Today, technology is accounted as one of the most significant factors of economic and industrial development in the world. Countries use different ways and methods to facilitate technology transfer and transaction in local, national, international and global levels. Creating techno-mart as center of technology transaction is one of the advanced mechanisms for the above purpose. In Iran, technology transfer and transaction do not follow a stable and coherent system. This weakness is the main cause of many problems for technology suppliers such as; elites, state organizations, and industrial sector especially small and medium size enterprises (SME's). In this paper technology transaction and transfer has been discussed and some cases of techno-mart in Europe and Asia have been reviewed. Then, survey research including interviews with experts from techno-mart and related fields experts (such as technology law, technology evaluation and marketing, supportive funds, etc.) were used to present a model of national techno-mart in Iran. In this model, mission and goals, different sections, ownership, internal process and techno-mart communications at national level along with necessary requirements for establishing a techno-mart environment have been described. It is derived from this study that other nations' experiences in dealing with requirements and primary infrastructures of techno-mart, is expected to lead policy makers towards a better decision making and planning.

Forming University-Industry positive relation to the goal of national development, besides the need for facilitating infrastructures, requires effective planning of policy and applying policy instruments. On the other hand, University and Industry are the essential elements of National Innovation System (NIS). Therefore, their interaction should be organized in the context of the theoretical bases of NIS. Meanwhile, Techno Marts are the agents and mechanisms that can play an effective role in offering research and technological outcomes of Universities and other research institutions. On the other hand, they are able to transfer the technological needs of Industries and other production institutions to the research community. This paper reviews the functions of Techno Marts as a policy tool as well as one of the NIS elements in connecting University and industry. However, the main focus of the paper is to clarify the Government role in assuring the efficiency of this mechanism.

In West Africa and Nigeria in particular, many virgin plants are still waiting to be evaluated for their medicinal importance. Claims of plants with folk medicinal applications need to be evaluated and verified. Gomphrena celosioides (family – Amaranthaceae) is a weed grown in lawns and the biological activity of the extract had earlier been established. In the present study, the plant was collected, air dried, ground and soxhlet extracted with n-hexane and two compounds were isolated from the flakes that were recovered from the n-hexane extract on cooling. Column chromatography using 5% chloroform in n-hexane effected the separation. The structures of the isolated compounds were elucidated by spectroscopic analysis using IR, NMR (1H and 13C) and EI-MS. The compounds were found to be aurantiamide and aurantiamide acetate. This is the first report of isolation of these compounds in Gomphrena celosioides.

Techno-entrepreneurship is a multidisciplinary and new field which is growing. In this paper, firstly the theories related to entrepreneurship and technology fields are reviewed, and then the techno-entrepreneurship is studied in detail. Also, a model for techno-entrepreneurship known as Pradon model is presented. This model comprises seven key elements including: technological entrepreneur, universities, corporations, capital, market/customers, government and finally advisors. Secondly, the entrepreneurship in the biotechnology as one case of techno-entrepreneurship is investigated. Bioentrepreneur is defined considering the characteristics of biotechnology. Opportunity assessment of biotechnology companies through the feasibility process (macro-level analysis), technology assessment (micro-level analysis) and finally the alternative commercialization options and pathways to their markets are stated, by using the related tools such as Spin-off companies, traditional out-licensing of technology, IP, trade sale and internal development. This article helps the researchers form the basis for future research and serves as a guide for governments and regions willing to develop and stimulate biotechnological entrepreneurship. At the end, after summing up the results, some suggestions in the related areas are presented.

Regarding the price of meat product filling in comparison with the negligible cost of the collagen casings, whole roll of the casings is discharged only on suspicion of a small cut during handling. Once the casings are designed to be biologically resistant, they represent relatively problematic waste that is nowadays rather transported to landfills. This represents a significant cost; once the role is opened, it becomes extremely voluminous. The long-term study that was carried out on a commercial scale assessed two methods of utilization: composting of highly disintegrated casings and composting of charred casings. Robust qualitative and financial analysis revealed that the composting of charred casings was more meaningful both from agrochemical and financial point of view.

GTL technology used to convert natural gas into oil products facilitates natural gas transportation to remote areas, increases value added, meets environmental objectives, recovers oil well gases and converts them into high quality products. That is why countries with large gas reserves are encouraged to use and develop GTL. Accordingly, this paper has tried to present a brief description of GTL process and study the economic viability of establishing GTL plants under two scenarios: "with" and "without" development and operation of gas fields. According to the study results, establishment of GTL plants is economically viable, the value added of GTL products is higher than that of natural gas and export of GTL products is more profitable than sale of natural gas through pipelines or as LNG. Furthermore, considering the high environmental cost of production of high quality products in oil refineries, GTL products could fully compete with such products in terms of price. The paper concludes with a review of the common investment methods in the downstream gas industry, and presents guidelines for financing GTL projects and attracting technical knowhow.

Purpose The overharvesting of the endemic palm tree Euterpe edulis Mart. (Arecaceae) from the Brazilian Atlantic Forest hotspot and the destination given to the sludge produced from urban sewage treatment are both serious environmental issues caused by human activities. In order to find solutions or alternatives for both the issues, we aimed to investigate the effect of increasing rates of a sewage sludge organic fertilizer (SSOF), produced by composting sewage sludge and solid waste, on the initial growth of E. edulis. Methods We mixed sand with 0, 62. 5, 125, and 250 kg· m− 3 of SSOF in 8 L (21 cm height × 24 cm top diameter × 20. 5 cm base diameter) pots and then planted a seedling of E. edulis in each pot. We assessed the seedlings’ height and stem diameter relative growth rate (RGR), biomass, root to shoot ratio, and shoot macronutrient (nitrogen, phosphorous, potassium, calcium, magnesium, and sulphur) concentrations in relation to fertilizer levels. We also evaluated the relation between plant height and diameter over time for each fertilization level. Results We found that height and stem diameter RGRs, biomass accumulation, and N and P shoot concentrations of E. edulis were positively related to SSOF levels between 120 and 250 kg· m− 3 in the substrate. Conclusions Our study demonstrates that SSOF can be further used as an alternative to sewage sludge disposal and contribute to E. edulis cultivation, and, hence, its conservation.