The Effective Bi-vocational Pastor

Pastors fill an important role as they lead churches to fulfill the Great Commission. This is especially challenging for bi-vocational pastors who have jobs outside of ministry. Meanwhile, some church members view the bi-vocational pastor as the paid professional and misunderstand their role as members/ministers. The original design of God is for pastors and members to be disciples who make disciples according to 2 Timothy 2:2. The purpose of this project is to help bi-vocational pastors in the Northeast strategically equip their people to become effective members, ministers, and missionaries who realize the significance of being disciples who make disciples. This researcher will survey bi-vocational pastors to assess their habits and strategies. Using this information and the research, the researcher will attempt to help bi- vocational pastors have more effective lives and ministries

Evlauation of Breeds and Breed Crosses for the Production of Weaning Weight in South Dakota

Records on 41,403 calves from 324 contemporary groups were studied to determine the effect of a calf\u27s breed background on its weaning weight. Calves with the heaviest weaning weights were crossbred, typically sired by Continental breed bulls and out of crossbred dams

Overcoming scarring in the urethra: Challenges for tissue engineering.

Urethral stricture disease is increasingly common occurring in about 1% of males over the age of 55. The stricture tissue is rich in myofibroblasts and multi-nucleated giant cells which are thought to be related to stricture formation and collagen synthesis. An increase in collagen is associated with the loss of the normal vasculature of the normal urethra. The actual incidence differs based on worldwide populations, geography, and income. The stricture aetiology, location, length and patient's age and comorbidity are important in deciding the course of treatment. In this review we aim to summarise the existing knowledge of the aetiology of urethral strictures, review current treatment regimens, and present the challenges of using tissue-engineered buccal mucosa (TEBM) to repair scarring of the urethra. In asking this question we are also mindful that recurrent fibrosis occurs in other tissues-how can we learn from these other pathologies

Signatures of Coronal Loop Opening via Interchange Reconnection in the Slow Solar Wind at 1 AU

The opening of closed magnetic loops via reconnection with open solar flux, so called “interchange reconnection”, is invoked in a number of models of slow solar wind release. In the heliosphere, this is expected to result in local switchbacks or inversions in heliospheric magnetic flux (HMF). When observed at 1 AU, inverted HMF has previously been shown to exhibit high ion charge states, suggestive of hot coronal loops, and to map to the locations of coronal magnetic separatrices. However, simulations show that inverted HMF produced directly by reconnection in the low corona is unlikely to survive to 1 AU without the amplification by solar wind speed shear. By considering the surrounding solar wind, we show that inverted HMF is preferably associated with regions of solar wind shear at 1 AU. Compared with the surrounding solar wind, inverted HMF intervals have lower magnetic field intensity and show intermediate speed and density values between the faster, more tenuous wind ahead and the slower, denser wind behind. There is no coherent signature in iron charge states, but oxygen and carbon charge states within the inverted HMF are in agreement with the higher values in the slow wind behind. Conversely, the iron-to-oxygen abundance ratio is in better agreement with the lower values in the solar wind ahead, while the alpha-to-proton abundance ratio shows no variation. One possible explanation for these observations is that the interchange reconnection (and subsequent solar wind shear) that is responsible for generation of inverted HMF involves very small, quiet-Sun loops of approximately photospheric composition, which are impulsively heated in the low corona, rather than large-scale active region loops with enhanced first-ionisation potential elements. Whether signatures of such small loops could be detected in situ at 1 AU still remains to be determined

Alternative models for genetic evaluation of feed intake by Afrikaner cattle

The objectives of this study were to evaluate statistical models of potential utility for genetic evaluation of feed intake and to estimate the (co)variance components and genetic parameters that would be necessary for their use in a national cattle evaluation scheme. Data were from Afrikaner bulls that were tested between 1974 and 2016 in Phases C (n = 1 250) and D (n = 11 083) of the National Beef Recording and Improvement Scheme. Statistical analyses in which the number of traits varied and contemporary group effects were considered either random or fixed were conducted using multiple-trait derivative-free restricted maximum likelihood. Contemporary group effects were important. When they were considered random, the estimated phenotypic variance of feed intake increased and its heritability reduced from approximately 0.43 ± 0.09 to approximately 0.30 ± 0.06. Use of average daily gain, recorded either concurrently with the feed intake measure (ADGC) or from related bulls reared on-farm (ADGD), had relatively little effect on estimated heritability of feed intake. Thus, considering contemporary group effects random consistently increased the accuracy of the estimated breeding values. Relatively small genetic correlations between ADGC and ADGD complicated the ultimate application of data recorded in Phase C and the use of data recorded in Phase D in decoupling the phenotypes for feed intake and growth in an evaluation of feed efficiency. Some modification of testing procedures may be necessary to facilitate this application of the results.Keywords: accuracy, contemporary group, genetic parameters, performance testin

