Spiritual care for people with intellectual and developmental disability: an exploratory study

Background: A faith-based (pseudonym, Adam’s House-AH) and a non-faith based care service (pseudonym, Greenleaves-GL) were explored to find out if and how spiritual support was provided for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). Method: Six months were spent volunteering within each service and a mixed-methods approach was utilised including applied and ethnographic methods to explore and describe if and how spirituality was embedded within the two services. Results: Themes found included community of value; homely functional care; and barriers to spiritual care. GL staff tended to provide what we termed “religious spiritual care” whilst AH staff administered both “religious” and “non-religious spiritual” based support. This difference may be related to the type of training found only at AH which included spiritual dimensions. Conclusion: Services could benefit from acknowledging the importance and significance of spiritual care training and education for effective and varied spiritual care for people with IDD who desire such support

Intellectual and developmental disabilities, spirituality and religion: a systematic review 1990-2015

Over the past two decades research on religion/spirituality has begun to gain momentum. Nevertheless, to our knowledge, a systematic review of empirical research in the field of intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD), social care services, and spirituality has not been carried out in the last 20 years. Six psychology, IDD, religion, and health related journals were searched in addition to two data bases. Published empirical papers on religion, religiosity, spirituality, spiritual and/or religious care and people with IDD and related terms between 1990 and 2015 were identified and examined. Of the 57 publications identified, only 8.9% met the inclusion criteria and were reviewed. The five empirical papers included in this review were thematically analysed, yielding four main themes in relation to spiritual/religious care: ‘understanding of spiritual/religious concepts’; ‘support to participate in spiritual/religious activities’; ‘spiritual/religious practices in relation to self-identity’; and ‘barriers to spiritual/religious care provision’. This paper concludes that more empirical and original research in relation to the spiritual care of people with IDD residing in IDD care services is needed

Spirituality and social networks of people with intellectual and developmental disability

Background: Researchers contend that religious/spiritual communities may provide a conduit to friendship for people with IDD. This research explored the interface between social networks and spirituality for individuals with IDD living in either a faith or non-faith based service. Method: A mixed-methods approach was used including semi-structured interviews, the Social Network Guide and the Spiritual Belief Inventory-15R with individuals with IDD (or staff members who provided their opinions of what individuals who lacked capacity to consent would say if they had capacity). These findings were corroborated with extensive field notes generated from participant observation. Results: The faith-based group had a higher network size (m= 78) compared to the non-faith based group (m = 44). Those with larger social networks also reported higher SBI-15R scores. Conclusion: Findings highlight the possible role of social, spiritual/religious activities for expanding individuals' social networks

Microbial diversity of a disused copper mine site (Parys Mountain, UK), dominated by intensive eukaryotic filamentous growth

The Parys Mountain copper mine (Wales, UK) contains a wide range of discrete environmental microniches with various physicochemical conditions that shape microbial community composition. Our aim was to assess the microbial community in the sediments and overlying water column in an acidic mine drainage (AMD) site containing abundant filamentous biogenic growth via application of a combination of chemical analysis and taxonomic profiling using 16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing. Our results were then compared to previously studied sites at Parys Mt. Overall, the sediment microbiome showed a dominance of bacteria over archaea, particularly those belonging to Proteobacteria (genera Acidiphilium and Acidisphaera), Acidobacteriota (subgroup 1), Chloroflexota (AD3 cluster), Nitrospirota (Leptospirillum) and the uncultured Planctomycetota/CPIa-3 termite group. Archaea were only present in the sediment in small quantities, being represented by the Terrestrial Miscellaneous Euryarchaeota Group (TMEG), Thermoplasmatales and Ca. Micrarchaeota (Ca. Micracaldota). Bacteria, mostly of the genera Acidiphilium and Leptospirillum, also dominated within the filamentous streamers while archaea were largely absent. This study found pH and dissolved solutes to be the most important parameters correlating with relative proportions of bacteria to archaea in an AMD environment and revealed the abundance patterns of native acidophilic prokaryotes inhabiting Parys Mt sites and their niche specificities

