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Books > Professional & Technical > Technology: general issues > General
The editors, aware of the recent work in evolutionary theory and
the science of chaos and complexity, challenge the sometimes
deterministic flavor of this subject. They are interested in
uncovering the place of agency in these theories that take history
so seriously. In the end, they are as interested in path creation
and destruction as they are in path dependence.
This path-breaking book examines the effects of multinationals on the competitiveness of industry in the UK. The in-depth investigation analyses how these firms gain access to technology and questions whether or not multinationals, in their support of local technologies, improve the potential and competitiveness of local industry. The book discusses the evolution of multinationals in the late twentieth century, the role of the UK in this evolution and the theories of multinationals. It examines what these theories imply for efficiency and welfare, and the policies which affect multinational enterprises (MNEs). The authors consider the strategic positioning of subsidiaries in the UK in relation to the firm's overall global investment strategy. Using detailed empirical surveys, they also look at the role of technology in multinationals and how these firms' strategies are developing in regard to this. The authors examine whether MNEs UK operations are dependent on existing technology or whether they play a more positive role in its local creation and use. Finally the role of decentralized R&D in multinationals, and the status of this in the UK, is considered. Multinationals, Technology and National Competitiveness will be welcomed by those interested in international investment, business strategy, technology and innovation and public policy.
Until now, techniques for studying biofilms- the cellular colonies that live in drinking water systems, wastewater operations, even ground and surface water- have been limited. Yet during the last decade, biofilms have become a critical element in water quality preservation systems, a key component of wastewater treatment biological reactions and the subject of extensive microbiological inquiry. An understanding of biofilm development, structure and dynamics is one condition for improving water supplies and for addressing technical problems such as biofouling, corrosion and bioweathering. Biofilms: Investigative Methods and Applications provides the first in-depth assessment of current and experimental ways to study biofilms, both in sample form and in situ. It shows how sensors, microscopy, lasers, and calorimetry, among other tools, can be used to obtain data on the morphology and metabolism of biofilms. This text is the first to organize and examine the best methods for investigating biofilms. It covers culture-based methods and emerging nondestructive techniques. It also shows how they can be used to characterize biofilms in a variety of manmade settings, such as sewers, wastewater plants, and drinking water distribution systems, as well as in karsts and groundwater sources. In clarifying the way biofilms are studied, the book offers new insights into these living films. It also applies inquiry techniques to the many problems confronting the environmental specialist-corrosion control, biofouling, and the improvement of fixed reactors in wastewater treatment. At the same time it explains technologies for the controlled growth of biofilms and shows how biofilms can be effectivelymonitored and subjected to quantitative analysis. The technical information in Biofilms: Investigative Methods and Applications is designed to be of use to engineers and researchers and to be helpful in the generation of electronic data.
Using a historical sociology approach, this book illustrates the formation of the technological state in Indonesia during the New Order period (1966-1998). It explores the nexus between power, high technology, development, and authoritarianism situated in the Southeast Asian context. The book discusses how the New Order regime shifted from the developmental state to the technological state, which was characterized by desire for technological supremacy. The process resulted in the establishment of a host of technological institutions and the undertaking of large-scale high-tech programs. Shedding light on the political dimension of socio-technological transformation, this book looks at the relationship between authoritarian politics and high technology development, and examines how effectively technology serves to sustain legitimacy of an authoritarian power. It explores into multiple features of the Indonesian technological state, covering the ideology of development, the politics of technocracy, the institutional structure, and the material and symbolic embodiments of high technology, and goes on to discuss the impact of globalization on the technological state. The book is an important contribution to studies on Southeast Asian Politics, Development, and Science, Technology, and Society (STS).
Economic and Financial Analysis for Engineering and Project Management is for engineers and others who must analyze the financial and economic ramifications of producing and sustaining capital projects. Unlike other books in the field, it offers straightforward and lucid explanations of all main formulas needed to carry out financial analyses. The math is kept simple and is fully explained, making the book accessible to non-technical personnel. Numerous sample problems are provided, and can be worked on standard spreadsheet programs, as well as using interest rate tables. The book shows how to link quantitative data to management decisions and to standard reporting forms and has been designed for practicing engineers and students alike.
Clare Wightman explores the key issue of gender in explaining the experience of men and women at work. She uses women's employment in the engineering industries between 1900 and 1950 to confront many of the contentious debates in women's history. She shows that the two World Wars did not produce radical changes for women at work. Throughout the book the author questions the leading role given to gender ideology in constructing the attitudes of employers, and suggests that it was only one factor among many which shaped women's experiences in the workplace. This is a major study with wide and challenging implications for the subject.
