Office of Technology Assessment - 919 Matching Results
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- Changes in sexual behavior of homosexual and bisexual men since the beginning of the AIDS epidemic
- This report discusses Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) and the ways to prevent those not infected with Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) from becoming infected with it.
- Changing by Degrees: Steps To Reduce Greenhouse Gases
- This report discusses the actions necessary to effect a major reduction of United States. carbon dioxide emissions. The U.S. is the world’s leading industrial society and largest single emitter of carbon dioxide. Climate change therefore presents a unique challenge to this Nation. It is a threat that will require major prudent political actions even before all the scientific certainties are resolved. The analysis, prevention, and remediation of global warming will require unprecedented international cooperation and action—an effort requiring actions sustained over decades, not just a few years.
- The Chemical Weapons Convention: Effects on the U.S. Chemical Industry
- Background paper exploring the multifaceted challenge of integrating a private, primarily civil industry into the global arms-control regime established by the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC).
- Child maltreatment in the United States: etiology, impact, and prevention
- This report starts out with definitions of child abuse and neglect, then it discusses the manifestation, effect and costs of child abuse and neglect, short term and long term.
- Children's Dental Services Under the Medicaid Program
- The report discusses the oral health of children eligible for Medicaid, the House Committee on Energy and Commerce and its Subcommittee on Health and the Environment requested OTA to determine whether children eligible for Medicaid are provided at least a minimum level of dental care. This study compares the dental manuals of seven State Medicaid programs with a set of “basic’ dental services (which comprise shared components of various well-accepted dental guidelines) to see if States allow these particular services.
- Children's Mental Health: Problems and Services: Background Paper
- A background paper by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) over the mental health problems of children and adolescents and the need for appropriateness of mental health services.
- China's evolving computer industry: the role of foreign technology transfers
- This report provides a series of assessments regarding China's strategy and objectives for computer development. It examines the specific role played by acquisition of foreign computers and related know-how by PRC.
- China's foreign policy, Beijing's military modernization, and American policy alternatives
- This report discusses the determinants of Chinese foreign policy under Mao, the foreign policy changes under Deng, and the influence of military modernization on Chinese foreign policy and on Washington-Beijing relations.
- Civilian Satellite Remote Sensing: A Strategic Approach
- This report analyzes the case for developing a long-term, comprehensive strategic plan for civilian satellite remote sensing, and explores the elements of such a plan, if it were adopted. The report also enumerates many of the congressional decisions needed to ensure that future data needs will be satisfied.
- Civilian Space Policy and Applications
- A report by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) that evaluates "the present states and possible future directions of space applications technologies in the civilian sector" and focuses on the technologies of "satellite communications, land remote sensing, materials processing in space, and space transportation" (p. iii).
- Civilian Space Stations and the U.S. Future in Space
- A study by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) that covers "the essential technical issues surrounding the selection and acquisition of infrastructure in space" (p. iii).
- Classification systems for decisionmaking for critically ill elderly patients
- This report discusses classification and aggregation of patients according to differential needs for care that have bee accepted as normal features of contemporary hospital practice.
- Cleaning Up Contaminated Wood-Treating Sites
- This report reviews technologies available for hazardous waste cleanup at wood-treating sites throughout the United States. OTA found that there are many Superfund wood-treatment sites located in this country that are very similar in terms of the contaminants present and the options selected for cleanup.
- Climate Treaties and Models: Issues in the International Management of Climate Change
- This paper seeks to place the issue of climate change within an international context. Specifically, it addresses the feasibility of forging treaty agreements among countries to achieve significant worldwide reductions in emissions of greenhouse gases.
- The clinical economics of nutrition support services and antibiotic medications for the critically and terminally ill elderly
- This report reviews the techniques that are available for assessing the economic impact of medical care intervention, provided a critical review of the studies that have examined the financial consequences of the use of nutrition support services and antibiotic medication. It also describes how their economic impact may vary from different points of view, and proposes the need for further studies and suggests policy implementation of the available data.
- Coal Exports and Port Development
- A report by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) that looks at federal policies that affect coal exports and port development and finds that "sizable increases in future U.S. coal exports are achievable if the Federal Government and the private sector complement the efforts of each in encouraging these exports and if present trends are not drastically altered by developments in other exporting and importing countries" (Preface).
