, in the right locations to obtain maximum profitability for GM and the retailer network. Operational Processes When we closely monitor GMs manufacturing cost, we can see a dramatic declining from $18.4 billion in 2003 to $8.1 billion in 2008. According to the following diagram (Figure 2) you can see the US hourly manufacturing cost reduction over the last few years. Figure 2 Further, this reduction reflects significant productivity improvements. And also, due to post-employment healthcare expense plan reductions, GMs new hires would be as low as $30 $35. This rate would be significantly below the average fully-loaded labor cost for TOYOTA, which public sources indicate is between $45 and $50 per hour. Below chart depicts GMs significant reduction of U.S. salaried employee count over the last few years. So definitely because of these types of operational cost reductions, GMs wages and benefits for both current workers and new hires will be fully competitive with TOYOTA in near future. Further Cost Reductions General Motors various restructuring initiatives over the past few years have been designed to improve its competitive position and ultimately the companys profitability, liquidity and capital structure. However over the past 15 years alone, General Motors (GM) spent over $103 billion on post-employment healthcare and pension expenses. Therefore, GM should plan to reduce the companys structural costs at least by $5 billion annually, or 16%, during the next two years. This would be a significant and important restructuring step to the companys long-term viability. Strategic Alliances and Collaborations In the present business context collaboration is the best option rather than the competition. Therefore going forward, GM should consider and plan to create possible and contributing collaborations such as an IJV (international joint venture) or alliances for the company. According to Daft, (2006) medium and large companies have couple of ways to become involved in international business. One is to seek cheaper sources of supply offshore, which is called outsourcing. Another is to develop markets for finish products outside their home countries, which may include exporting, licensing, and direct investing. These are called market entry strategies because they represent alternative ways to sell products and services in foreign markets. Most firms begin with exporting and work up to direct investment. Exhibit 1.1 shows the strategies companies can use to enter foreign markets. Exhibit 1.1 International journal of business management, (2010) commented that newly established, 3 technology-based firms entering international markets often have limited resources in terms of capabilities, time, and capital. As a consequence, these firms often use entry modes characterized by low resource commitment, including partnership agreements (strategic alliances). What is the Best Marketing Strategy for GM? In this section I have investigate how the partner selection criteria is important for GM when they select a marketing entry strategy. Trust, Relatedness of Business, Access to Networks, Access to Market Knowledge, Reputation Factors should be considered as the five primary concerns when a company selects a partner company to proceed with a collaborative approach. Based on number studies, and according to my own analysis, to regain the market, I suggest GM should proceed with strategic alliances market entry mode. Forging Strategic Alliances and Collaborative Strategies Jeannet and Hennessy, (2004) have clearly justified that the more recent phenomenon is the development of range of Strategic Alliances. Alliances are different from traditional joint ventures, in which two partners contribute a fixed amount of resources and the venture develops on its own. In an alliance, two entire firms pool their resources directly in a collaboration that goes beyond the limits of joint ventures, although a new entity may be formed, it is not a requirement. Sometimes the alliance is supported by some equity acquisition of one or both of the partners. In an alliance, each partner brings a particular skill or resource-usually, they are complementary-and by joining forces, each expects to profit from the others experience. Typically alliances involved distribution access, technology transfers, or production technology, with each partner contributing a different element to the alliance. Daniels, Radebaugh, and Sullivan, (2007) suggest an alliance is a collaborative arrangement in which at least one of the collaborating companies takes an ownership position. In some cases, each party takes an ownership, such as by buying part of each others shares or by swapping some shares with each other. The purpose of the equity ownership is to solidify a collaborating contract, such as a supplier-buyer contract, so that it is more difficult to break-particularly if the ownership is large enough to secure a board membership for the investing company. Production Bases Alliances According to my analysis, GM should proceed with Production Bases Alliances. Jeannet and Hennessy, (2004) pointed out these alliances fall into two groups. First there is the search for efficiency through component linkages, which may include engines or other key components of a car. Second, companies have begun to share entire car models, either by producing jointly or by developing them together. U.S. automobile manufacturers have been very active in creating global alliances with partners, primarily in Japan. Many of these alliances are production based. As a good example, to compete more effectively in the super-small car segment in Europe, Peugeot of France and Toyota of Japan collaborated on the building of a new production plants located in Kolin, Czech Republic by investing about $ 1.5 billion in this facility. The two partners shared the same body design but used exterior modifications to differentiate their models. Both companies carried out their marketing strategies separately, and thus are likely to compete against each other through their own sales and distribution networks. By joining forces, broth manufactures will gain economies in a very price sensitive market segment. If GM collaborates with a leading automobile partner such as TOYOTA or any other, they would also be able to win the competitive advantage through strategic production bases alliances. Problems of Collaborative Arrangements None of these arrangements are not problem-free or perfect approaches. Daniels, Radebaugh, and Sullivan, (2007) shows that although collaborative arrangements have many advantages, some companies avoid them; many arrangements develop problems that lead partners to renegotiate their relationships. Partners might renegotiate responsibilities, ownership, or management structure. In spite of new relationships, many agreements break down or are not renewed at the end of an initial contract period. Collaborations Importance to Partners One partner may give more management attention to a collaborative arrangement than the other does. If things go wrong the active partner blames the less active partner for making lack of attention, and the less active partner blames the more active partner for making poor decisions. Objectives Differences Although companies enter into collaborative arrangements because they have complementary capabilities, their objectives may evolve differently over time. For instance, one partner may want to reinvent earnings for growth and the other may want to receive dividends. One partner may want to expand the product line and sales territory, and the other may see this as competition with its wholly owned operations. A partner may wish to sell or buy from the venture, and the other partner may disagree with the prices. For example, GM has joint venture in Thailand with Fuji Heavy Industries to make and export vehicles to Opel in Germany and Subaru in Japan. Because of disagreements over quality, both companies perform inspections, which is time consuming and expansive, they have even argued over standards of paint jobs. Control Problems By sharing the assets with another, one company may lose some control on the extent or quality of the assets use. Some companies have well known trademarked names that they licence abroad for the production of some products that they have never produced or had expertises. When no single company has control of a collaborative arrangement, the operation may lack direction. At the same time, if one dominates, it must still consider the other company interests. Cultural Differences Companies differ by nationality in how they evaluate the success of their operations. Japanese companies tend to evaluate primarily on how an operation help build its strategic position, particularly by improving its skills. European companies rely more on a balance between profitability and achieving social objectives. This difference can mean that one partner is satisfied while the other is not. In spite of these potential problems, joint ventures from culturally distant countries survive at least as well as those between partners from similar cultures. However as is the marriage, a positive prior relationship between two companies does not guarantee that partners will be well matched in a strategic alliance. Compatibility of corporate cultures also is important in cementing relationship. Conclusion Due to the global economic recession and enormous industry competition, GM lost their industrial leadership to TOYOTA. The secret of its success was their well defined production processes and their high quality customer focused production. By analyzing the GMs presents strengths and opportunities, still GM has the potentiality and own competitive advantage to take over the industry leadership through a strategic approach. I have thoroughly evaluated the situation, especially the best practices and strategic movements of TOYOTA as well as the blunders made by GM during the past few years separately. Then under the How GM becomes the Leader Again topic, clearly I have described all the possible improvements and rearrangements, which need to be applied with a systematic restructuring process to GM. Importantly, this restructuring process requires considerable sacrifices from all stakeholders, dealers, suppliers, employees and executives. During these financial crisis and economic uncertainty challenges, with a proper analysis and understanding GM would be able to open significant number of opportunities with the new strategic restructuring process and innovative products developments in the near future. Then in the final part of the report, I have explained and justified possible strategic market entry approaches that GM can follow to regain the industry leadership again.

