Evaluation of The Forgiveness project within prisons

The Forgiveness Project (TFP) is a UK based charity that uses real stories to explore how ideas around forgiveness, reconciliation and conflict resolution can have a positive impact on people’s lives. One aspect of the charity’s work is a programme run within prisons, targeted at the early stages of a sentence. TFP describe their prison programme as an intensive, group based intervention that encourages prisoners to explore concepts of forgiveness and reparation in a framework that fosters greater accountability and responsibility. Every course is co-facilitated by at least one ex-offender and a victim/survivor of serious crime. The intervention can be seen as being restorative and preparatory; those who take part in the programme will tend to be relatively early on in their sentence. TFP centres on the personal testimonies of both victims and perpetrators of crime and violence. TFP is unlike many other restorative initiatives in that it has no political or religious affiliation and TFP’s prison programme is similarly secular in its approach. TFP aims to facilitate changes in attitude and thinking styles of offenders. That is, to encourage prisoners and young offenders in finding their own pathways to change. In finding those pathways, they may draw on many different resources and insights. These could include personal, communal, spiritual or religious beliefs that they may have, whether or not they have previously seen those beliefs as relevant to their offending behaviours. TFP run programmes via both education and psychology units. The emphasis on individual change is also intended to differentiate TFP from prison or National Offenders Management Service interventions. This person centred, facilitative but non prescriptive approach was adopted with the intention that prisoners and young offenders would be more responsive to the intervention than they may be to other, more standardised, manual based programmes. This report of a research study by Dr Joanna Adler and Mansoor Mir of Forensic Psychological Services at Middlesex University into the effectiveness of TFP presents quantitative and qualitative findings, and concludes overall that TFP is well received by prisoners and staff, potentially has an impact on recidivism and does well to stimulate insight and bring about change. The report ends with some recommendations to increase capacity and sustainability

A survey on the possibility of utilizing γH2AX as a biodosimeter in radiation workers

Introduction DNA damage is among the main consequences of radiation. Of many different classes of DNA damage, double-strand breaks are the most deleterious. Development of a sensitive biodosimetry method, which utilizes a detection material with a similar construction to the body, seems essential for monitoring radiation workers. In this study, histone H2AX protein was examined as a potential biodosimeter in radiation workers. Moreover, the presence of this protein after in vitro irradiation of blood samples was assessed simultaneously. Materials and Methods Blood samples from 46 radiation workers were analyzed in Golestan province, Iran. Meanwhile, two groups of blood samples (five blood samples in each group) were irradiated in vitro by doses of 1 to 0.2 Gy and 0.09 to 0.01 Gy from a 60Co source, respectively. γH2AX level in lymphocytes was measured, using Western blot technique. ANOVA and Tukey's tests were performed, using SPSS version 16. The significance level was considered to be 0.05. Results The results of Western blotting for the identification of γH2AX protein in radiation workers were negative. However, γH2AX level in lymphocytes of two in vitro irradiated groups showed a significant correlation with the radiation dose (P<0.0001). Conclusion The results showed that γH2AX was a good indicator for acute or local exposure to ionizing radiation, while in chronically exposed individuals, including radiation workers, this protein was useless at least in autoradiography detection method. Regarding the presence of γH2AX protein in blood samples, which were irradiated in vitro at low doses, it can be concluded that this protein has powerful repair mechanisms

K\"ahlerian Effective Potentials for Chern-Simons-Matter Theories

In this paper, we will calculate the effective potential for a theory of multiple M2-branes. As the theory of multiple M2-branes can be described by a Chern-Simons-matter theory, this will be done by calculating the K\"ahlerian effective potential for a Chern-Simons-matter theory. This calculation will be performed in $\mathcal{N} = 1$ superspace formalism. We will initially study an Abelian Chern-Simons-matter theory, and then generalize those results to the full non-Abelian Chern-Simons-matter theory. We will obtain explicit expressions for the superpropagators for this theory. These superpropagators will be used to calculate the one-loop effective potential.Comment: 15 page

The CAG trinucleotide repeat length in the androgen receptor does not predict the early onset of prostate cancer