Featuring new and updated information on computer technologies, including networking and using the Internet as a necessary tool for professionals, Human Services Technology: Understanding, Designing, and Implementing Computer and Internet Applications in the Social Services will help individual human service professionals and agencies understand, design, implement, and manage computer and Internet applications. Combining several relevant fields, this informative guide provides you with the knowledge to effectively collect, store, manipulate, and communicate information to better serve clients and successfully manage human service agencies. Human Services Technology explains basic technological terms and gives you the history of technology uses before you explore other areas of Information Technology (IT). This essential guide will also improve your ability to find and understand recent research and information on important topics. Human Services Technology will expand your technical know-how and help you better serve clients by offering you proven methods and explanations, such as: describing terms--such as hardware, networking, and telecommunications--with easy-to-understand analogies and examples using IT applications to support social policies, improve service coordination among agencies, efficiently manage agencies in order to save time, support workers'decision making with information, and assist clients solving the problems that internal and external issues cause when determining IT needs, such as working with federal reporting requirements understanding and dealing with the 10 most critical IT issues for management Containing dozens of graphs, tables, and figures, this knowledgeable book will help you with any IT problem you encounter. Symbols by certain subjects in the book indicate that you can find more information and references on that issue through links on the book?s accompanying Web site. Human Services Technology will enable you to thoroughly understand and use IT to help you offer improved services to clients and manage agencies with increased efficiency and effectiveness.
This book is emerged from an insightful essay by the American Nobel chemist Dudley Herschbach, speculating about how the mythological Hercules might have tackled a hypothetical, monumental task, or "thirteenth labor," such as weighing the Earth's atmosphere.
Clare Wightman explores the key issue of gender in explaining the experience of men and women at work. She uses women's employment in the engineering industries between 1900 and 1950 to confront many of the contentious debates in women's history. She shows that the two World Wars did not produce radical changes for women at work. Throughout the book the author questions the leading role given to gender ideology in constructing the attitudes of employers, and suggests that it was only one factor among many which shaped women's experiences in the workplace. This is a major study with wide and challenging implications for the subject.
'All new technology is accompanied with great expectations on the one hand and great fear on the other. Thierry Geerts reduces the digital revolution to its true proportions and shows that we control the impact of technology ourselves: technology becomes what we make of it. Few are better placed than the author to clearly define the potential, the tasks, and the responsibility that awaits each and every one of us.' - Caroline Pauwels, rector of the VUB 'After Digitalis drew up the contours of the new digital world, Homo digitalis now describes how we can appropriate it so that digitalisation will benefit humanity. But instead of trying to convince at all costs, Thierry Geerts puts things in perspective. With great expertise, he guides us through numerous groundbreaking initiatives that start-ups and companies in Europe have often developed.'- Alain Gerlache, journalist 'This book couldn't have come out at a better time. Change can be scary for many, but above all, it brings many opportunities. Thierry Geerts fantastically explains how Digitalis can be an inclusive place where social mobility and equality are self-evident. Now it's up to our entrepreneurs, policymakers, and each of us as individuals to gear up and resolutely opt for the digital future.' - Yasmien Naciri, entrepreneur and marketer 'Think about the reasons for technology. That is the challenge that Thierry Geerts takes on with gusto and enthusiasm in this fascinating book.' - Laurent Hublet, co-founder and CEO of BeCentral, the largest digitalis campus in Europe In Homo digitalis, Thierry Geerts, CEO of Google Belgium and Luxembourg, looks at the dangers and opportunities of the digital revolution. Without taboos and with an eye to the future, he offers thoughtful examples of how digitalisation affects us as people and as a society. His conclusion is clear: technology is neutral, and it's up to people to use it consciously and confidently. If we do that, digitalisation will make us happier, with more time for creativity, personal development, healthcare, and the things that really matter. Then we'll become more human and we homo sapiens will turn into homo digitalis.
Since 1988, Malaysia's remarkable economic performance has attracted attention around the world and been subject to much study and enthusiastic acclaim. However, in the wake of the financial crisis of 1998, the debate has centred on whether this impressive growth rate can be sustained. As the economy moves beyond growth based on low labour costs and other factor-endowed advantages, industrial technology development becomes increasingly critical to continued growth. This volume, and its companion, "Technology, Competitiveness and the State", examine and evaluate Malaysian industrialization in terms of its experience of and prospects for industrial technology development. The focus is on the development of Malaysia's technological-industrial base from a sector and firm-specific perspective, including the role of foreign multinationals in this process. The text reflects on whether existing development strategies can be maintained in the wake of the financial crises sweeping the East Asian economies.
The Behavior of Sandwich Structures of Isotropic and Composite
Materials presents the mathematics, descriptions, and analytical
techniques in the growing field of sandwich structures. From a
background in sandwich structures to thermoelastic problems of
sandwich structures and sandwich shell theory, the book provides
the knowledge needed to analyze, design, and optimize various
sandwich structures.