Aging is Associated with Reductions in Fascicle Length, Sarcomere Length and Serial Sarcomere Loss

Introduction: Aging is associated with decreased active force production leading to muscle weakness and subsequently decreased muscle performance. Aging also affects the muscle’s passive force properties; whereby in old age passive muscle force has been shown to be elevated above that of young, which may be related to increased muscle stiffness with age.  The purpose of this study was to investigate potential structural property changes that occur in aged muscle that may contribute to increased passive force. Methods: The muscle length where peak force occurred (i.e. plateau of the force-length relationship (FL); L0) was determined for the medial gastrocnemius muscle (MG) of young (n = 9) and old rats (n = 8) rats. Muscles were fixed at L0 in 10% formalin, fascicle length, sarcomere number and the sarcomere length were compared at L0. Results: Muscle from old rats showed a reduction of ~14% in fascicle length, ~4% in sarcomere length and  ~10% in sarcomere number, (P < 0.001). Discussion: Shorter fascicles and reduced sarcomeres in series in muscle from old rats may explain increased passive forces in older individuals. Reduced sarcomere number in series would lead to overstretched sarcomeres, leading to increased tension on sarcomere passive force structures and sarcomeres operating on the descending limb of FL relationship

An Improved In Vivo Methodology to Visualise Tumour Induced Changes in Vasculature Using the Chick Chorionic Allantoic Membrane Assay

Background/Aim: Decreasing the vascularity of a tumour has proven to be an effective strategy to suppress tumour growth and metastasis. Anti-angiogenic therapies have revolutionized the treatment of advanced-stage cancers, however there is still demand for further improvement. This necessitates new experimental models that will allow researchers to reliably study aspects of angiogenesis. The aim of this study was to demonstrate an in vivo technique in which the highly vascular and accessible chorioallantoic membrane (CAM) of the chick embryo is used to study tumour-induced changes in the macro and microvessels. Materials and Methods: Two cancer cell lines (human melanoma (C8161) and human prostate cancer (PC3)) were selected as model cells. Human dermal fibroblasts were used as a control. One million cells were labelled with green fluorescent protein and implanted on the CAM of the chick embryo at embryonic development day (EDD) 7 and angiogenesis was evaluated at EDDs 10, 12 and 14. A fluorescently-tagged lectin (lens culinaris agglutinin (LCA)) was injected intravenously into the chick embryo to label endothelial cells. The LCA is known to label the luminal surface of endothelial cells, or dextrans, in the CAM vasculature. Macrovessels were imaged by a hand-held digital microscope and images were processed for quantification. Microvessels were evaluated by confocal microscopy. Tumour invasion was assessed by histological and optical sectioning. Results: Tumour cells (C8161 and PC3) produced quantifiable increases in the total area covered by blood vessels, compared to fibroblasts when assessed by digital microscopy. Tumour invasion could be demonstrated by both histological and optical sectioning. The most significant changes in tumour vasculature observed were in the microvascular structures adjacent to the tumour cells, which showed an increase in the endothelial cell coverage. Additionally, tumour intravasation and tumour thrombus formation could be detected in the areas adjacent to tumour cells. The fragility of tumour blood vessels could be demonstrated when tumour cells seeded on a synthetic scaffold were grown on CAM. Conclusion: We report on a modification to a well-studied CAM in vivo assay, which can be effectively used to study tumour induced changes in macro and microvasculature

Psychological Morbidity and Expressed Motivation in Patients Requesting Rhinoplasties and Research Portfolio

Research was undertaken to assess psychological morbidity, expressed motivation and expectations of surgery in individuals (n=50) who had requested cosmetic rhinoplasties. Subjects participated in semi-structured interviews, completed three questionnaires and were categorised on their appearance by two means. Hypotheses were made for the total subject population and for differences according to gender and independently-rated severity of nasal disfigurement. Results supported some hypotheses, with subjects indicating higher anxiety and neuroticism, and lower extraversion and self-esteem than normed scores. Although less disfigured subjects appeared to show greater neuroticism and lower self-esteem, this relationship was not statistically significant (p<.05). Other hypotheses were not supported, as subjects did not meet clinical 'caseness' for depression, and males did not appear to be significantly more psychopathological on any measures and scored significantly lower neuroticism than females. Results should be interpreted with caution due to small subgroup sizes in the sample