Structural Invariance of Sunspot Umbrae Over the Solar Cycle: 1993-2004

Measurements of maximum magnetic flux, minimum intensity, and size are presented for 12 967 sunspot umbrae detected on the NASA/NSO spectromagnetograms between 1993 and 2004 to study umbral structure and strength during the solar cycle. The umbrae are selected using an automated thresholding technique. Measured umbral intensities are first corrected for a confirming observation of umbral limb-darkening. Log-normal fits to the observed size distribution confirm that the size spectrum shape does not vary with time. The intensity-magnetic flux relationship is found to be steady over the solar cycle. The dependence of umbral size on the magnetic flux and minimum intensity are also independent of cycle phase and give linear and quadratic relations, respectively. While the large sample size does show a low amplitude oscillation in the mean minimum intensity and maximum magnetic flux correlated with the solar cycle, this can be explained in terms of variations in the mean umbral size. These size variations, however, are small and do not substantiate a meaningful change in the size spectrum of the umbrae generated by the Sun. Thus, in contrast to previous reports, the observations suggest the equilibrium structure, as testified by the invariant size-magnetic field relationship, as well as the mean size (i.e. strength) of sunspot umbrae do not significantly depend on solar cycle phase.Comment: 17 pages, 6 figures. Published in Solar Physic

Challenges in monitoring and managing engineered slopes in a changing climate

Geotechnical asset owners need to know which parts of their asset network are vulnerable to climate change induced failure in order to optimise future investment. Protecting these vulnerable slopes requires monitoring systems capable of identifying and alerting to asset operators changes in the internal conditions that precede failure. Current monitoring systems are heavily reliant on point sensors which can be difficult to interpret across slope scale. This paper presents challenges to producing such a system and research being carried out to address some of these using electrical resistance tomography (ERT). Experimental results show that whilst it is possible to measure soil water content indirectly via resistivity the relationship between resistivity and water content will change over time for a given slope. If geotechnical parameters such as pore water pressure are to be estimated using this method then ERT systems will require integrating with more conventional geotechnical instrumentation to ensure correct representative information is provided. The paper also presents examples of how such data can be processed and communicated to asset owners for the purposes of asset management

Plasma Magnetosphere Formation Around Oscillating Magnetized Neutron Stars

The notion of death line of rotating pulsars is applied to model of oscillating neutron stars. It is shown that the magnetosphere of typical non-rotating oscillating stars may not contain secondary plasma to support the generation of radio emission in the region of open field lines of plasma magnetosphere.Comment: Accepted for publication in Astrophysics & Space Scienc

Moisture monitoring in clay embankments using electrical resistivity tomography

Systems and methods are described for monitoring temporal and spatial moisture content changes in clay embankments using electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) imaging. The methodology is based upon development of a robust relationship between fill resistivity and moisture content and its use in the transformation of resistivity image differences in terms of relative moisture content changes. Moisture level and moisture content movement applications are exemplified using two case histories from the UK. The first is the BIONICS embankment, near Newcastle (NE England), which was constructed in 2005 using varying degrees of compaction of a medium plasticity sandy, silty clay derived from the Durham Till. The second is a Victorian embankment south of Nottingham (Central England), constructed in 1897 using end tipping of Late Triassic siltstone and mudstone taken from local cuttings. Climate change forecasts for the UK suggest that transportation earthworks will be subjected to more sustained, higher temperatures and increased intensity of rainfall. Within the context of preventative geotechnical asset maintenance, ERT imaging can provide a monitoring framework to manage moisture movement and identify failure trigger conditions within embankments, thus supporting on demand inspection scheduling and low cost early interventions

Rare genetic variation in UNC13A may modify survival in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis

Our objective was to identify whether rare genetic variation in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) candidate survival genes modifies ALS survival. Candidate genes were selected based on evidence for modifying ALS survival. Each tail of the extreme 1.5% of survival was selected from the UK MND DNA Bank and all samples available underwent whole genome sequencing. A replication set from the Netherlands was used for validation. Sequences of candidate survival genes were extracted and variants passing quality control with a minor allele frequency ≤0.05 were selected for association testing. Analysis was by burden testing using SKAT. Candidate survival genes UNC13A, KIFAP3, and EPHA4 were tested for association in a UK sample comprising 25 short survivors and 25 long survivors. Results showed that only SNVs in UNC13A were associated with survival (p = 6.57 × 10−3). SNV rs10419420:G > A was found exclusively in long survivors (3/25) and rs4808092:G > A exclusively in short survivors (4/25). These findings were not replicated in a Dutch sample. In conclusion, population specific rare variants of UNC13A may modulate survival in ALS