- Coastal Effects of Offshore Energy Systems: An Assessment of Oil and Gas Systems, Deepwater Ports, and Nuclear Powerplants Off the Coasts of New Jersey and Delaware
- An assessment by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) about the effects of coastal development in the United States, specifically New Jersey and Delaware. The study looks at "the likely consequences of three energy systems for the ocean environment, the coastal environment, and the economics and patterns of life in both States during the next two decades" (p. c.1).
- Combined Summaries: Technologies To Sustain Tropical Forest Resources and Biological Diversity
- This report discusses how the loss of tropical forests and reduction in the Earth’s biological diversity has grown from development assistance concerns to themes of global debate during the last decade. At the same time that the value of biological resources to local communities and individual nations has become more fully appreciated, the connections between these resources and global environmental stability and economic development potential have been uncovered.
- Coming Clean: Superfund Problems Can Be Solved...
- In this report, OTA concludes that there is ample reason to be optimistic about the potential of the Superfund program and presents a number of possible strategic initiatives and incremental program changes in some detail. As difficult as the national cleanup job is, there are many ways to build a better balance between health and environmental needs and the limitations that technology, experience, and economics will always impose.
- Commercial Biotechnology: An International Analysis
- A report by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) that "assesses the competitive position of the United States with respect to Japan and four European countries believed to be the major competitors in the commercial development of 'new biotechnology'" (p. iii).
- Commercial newsgathering from space
- This technical memorandum concludes that although the technology is available to create a mediasat system, the high cost and current low demand for remotely sensed data will limit media efforts to own and operate a dedicated remote sensing satellite system.
- Commercializing high-temperature superconductivity
- Since the discovery of high-temperature superconductivity (HTS), research laboratories around the world have pushed the temperature limits steadily upward, opening the way to commercial applications with potentially revolutionary impacts. The scientific race is becoming a commercial race, one featuring U.S. and Japanese companies, and one that the United States could lose. Indeed, American firms may already be falling behind in commercializing the technology of superconductivity.
- Comparative Analysis of the 1976 ERDA Plan and Program
- A report by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) analyzing the status of ERDA regarding short-term and long-term energy problems. It follows a 1975 analysis that contained a plan for ERDA; this report shows the progress since then and highlights 16 major issues that are of importance.
- A comparative review of information technology management practices in selected state governments
- This report presents an analysis of information technology management practices in selected state governments.The focus is on approaches of strategic management in central state governments.
- Compensation for Vaccine-Related Injuries
- A report by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) that specifies what a federal program that compensates "vaccinees injured as a result of being vaccinated in public immunization programs" might look like (p. iii).
- Competing Economies: America, Europe, and the Pacific Rim
- This report examines how the economic environment of the United States can be made more conducive to improving manufacturing performance. It considers how Federal institutions, in cooperation with industry, can develop competitiveness strategies for high-tech, fast growing industries; and how trade, financial, and technology policies could be combined into a strategic competitiveness policy.
- Competition in Coastal Seas: An Evaluation of Foreign Maritime Activities in the 200-Mile EEZ
- This background paper reviews the status of the major sectors of the maritime industry engaged in EEZ activities and notes the significant trends. Basic data on the major sectors were first prepared for OTA by the Maritime Administration. OTA then conducted a survey of industry and other interested parties and prepared the analyses in the paper.
- Compilation of Abbreviations and Terms
- This paper contains glossaries of terms and abbreviations compiled from selected reports issued between 1987 and 1992 by the Health Program and the Biological and Behavioral Sciences Program of the Office of Technology Assessment.
- Complex Cleanup: The Environmental Legacy of Nuclear Weapons Production
- This report is a comprehensive look at the problem as we now know it, the public concerns about the problem, and DOE’s plans for addressing it. It focuses especially on the need for additional attention to those areas which DOE has neither the capability nor the credibility to handle.
- Composting technologies, costs, programs, and markets
- This report provides an overview of the technology of composting which involves three major steps: 1) the preparation of the raw material, 2) the compost process itself, and 3) the grading of the final product.
- Computer-Based National Information Systems: Technology and Public Policy Issues
- A report by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) that "presents the results of an overview study on the use of computer technology in national information systems and related public policy issues" (p. iii).
- Computer networks in elementary and secondary education
- This report discusses the power of new tools for teaching and learning
- Computer Software and Intellectual Property
- This background paper examines existing intellectual-property protection for computer software-copyrights, patents, and trade secrets—and provides an overview of the often conflicting views and concerns of various stakeholders. It was prepared in response to a request from the Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, and the Administration of Justice of the House Committee on the Judiciary.
