Christian Ministry to Refugees in the Contrasting Settings of Greece and Germany

The refugee crisis in Europe may be one of the most significant opportunities for the spread of the gospel on that continent since the fall of the Iron Curtain. Many churches in Western Europe are engaging these newcomers in holistic ministry. From February to May 2018, seventeen leaders were interviewed from fourteen ministries engaged in refugee ministry in Greece and Germany to explore refugee ministry realities and practices in these two nations with contrasting policies. The research describes the shifting refugee situation, the shifting context, the relationship between these ministries and government, refugee ministry approaches, spiritual openness among refugees, and observations from frontline practitioners

Christian Ministry to Refugees in the Contrasting Settings of Greece and Germany

The refugee crisis in Europe may be one of the most significant opportunities for the spread of the gospel on that continent since the fall of the Iron Curtain. Many churches in Western Europe are engaging these newcomers in holistic ministry. From February to May 2018, seventeen leaders were interviewed from fourteen ministries engaged in refugee ministry in Greece and Germany to explore refugee ministry realities and practices in these two nations with contrasting policies. The research describes the shifting refugee situation, the shifting context, the relationship between these ministries and government, refugee ministry approaches, spiritual openness among refugees, and observations from frontline practitioners

Business cycles: the role of energy prices

Oil price shocks have figured prominently U.S. business cycles since the end of World War II—although the relationship seems to have weakened during the 1990s. In addition the economy appears to respond asymmetrically to oil price shocks, rising oil prices hurt economic activity more than falling oil prices help it. This section of the Encyclopedia of Energy sorts through an extensive economics literature that relates oil price shocks to aggregate economic activity. It examines how oil price shocks create business cycles, why they seem to have a disproportionate effect on economic activity, why the economy responds asymmetrically to oil prices, and why the relationship between oil prices and economic activity may have weakened. It also addresses the issue of developing energy policy to mitigate the economic effects of oil price shocks.Petroleum industry and trade

Career Preparation and the College Football Player

The lives of collegiate student-athletes are filled with needs: assistance in general scheduling/managing of campus activities, academic counseling, and career preparation. While it is generally accepted that all three areas are part of the challenges for academic athletic counselors, career preparation through a sound academic program is the fulfilling purpose of student-athletes. However, the number of graduating student athletes, particularly college football players, does not reflect this attitude. The purpose of this article was to present an overview of the college football player and information supporting the importance of strong academic athletic counseling

Narrow-line Laser Cooling by Adiabatic Transfer

We propose and demonstrate a novel laser cooling mechanism applicable to particles with narrow-linewidth optical transitions. By sweeping the frequency of counter-propagating laser beams in a sawtooth manner, we cause adiabatic transfer back and forth between the ground state and a long-lived optically excited state. The time-ordering of these adiabatic transfers is determined by Doppler shifts, which ensures that the associated photon recoils are in the opposite direction to the particle's motion. This ultimately leads to a robust cooling mechanism capable of exerting large forces via a weak transition and with reduced reliance on spontaneous emission. We present a simple intuitive model for the resulting frictional force, and directly demonstrate its efficacy for increasing the total phase-space density of an atomic ensemble. We rely on both simulation and experimental studies using the 7.5~kHz linewidth $^1$S$_0$ to $^3$P$_1$ transition in $^{88}$Sr. The reduced reliance on spontaneous emission may allow this adiabatic sweep method to be a useful tool for cooling particles that lack closed cycling transitions, such as molecules.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure

Surveying structural complexity in quantum many-body systems

Quantum many-body systems exhibit a rich and diverse range of exotic behaviours, owing to their underlying non-classical structure. These systems present a deep structure beyond those that can be captured by measures of correlation and entanglement alone. Using tools from complexity science, we characterise such structure. We investigate the structural complexities that can be found within the patterns that manifest from the observational data of these systems. In particular, using two prototypical quantum many-body systems as test cases - the one-dimensional quantum Ising and Bose-Hubbard models - we explore how different information-theoretic measures of complexity are able to identify different features of such patterns. This work furthers the understanding of fully-quantum notions of structure and complexity in quantum systems and dynamics.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figure

