Practice-based evidence for spiritually integrated psychotherapies: examining trajectories of psychological and spiritual distress

Objective: The aims of this practice-based evidence study were to (1) examine clients’ trajectories of psychological and spiritual distress over the course of spiritually integrated psychotherapies (SIPs) and (2) explore the role of varying types of spiritual interventions in these outcomes. Method: In total, 164 practitioners of SIPs from 37 settings in a practice-research network administered the Clinically Adaptive Multidimensional Outcome Survey (Sanders et al., 2018) at each session with 1227 clients and reported their use of theoretical orientations and spiritual interventions on an after-session summary checklist. Results: Focusing on sessions over an initial 12-week period, latent growth curve modeling analyses revealed that clients, on average, experienced significant reduction of psychological distress during their engagement in SIPs with improvements occurring most sharply in the first month. Further, other findings revealed a salient reciprocal interplay with spiritual distress throughout treatment, such that clients who were struggling with their religious faith and/or spirituality (R/S) were more psychologically distressed and displayed a more attenuated and gradual pattern of symptom reduction. In such cases, clinicians frequently utilized spiritual interventions involving Basic Skills (e.g., spiritual assessment), Virtues (e.g., discuss self-control), and Religious Attachment (e.g., encourage acceptance of divine love) that were uniquely associated with clients’ rate and duration of decline in psychological and spiritual distress. Conclusions: The present findings affirm the routine effectiveness of SIPs along with highlighting the potential value of certain spiritual interventions in supporting holistic recovery among clients who want clinicians to be culturally responsive to their spiritual and/or religious identities

Decentralized treatment and recycling of greywater from a school in rural India

Rural areas in developing countries face the twin challenges of water scarcity and risk of groundwater contamination due to lack of water treatment options. A decentralized greywater treatment system for reuse is an option that addresses both of these challenges. This study reports the performance of a decentralized greywater treatment and reuse system which was constructed and operated for over 12 months in a government-managed school in rural India. The handwash and kitchen wash wastewater streams were treated separately due to differences in the initial greywater characteristics. The treatment stages included pre-treatment using screens and grease traps, slow sand biofiltration combined with anaerobic sludge bioreactor, and aeration before the final ozone-based disinfection stage. The treated water at the end of all these stages was used for toilet-flushing in the school. The treatment system was operated for one year and sampling was performed to investigate the system performance. The overall treatment system showed removal efficiencies of 99 %, 98 %, 66 %, 73 %, 98 %, 96 % and >99.99 % for the parameters of turbidity, total suspended solids, nitrate, total phosphorus, biological oxygen demand (5 days), chemical oxygen demand and fecal coliform respectively. This study quantifies the performance of each subsystem and demonstrates for the first time that a decentralized greywater treatment can be operated effectively and economically in a rural Indian setting

Classical approach in quantum physics

The application of a classical approach to various quantum problems - the secular perturbation approach to quantization of a hydrogen atom in external fields and a helium atom, the adiabatic switching method for calculation of a semiclassical spectrum of hydrogen atom in crossed electric and magnetic fields, a spontaneous decay of excited states of a hydrogen atom, Gutzwiller's approach to Stark problem, long-lived excited states of a helium atom recently discovered with the help of Poincar$\acute{\mathrm{e}}$ section, inelastic transitions in slow and fast electron-atom and ion-atom collisions - is reviewed. Further, a classical representation in quantum theory is discussed. In this representation the quantum states are treating as an ensemble of classical states. This approach opens the way to an accurate description of the initial and final states in classical trajectory Monte Carlo (CTMC) method and a purely classical explanation of tunneling phenomenon. The general aspects of the structure of the semiclassical series such as renormgroup symmetry, criterion of accuracy and so on are reviewed as well. In conclusion, the relation between quantum theory, classical physics and measurement is discussed.Comment: This review paper was rejected from J.Phys.A with referee's comment "The author has made many worthwhile contributions to semiclassical physics, but this article does not meet the standard for a topical review"