- Computer Technology in Medical Education and Assessment: Background Report
- A report by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) that reviews "the state-of-the-art of the use of computer technology in medical education and assessment" and describes "the technologies and strategies for computer-based education and assessment, the current state of medical education and assessment activities, and computer applications in medicine" (p. iii).
- Computerized Manufacturing Automation: Employment, Education, and the Workplace
- An assessment by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) that looks "not only at robots but also at related computer-based technologies for design, production, and management" and "the technologies of programmable automation, their uses, and future capabilities" (p. iii).
- Computers and learning: do they work?: a review of research
- This report discusses the role of computer in utilizing learning process.
- Confused Minds, Burdened Families: Finding Help for People With Alzheimer's and Other Dementias
- This OTA report analyzes the problem of locating and arranging services for people with dementia, presents a framework for an effective system to connect them to appropriate services, and discusses congressional policy options for establishing such a system. One of the main policy issues is whether the system should serve people with dementia exclusively or serve people with other diseases and conditions as well.
- Congressional applications of information technology
- This report discusses the implications of specific information technology applications on the Congress.
- Conservation and Solar Energy Programs of the Department of Energy: A Critique
- A study by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) that "evaluates the progress and direction of a number of conservation and solar energy programs, in order to provide an overview of the balance and long-range contribution of these efforts, and to discover if the programs are coherently linked to goals set by Congress and the administration" (p. iii).
- Construction and materials research and development for the nation's public works
- A report on the nation’s infrastructure that is the physical framework that supports and sustains virtually all domestic economic activity; it is essential to maintaining international competitiveness as well.
- The Containment of Underground Nuclear Explosions
- This special report reviews the safety of the nuclear testing program and assesses the technical procedures used to test nuclear weapons and ensure that radioactive material produced by test explosions remains contained underground. An overall evaluation considers the acceptability of the remaining risk and discusses reasons for the lack of public confidence.
- The context for exploring workplace monitoring
- This report describes the history of monitoring work and the legal framework which applies to employee privacy rights and associate4d issues of worker protection.
- The Continuing Challenge of Tuberculosis
- This report synthesizes current understanding of tuberculosis (TB) in the United States, including the extent of the disease, the state of research of new preventive, diagnostic, and therapeutic technologies to aid in its control, and the delivery of effective TB services. The report also provides an overview of Federal involvement in these activities.
- Continuing the commitment: agricultural development in the Sahel
- This report discusses the hunger in West Africa and draws on the expertise of a large number of people. In 1985, rain came to the Sahel and provided partial relief from its latest drought.
- Contractor report on mineral processing
- This report discusses the processing of titanium and associated heavy minerals, the general explorations of offshore deposits, and offshore titanium heavy minerals production scenarios.
- Contributions of DOE Weapons Labs and NIST to Semiconductor Technology
- This report examines how NIST and DOE weapons laboratories could contribute to advances in semiconductor technology aimed specifically at civilian applications. Semiconductor technology was chosen as an example of a technology focus for a civilian technology initiative, primarily because the industry had already developed a set of comprehensive technology roadmaps and the federal labs had substantial expertise in the area.
- Coping With an Oiled Sea
- In the aftermath of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska in March, 1989, a myriad of investigations were initiated to evaluate the causes of that accident and to propose remedies. The Office of Technology Assessment was asked to study the Nation’s oil spill clean-up capabilities and to assess the technologies for responding to such catastrophic spills in the future.
- Copper, technology & competitiveness
- This report responds to a request from the Technology Assessment Board—the congressional oversight body for the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA)–prompted by the balance-of-trade and other economic implications of these events. The report describes the conditions the domestic and world copper industry faced during the early 1980s. It documents the steps U.S. copper companies took to improve their position so dramatically in the mid-980s, and evaluates the industry’s present and possible future status, including relative costs of production and the elements of those costs.
- Copyright and Home Copying: Technology Challenges the Law
- This report first examines home recording technologies. Then—focusing primarily on audiotaping—we examine the ambiguous legal status of home copying. Our report considers the economic effects that home audiotaping may have on the recording industry, contrasted to the effects that restricting home taping might have on consumers. Finally, we identify a range of actions that either Congress or the industry might pursue.
- The Cost-Effectiveness of Colorectal Cancer Screening in Average-Risk Adults
- This paper presents an analysis of the cost-effectiveness of colorectal cancer (CRC) screening in average-risk adults beginning at age 50. It examines the relative cost effectiveness of competing CRC screening technologies and schedules.