Onion gene expression in response to ethylene and 1-MCP

Onion is regarded as a non-climacteric vegetable. In onions, however, ethylene can suppress sprouting while the ethylene binding inhibitor, 1-MCP (1- methylcyclopropene) can also suppress sprout growth yet, it is unknown how ethylene and 1-MCP elicit the same response. In this study, onions were treated with 10 μL L-1 ethylene or 1 μL L-1 1-MCP individually or in combination for 24 h at 20°C before or after curing (six weeks) at 20 or 28°C then stored at 1°C. Following curing, a subset of these same onions was stored separately under continuous air or ethylene (10 μL L- 1) at 1°C Onions treated with ethylene and 1-MCP in combination after curing for 24 h had reduced sprout growth as compared with the control 25 weeks after harvest. Sprout growth following storage beyond 25 weeks was only reduced through continuous ethylene treatment. This observation was supported by a higher proportion of down-regulated genes characterised as being involved in photosynthesis measured using a newly developed onion microarray. Physiological and biochemical data suggested that ethylene was being perceived in the presence of 1-MCP since sprout growth was reduced in onions treated with 1-MCP and ethylene applied in combination but not when applied individually. A cluster of probes representing transcripts up-regulated by 1-MCP alone but down-regulated by ethylene alone or in the presence of 1-MCP support this suggestion. Ethylene and 1-MCP both down52 regulated a probe tentatively annotated as an ethylene receptor as well as EIN3, suggesting that both treatments down-regulate the perception and signalling events of ethylene

Invasion of the central nervous system by Cryptococcus neoformans requires a secreted fungal metalloprotease.

UnlabelledCryptococcus spp. cause life-threatening fungal infection of the central nervous system (CNS), predominantly in patients with a compromised immune system. Why Cryptococcus neoformans has this remarkable tropism for the CNS is not clear. Recent research on cerebral pathogenesis of C. neoformans revealed a predominantly transcellular migration of cryptococci across the brain endothelium; however, the identities of key fungal virulence factors that function specifically to invade the CNS remain unresolved. Here we found that a novel, secreted metalloprotease (Mpr1) that we identified in the extracellular proteome of C. neoformans (CnMpr1) is required for establishing fungal disease in the CNS. Mpr1 belongs to a poorly characterized M36 class of fungalysins that are expressed in only some fungal species. A strain of C. neoformans lacking the gene encoding Mpr1 (mpr1Δ) failed to breach the endothelium in an in vitro model of the human blood-brain barrier (BBB). A mammalian host infected with the mpr1Δ null strain demonstrated significant improvement in survival due to a reduced brain fungal burden and lacked the brain pathology commonly associated with cryptococcal disease. The in vivo studies further indicate that Mpr1 is not required for fungal dissemination and Mpr1 likely targets the brain endothelium specifically. Remarkably, the sole expression of CnMPR1 in Saccharomyces cerevisiae resulted in a robust migration of yeast cells across the brain endothelium, demonstrating Mpr1's specific activity in breaching the BBB and suggesting that Mpr1 may function independently of the hyaluronic acid-CD44 pathway. This distinct role for Mpr1 may develop into innovative treatment options and facilitate a brain-specific drug delivery platform.ImportanceCryptococcus neoformans is a medically relevant fungal pathogen causing significant morbidity and mortality, particularly in immunocompromised individuals. An intriguing feature is its strong neurotropism, and consequently the hallmark of cryptococcal disease is a brain infection, cryptococcal meningoencephalitis. For C. neoformans to penetrate the central nervous system (CNS), it first breaches the blood-brain barrier via a transcellular pathway; however, the identities of fungal factors required for this transmigration remain largely unknown. In an effort to identify extracellular fungal proteins that could mediate interactions with the brain endothelium, we undertook a proteomic analysis of the extracellular proteome and identified a secreted metalloprotease (Mpr1) belonging to the M36 class of fungalysins. Here we found that Mpr1 promotes migration of C. neoformans across the brain endothelium and into the CNS by facilitating attachment of cryptococci to the endothelium surface, thus underscoring the critical role of M36 proteases in fungal pathogenesis