Monday, January 20, 2020

Madness and Insanity in Shakespeares Hamlet - A Sane Man :: Shakespeare Hamlet Essays

Hamlet: A Sane Man Hamlet was indeed a very sane man. He was only feigning madness to further his own plans for revenge. His words were so cleverly constructed that others will perceive him as mad. It is this consistent cleverness that is the ultimate evidence of his complete sanity. Can a mad person be so clever? No, a mad person cannot. Hamlet is sane and brilliant. After Hamlet, Horatio, and Marcellus see the ghost, Hamlet tells Horatio that he is going to "feign madness". If Horatio is to notice Hamlet acting strange it is because he is putting on an act. "How strange or odd some'er I bear myself/(As I perchance hereafter shall think meet/To put an antic disposition on)/That you, at such times seeing, never shall,/With arms encumbered thus, or this headshake ,/Or by pronouncing of some doutful phrase,/As "Well,well,we know," or "We could an if we/would,"/Or "If we list to speak," or "There be an if they/might,"/Or such ambiguous giving-out, to note/That you know of me-this do swear,/(I,v,190-201).Hamlet states that from this point forward I may act weird but to ignore my acts of madness for they are just that, acts, and are in no way a sign of true madness. Only a sane and rational person could devise such a plan as to act insane to convince others that he is insane when he actually has complete control over his psyche. Hamlet only acts mad when he is in the presence of certain characters. When he is around Polonius, Claudius, Gertrude, Ophelia, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern he acts completely irrational. When Hamlet is around Horatio, Bernardo, Fransico, the players, and the gravediggers Hamlet acts completely sane. When Hamlet and Polonius meet in II,ii Hamlet calls Polonius a fishmonger and makes strange conversation with him. In IV,iii Hamlet refuses to tell Claudius were he has hidden the body of Polonius and goes on about how Polonius is at supper. When Hamlet encounters Gertrude in her closet, an unusual place, in III,iv. He yells at his own mother. In II,i Hamlet enters Ophelia's closet, a highly unusual act, he is dressed badly, and acts very strange towards her. Claudius and Polonius set up a clandestine meeting between Hamlet and Ophelia in III,i. Ophelia then tries to return some gifts that Hamlet gave to her and Hamlet claims that he did not give her any gifts and that he never loved her at all. During the play in III,ii Hamlet sexually harasses Ophelia in front of the entire audience of the play. In IV,ii Hamlet refuses to tell Rosencratz