Using Enterprise Education to Prepare Healthcare Professional Graduates for the Real-world

Objectives: Every year, HEIs around the world provide an increasing number of graduates with professional degrees in various areas of healthcare including for example medicine, pharmacy, dentistry and podiatry. In most cases, these graduates will get the opportunity to develop a range of generic transferable skills during their HE. Yet, many of these become self-employed or responsible for managing a business, but are not always exposed to curricula that develop their awareness of the concepts of enterprise and entrepreneurship and their role in developing economies and societies, and, thus, do not have the necessary range of enterprise skills that they will need in the real-world, whether employed or self-employed. This paper investigates the extent to which Enterprise Education (EE) is applied at professional health schools at HEIs to develop graduates’ ‘soft’ and ‘functional’ enterprise skills, and how effective the process of delivering this education is. Prior work: Previous literature mainly deals with the application of EE through business and management schools, rather than professional ones. Yet, there is a call for researching EE and skills with more focus on exploring the methods and objectives of specific disciplines. At the same time, research investigating learning in professional degrees focuses almost entirely on the development of technical skills related to the discipline, without a general perspective on developing a wider range of enterprise skills. Approach: The study draws on a qualitative research study in the pharmacy education context. Personal interviews with pharmacy employers and academics were carried out, and thematic analysis was applied to identify themes and codes. Results: Despite that experiential and interactive learning approaches, which can support the development of graduates’ enterprise skills, are applied quite often at pharmacy schools, the application of these approaches is focused on discipline-related material and, therefore, can only support the development of graduates’ ‘soft’ enterprise skills. However, there appears to be resistance against developing graduates’ ‘functional’ enterprise skills in pharmacy disciplines, especially in light of the lack of awareness of the concept of EE among academics. The study offers some possible opportunities/propositions that could facilitate the development of more enterprising healthcare graduates, while highlighting the importance of raising the awareness of academics in this regard and embedding EE as part of schools’ philosophies. Implication: This study should help professional health schools at HEIs decide more accurately on how to develop their graduates’ ‘soft’ and ‘functional’ enterprise skills, and address the needs of the real-world. Value: This study directs the attention of HEIs to support developing professional graduates who are ready for the real-world, and who can support the growth and success of any organisation whether employed or self-employed

Search for displaced vertices arising from decays of new heavy particles in 7 TeV pp collisions at ATLAS

We present the results of a search for new, heavy particles that decay at a significant distance from their production point into a final state containing charged hadrons in association with a high-momentum muon. The search is conducted in a pp-collision data sample with a center-of-mass energy of 7 TeV and an integrated luminosity of 33 pb^-1 collected in 2010 by the ATLAS detector operating at the Large Hadron Collider. Production of such particles is expected in various scenarios of physics beyond the standard model. We observe no signal and place limits on the production cross-section of supersymmetric particles in an R-parity-violating scenario as a function of the neutralino lifetime. Limits are presented for different squark and neutralino masses, enabling extension of the limits to a variety of other models.Comment: 8 pages plus author list (20 pages total), 8 figures, 1 table, final version to appear in Physics Letters

Measurement of the polarisation of W bosons produced with large transverse momentum in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV with the ATLAS experiment

This paper describes an analysis of the angular distribution of W->enu and W->munu decays, using data from pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV recorded with the ATLAS detector at the LHC in 2010, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of about 35 pb^-1. Using the decay lepton transverse momentum and the missing transverse energy, the W decay angular distribution projected onto the transverse plane is obtained and analysed in terms of helicity fractions f0, fL and fR over two ranges of W transverse momentum (ptw): 35 < ptw < 50 GeV and ptw > 50 GeV. Good agreement is found with theoretical predictions. For ptw > 50 GeV, the values of f0 and fL-fR, averaged over charge and lepton flavour, are measured to be : f0 = 0.127 +/- 0.030 +/- 0.108 and fL-fR = 0.252 +/- 0.017 +/- 0.030, where the first uncertainties are statistical, and the second include all systematic effects.Comment: 19 pages plus author list (34 pages total), 9 figures, 11 tables, revised author list, matches European Journal of Physics C versio

