Letter from the Guest Editors, Ali Fatemi and Harold Welsch

The 2003 meetings of the Academy of Entrepreneurial Finance Conference were held on the campus of DePaul University in Chicago, Illinois, April 30-May 2, 2003. The conference brought together a large number of academics, practitioners and policy makers from around the world. It accomplished its goal of bringing together those engaged in the scholarly investigation of entrepreneurial finance and practitioners and other professionals of the field. The conference provided for a forum to share the results of research, acquire state of the art information, and exchange ideas on a variety of topics. These included the entrepreneurial investment decision, the financing process, IPOs, access to capital through the public sector, the teaching of entrepreneurial finance, and venture capital. Reflecting the overall orientation of the conference, luncheon keynotes emphasized both the practical and the academic sides of the debate. James Malackowski, the CEO of Duff & Phelps Capital Partners, on the first full day of the conference, and Professor Steven Kaplan of the University of Chicago, on the second day, shared some extremely valuable insights and results with the participants. Further enriching the conference were other keynote speeches delivered by Bret Maxwell of MK Capital, and James Stancill of the University of Southern California. In our assessment, the conference was a huge success. It would not have been so had it not been for the support of the board of the Academy of Entrepreneurial Finance, including Jacky So, Rassoul Yazdipour, Chunchi Wu, Allan Young, Charles Ou, Andrew Zacharakis, Jerome Osteryoung, and G. Geoffrey Booth. As the co-chairs of the conference, we remain indebted for their support

The Relationship Between Writing Competence, Language Profiency And Grammatical Errors In The Writing Of Iranian TEFL Sophomores [LB2372.E5 F252 2008 f rb].

Kajian yang mengkaji hubungan antara kompetensi penulisan, kemahiran bahasa dan kesalahan tatabahasa di penulisan dalam kalangan pelajar TEFL Iran tahun dua ini dilaksanakan dalam dua fasa. This study which investigated the relationship between writing competence, language proficiency and grammatical errors in the writing of Iranian TEFL sophomores was carried out in two phases

An 8x8 Heterodyne Lens-less OPA Camera

This paper presents an 8x8 optical phased array (OPA) receiver that operates as a lens-less camera using a heterodyne architecture on a thin silicon-photonics integrated SOI substrate. It has a receiving beam width of 0.75° and beam steering range of 8°

A 1-D heterodyne lens-free optical phased array camera with reference phase shifting

This paper presents the first integrated silicon photonics optical phased array (OPA) receiver with imaging capabilities. A 32-element 1D OPA with an overall aperture size of 96x50 μm^2 is used to generate an electrically steerable “gazing beam”. The OPA receiver elements couple the incident light to on-chip waveguides which is processed as a phased array receiver. To minimize signal loss and enhance sensitivity, a heterodyne architecture with phase shifters in the local reference path is utilized. The OPA receiver can provide fully programmable angular selectivity with a grating-lobe-free field-of-view of 30° and a gazing beamwidth of 0.74°

Sovereign Wealth Funds: An Exploratory Study of Their Behavior

Sovereign wealth funds have recently moved to the front and center of discussion, both within the investment world and the political arena. In this paper we evaluate the differences and common features of these funds. Utilizing an ownership database, we probe the ownership, geographic, and industry concentration of the funds deployed by these entities. We also compare and contrast the main features of two of the largest sovereign wealth funds

An Investigation into the English Language Needs of Bank Employees of Saderat Bank in Mashhad

With the increase in marketing and trading, recognition of the need for improved English communication skills has been growing among Banking professionals. Need analysis is a chief point to consider in English for Specific Purposes (ESP ) courses for syllabus design and materials development. This study was done in order to understand to what extend Bank employees of Saderat bank in Mashhad  need to use English at the present time and future and also to find out what problems in using English they have during their work This research was done in Saderat Banks in Mashhad, in some parts of the central office such as: management department, inspection department, financial marketing and 10 branches with Foreign Exchange departments, Accounting department, Transfer department and Loan department. The participants included 70 bank employees with different job positions. They were asked to answer a questionnaire which included 33 closed questions and 1 open-ended question to identify English skills that they need in their job, the problems they have in using English and their desire for taking an English training course. Based on the data analysis it became clear that they need speaking skill the most and they have problems with all the skills. They stated that Bank should provide English training courses for them

High sensitivity active flat optics optical phased array receiver with a two-dimensional aperture

Optical phased arrays (OPAs) on integrated photonic platforms provide a low-cost chip-scale solution for many applications. Despite the numerous demonstrations of OPA transmitters, the realization of a functional OPA receiver presents a challenge due to the low received signal level in the presence of noise and interference that necessitates high sensitivity of the receiver. In this paper, an integrated receiver system is presented that is capable of on-chip adaptive manipulation and processing of the captured waveform. The receiver includes an optoelectronic mixer that down-converts optical signals to radio frequencies while maintaining their phase and amplitude information. The optoelectronic mixer also provides conversion gain that enhances the system sensitivity and its robustness to noise and interference. Using this system, the first OPA receiver with a two-dimensional aperture of 8-by-8 receiving elements is demonstrated which can selectively receive light from 64 different angles. The OPA receiver can form reception beams with a beamwidth of 0.75° over an 8° grating-lobe-free field of view