Objective To relate the repeat length of the androgen-receptor CAG trinucleotide to the age of onset of prostate cancer, stage and grade of disease. Patients and methods After obtaining ethical approval, 265 patients with locally confined or locally advanced/metastatic prostate cancer were identified and evaluated for age at diagnosis (less than 65 years and greater than 75 years). DNA was extracted from peripheral blood lymphocytes and 1 mug aliquots subjected to polymerase chain reaction using fluorescently labelled primers. Samples were then run on an ABI 377 gene scan analysis gel with an internal molecular weight marker. The length of the CAG repeat was determined by comparing the gene scan product size to samples where the CAG repeat length had been quantified using direct sequencing. The Kruskal-Wallis, Mann-Whitney and Wilcoxon two sample tests were used to analyse the data. Results The mean (range) length of the CAG repeat in the androgen receptor was 22.2 (10-31) in the younger and 22.5 (16-32) in the older group, and was not statistically different. There was no significant association between the CAG repeat length and the age of onset of prostate cancer (P = 0.568) or with stage (P = 0.577) and grade (P = 0.891) of prostate cancer. Conclusion These results suggest that there is no correlation between the androgen receptor CAG repeat length and the age of onset, stage and grade of prostate cancer, confirming recent doubts from other similar studies of a suggested correlation between shorter androgen receptor CAG repeat and early onset and aggressiveness of prostate cancer

Fitoremediasi Logam Berat Merkuri (Hg)pada Tanah Dengan Tanaman Celosia Plumosa (Voss) Burv.

Merkuri merupakan logam berat yang sangat toksik terhadap organisme. Penggunaannyadalam aktivitas tertentu menyebabkan merkuri disebarkan ke lingkungan diantaranya melaluibahan pertanian, obat-obatan, cat, kertas, pertambangan serta sisa buangan industri.Penelitian bertujuan untuk melakukan fitoremediasi logam merkuri (Hg) pada tanahmenggunakan tanamanCelosia plumosa(Voss) Burv. Penelitian menggunakan RancanganAcak Kelompok dengan 4 perlakuan (sumber tanah) dan 3 kelompok, 5 tanaman Celosiaplumosa (Voss) Burv. setiap unit penelitian. Analisis kandunga merkuri (Hg) tanah (sebelumdan setelah fitoremediasi) dan jaringan tanaman menggunakan Spektrofotometer SerapanAtom. Data yang diperoleh diolah secara statistik dengan Analisi variansi (Anova) dan ujilanjut Beda Nyata terkecil (BNT). Hasil analisis statistik menunjukkan bahwa kandunganmerkuri (Hg) pada tanah dan tanaman setelah fitoremediasi tidak berbeda nyata. Keempatjenis tanah tersebut memiliki kandungan merkuri (Hg) tinggi diatas ambang bataskandungan merkuri (Hg) alami tanah. Fitoremediasi menggunakan Celosia plumosa (Voss)Burv. mampu menurunkan kandungan merkuri (Hg) pada keempat jenis tanah(81,25sampai 98,68%), bahkan pada tanah kebun dan tanah sawah reduksi kandungan merkuri(Hg) mencapai nilai dibawah ambang batas kandungan merkuri (Hg) alami tana

Women, faith and social cohesion: Models for building cohesive communities

Using a participatory approach with women from diverse backgrounds in Bradford, this report examines the role of women and faith in building cohesive communities and provides models for developing and evaluating social cohesion activity

Density Functionalized Drug-Surfactant Interaction of Aqueous SDS-Tartrazine

Study of molecular density theory is considered nowadays as a powerful tool to speculate various physical and chemical properties of materials. Herein, we report the theoretical inference of associated changes in chemical properties of sodium dodecyl sulphate and tartrazine when allowed to go through pre- and post-micellization phenomena. Because of the involvement of the two compounds in manifold industrial applications, the study reflects some important conclusions of drug-surfactant chemistry. The computational work involves the use of Polarizable Continuum Model (PCM), water as solvent and 631g(d,p) basis set with B3LYP as functional. Each molecule was run individually first to arrive at an optimized structure followed by a final optimization of assumed network (mesh of proposed binary mixture) to visualize the changes that occur on combination. Each set of energy minimal calculation was then run for frequency calculation, electronic spectral evaluation and molecular natural population analysis. Molecular electrostatic potential surfaces were discussed in linking the appropriate hydrophobic and hydrophilic interaction

Finite-Difference Equations in Relativistic Quantum Mechanics

Relativistic Quantum Mechanics suffers from structural problems which are traced back to the lack of a position operator $\hat{x}$, satisfying $[\hat{x},\hat{p}]=i\hbar\hat{1}$ with the ordinary momentum operator $\hat{p}$, in the basic symmetry group -- the Poincar\'e group. In this paper we provide a finite-dimensional extension of the Poincar\'e group containing only one more (in 1+1D) generator $\hat{\pi}$, satisfying the commutation relation $[\hat{k},\hat{\pi}]=i\hbar\hat{1}$ with the ordinary boost generator $\hat{k}$. The unitary irreducible representations are calculated and the carrier space proves to be the set of Shapiro's wave functions. The generalized equations of motion constitute a simple example of exactly solvable finite-difference set of equations associated with infinite-order polarization equations.Comment: 10 LaTeX pages, final version, enlarged (2 more pages