The field of environmental engineering is rapidly emerging into a mainstream engineering discipline. For a long time, environmental engineering has suffered from the lack of a well-defined identity. At times, the problems faced by environmental engineers require knowledge in many engineering fields, including chemical, civil, sanitary, and mechanical engineering. Increased demand for undergraduate training in environmental engineering has led to growth in the number of undergraduate programs offered. Fundamentals of Environmental Engineering provides an introductory approach that focuses on the basics of this growing field.
This dictionary provides some 40,000 terms and references in all the major areas in the field, including: Air Pollution and Air Quality Control - Environmental Policy - Noise Pollution - Soil Contamination and Remediation - Water Pollution & Waste Water Treatment - Water Supply and Drinking Water - and many others.
This major reference provides a comprehensive treatment of the physiological effects of foods and food components capable of promoting good health and preventing or alleviating diseases. It assembles, in one volume, extensive recent information on the nature and physiological effects of biologically-active components of major plant foods-cereals, oilseeds, fruits, and vegetables-and dairy and fish products. For the first time in any reference work, internationally renowned specialists discuss how to manufacture and evaluate food products with health enhancing effects, using both traditional and novel processing methods.
Presented in a generous, theoretically integrative framework, "Reading Science" is a unique collection which looks at the distinctive language of science and technology and the role it plays in building up scientific understandings of the world. It is also the first book to include analysis of the role of images (graphs, charts, maps) in science writing and to consider the importance of reading science discourse as a multi-modal text. The authors approach the matter from the standpoints of new rhetoric, functional linguistics, discourse analysis and critical theory, contributing to a broad and definitive treatment of the topic. The book's internationally renowned contributors include M.A.K. Halliday, Charles Bazerman and Jay Lemke.
In Chinese Firms and Technology in the Reform Era, Yizheng Shi
analyses the technological behaviour of state- owned firms. In
particular he shows how they have imported, utilised and
assimilated foreign technology into their operations. The author
argues that despite being granted more autonomy and having to face
increased competition, Chinese firms are still not motivated to
assimilate properly imported technology because of the absence of
well- delineated property rights.
The digital music revolution and the rise of piracy cultures has transformed the music world as we knew it. Digital Music Distribution aims to go beyond the polarized and reductive perception of 'piracy wars' to offer a broader and richer understanding of the paradoxes inherent in new forms of distribution. Covering both production and consumption perspectives, Spilker analyses the changes and regulatory issues through original case studies, looking at how digital music distribution has both changed and been changed by the cultural practices and politicking of ordinary youth, their parents, music counter cultures, artists and bands, record companies, technology developers, mass media and regulatory authorities. Exploring the fundamental change in distribution, Spilker investigates paradoxes such as: The criminalization of file-sharing leading not to conflicts, but to increased collaboration between youths and their parents; Why the circulation of cultural content, extremely damaging for its producers, has instead been advantageous for the manufacturers of recording equipment; Why more artists are recording in professional sound studios, despite the proliferation of good quality equipment for home recording; Why mass media, hit by many of the same challenges as the music industry, has been so critical of the way it has tackled these challenges. A rare and timely volume looking at the changes induced by the digitalization of music distribution, Digital Music Distribution will appeal to undergraduate students and policy makers interested in fields such as Media Studies, Digital Media, Music Business, Sociology and Cultural Studies.
Technology has long been seen as a path to economic growth. However
there is considerable debate about the exact nature of this
relationship. Economics of Structural and Technological Change
employs a wide range of theoretical and applied approaches to
explore the concept of technological change.
Only recently has bitterness control become of commercial importance to a food or pharmaceutical formulation chemist. Over the years, an increasing interest in more palatable food and beverage products with low fat and low sugar content has arisen, thus creating a market need for the control of bitterness perception.
This new text provides a practical guide to hydrophilic polymer coatings technology for applications in a wide range of medical materials and devices. It concisely provides both the scientific basics of this class of polymers and the up-to-date information needed for product development and evaluation, processing, manufacturing, and regulatory compliance. More than fifty schematics illustrate materials, processes, and equipment. The entire presentation is oriented to the practical needs of personnel involved in product development and evaluation, process engineering, and manufacturing management.
The systems of innovation approach is considered by many to be a useful analytical approach for better understanding innovation processes as well as the production and distribution of knowledge in the economy. It is an appropriate framework for the empirical study of innovations in their contexts and is relevant for policy makers. This text is the result of the work within an international inter-disciplinary network or working seminar with the task of building a more solid and sophisticated conceptual and theoretical foundation for the continued study of innovations in a systemic context. |
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