Observation of a new chi_b state in radiative transitions to Upsilon(1S) and Upsilon(2S) at ATLAS

The chi_b(nP) quarkonium states are produced in proton-proton collisions at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV and recorded by the ATLAS detector. Using a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.4 fb^-1, these states are reconstructed through their radiative decays to Upsilon(1S,2S) with Upsilon->mu+mu-. In addition to the mass peaks corresponding to the decay modes chi_b(1P,2P)->Upsilon(1S)gamma, a new structure centered at a mass of 10.530+/-0.005 (stat.)+/-0.009 (syst.) GeV is also observed, in both the Upsilon(1S)gamma and Upsilon(2S)gamma decay modes. This is interpreted as the chi_b(3P) system.Comment: 5 pages plus author list (18 pages total), 2 figures, 1 table, corrected author list, matches final version in Physical Review Letter

Measurement of the inclusive isolated prompt photon cross-section in pp collisions at sqrt(s)= 7 TeV using 35 pb-1 of ATLAS data

A measurement of the differential cross-section for the inclusive production of isolated prompt photons in pp collisions at a center-of-mass energy sqrt(s) = 7 TeV is presented. The measurement covers the pseudorapidity ranges |eta|<1.37 and 1.52<=|eta|<2.37 in the transverse energy range 45<=E_T<400GeV. The results are based on an integrated luminosity of 35 pb-1, collected with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The yields of the signal photons are measured using a data-driven technique, based on the observed distribution of the hadronic energy in a narrow cone around the photon candidate and the photon selection criteria. The results are compared with next-to-leading order perturbative QCD calculations and found to be in good agreement over four orders of magnitude in cross-section.Comment: 7 pages plus author list (18 pages total), 2 figures, 4 tables, final version published in Physics Letters

Measurement of D*+/- meson production in jets from pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

This paper reports a measurement of D*+/- meson production in jets from proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of sqrt(s) = 7 TeV at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. The measurement is based on a data sample recorded with the ATLAS detector with an integrated luminosity of 0.30 pb^-1 for jets with transverse momentum between 25 and 70 GeV in the pseudorapidity range |eta| < 2.5. D*+/- mesons found in jets are fully reconstructed in the decay chain: D*+ -> D0pi+, D0 -> K-pi+, and its charge conjugate. The production rate is found to be N(D*+/-)/N(jet) = 0.025 +/- 0.001(stat.) +/- 0.004(syst.) for D*+/- mesons that carry a fraction z of the jet momentum in the range 0.3 < z < 1. Monte Carlo predictions fail to describe the data at small values of z, and this is most marked at low jet transverse momentum.Comment: 10 pages plus author list (22 pages total), 5 figures, 1 table, matches published version in Physical Review

Search for scalar top quark pair production in natural gauge mediated supersymmetry models with the ATLAS detector in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV

The results of a search for pair production of the lighter scalar partners of top quarks in 2.05 fb-1 of pp collisions at sqrt(s) =7 TeV using the ATLAS experiment at the LHC are reported. Scalar top quarks are searched for in events with two same flavour opposite-sign leptons (electrons or muons) with invariant mass consistent with the Z boson mass, large missing transverse momentum and jets in the final state. At least one of the jets is identified as originating from a b-quark. No excess over Standard Model expectations is found. The results are interpreted in the framework of R-parity conserving, gauge mediated Supersymmetry breaking `natural' scenarios, where the neutralino is the next-to-lightest supersymmetric particle. Scalar top quark masses up to 310 GeV are excluded for the lightest neutralino mass between 115 GeV and 230 GeV at 95% confidence level, reaching an exclusion of the scalar top quark mass of 330 GeV for the lightest neutralino mass of 190 GeV. Scalar top quark masses below 240 GeV are excluded for all values of the lightest neutralino mass above the Z boson mass.Comment: 7 pages plus author list (20 pages total), 4 figures, 1 table, matches published PLB versio