Saturday, January 11, 2020

Title : the Affects of Temperature on Enzymes Activity

Title : the affects of temperature on enzymes activity 1. The Problem: measuring and recording the digestion of carbohydrates by enzyme amylase 2. Independent variable: water bath temperature 3. Dependent variable: the time taken for the carbohydrates to get digested by amylases 4. Controls: the amounts of the carbohydrates and the enzymes in the reaction 5. Quantitative measurement: Time | Temperature | Enzymes concentration | Substrate concentration | Starches Indicators | Catalysts | In minutes | Cloven /Celeste | Per millimetre cube | Per millimetre cube | Per drop | No catalyst | 1.Materials: 6 water bathes. test tubes, test tube rack , amylase enzymes , carbohydrate form ( flower or ,potato), thermometers , indicator ,stop clock ,protection (lab coat, goggles ) 2. Procedure: * prepare 6 test tubes with 10 cm of carbohydrate milk and misuse 5 cm of amylase enzymes in a cringe and add to test tube also indicator should be add and there is no catalyst in this experiments * Place t he test tubes on the water baths Water baths should be with fixed temperatures from 10 ,20,30,40,50,60,70 * Start the stop clock as soon as the test tube in the water bath * Keep an eye on the test tube till colour change is observed and the take the test tube out and tack time measurements * Also every temperature measurements should be done individually that the other tests to eliminate error (no one can be in 6 places at the same time ) * Make a table and record the time taken to the enzymes to work and digest the substrate at each temperature individually *Draw a graph Make your conclusion based on the results Hypothesis:. the affect of temperatures on rate of typical enzyme –controlled reaction up to about 40c the rate increases smoothly, also a 10 degree increase of the temperature accompanied by approximate doubling in of the rate of the reaction this is the normal temperature rule of chemical reactions in general, above this temperature the rate starts to fall off the n decline rapidly . above 60 degree the rate ceases or stop completely. . Explanation: increase of reaction why? Increases in the temperature of a system results from increases in the kinetic energy of the system. This has several effects on the rates of reactions, 1-the increase in temperature will increase the activation energy of a molecules there for it has more potential to react and change status Also the temperature will make the molecules move faster and as a result more collision will be possible per/minute . Enzyme’s activity stops why? Altogether and that is because of the heat changes the shape of the enzyme molecules preventing them from working ,this is called (denaturation ) in fact enzymes will denature and any temperature that is why they cannot be used over and over again ,however the higher the temperature the less time it takes for the denaturation to occurs . 5. Risk assessmentHazard | Risk | How to avoid | What happens in case of accident | Risk probabil ity to occurs | Heat from hot water bath| Burning | Handel with care | Seek medical help| Big risk| Enzymes | Biological hazards (irritant | Handel with correct equipment | Wash under water tape | Medium | Glass equipment | Injury or a glass cute| Try to handel with care | Seek medical help | Big | Thermometer | In case it breaks contain mercury | Handle with care Don’t move it from the water bath unless by the lab specialist | Seek eargent medical help in case of contact with mercury | Big | Electrical wire from water baths | Electrocuted or starting a fire | But it out of the way not in contact with water | Seek medical help | Small | Source | Reference | Was it useful | Used for | Advanced biology | Michael Kent, 2004. Advanced Biology. Edition. Oxford University Press| yes| Background information | Biology – Principles and Processes| M B V Roberts, 1993. Biology: Principles and Processes Pb. Edition. Thomas Nelson. | Yes | Methods | Web | Effect of temperature on e nzyme activity. 2012. Effect of temperature on enzyme activity. [ONLINE] Available at: http://academic. brooklyn. cuny. edu/biology/bio4fv/page/enz_act. htm. [Accessed 13 November 2012]. | Yes | | | | | |