Pop stars and idolatry: an investigation of the worship of popular music icons, and the music and cult of Prince.

Prince is an artist who integrates elements from the sacred into his work. He uses popular iconography to present himself as an icon of consumer culture, as a deified ‘rock god’ worshipped by his fans, and as a preacher leading his audience like a congregation. His personality cult mixes spirituality and sexuality, and deals with issues of ecstasy and liberation, a transgressional approach that draws both controversy and public interest. This paper investigates Prince’s work and the role of the pop star as an icon within contemporary culture, an icon that contains a physicality and sexuality not present in contemporary western religious traditions. It discusses to what extent popular musical culture operates as a form of religious practice within contemporary western culture, and the implications that this has. The paper investigates the construction of Prince’s public character, his manipulation of the star system, and how he uses popular iconography to blur the distinctions between spirituality and sexuality, the idealised performer and the real world, the sacred and the profane, and the human and the divine. It explores how he possesses and is possessed by the audience, who enter into the hollow vessel he offers up to his fans

Unit organization of the topic formulas in intermediate algebra

Thesis (Ed.M.)--Boston Universit

Traumatic Injuries Among Multiple Sclerosis Patients

Background Because of the high degree of disability in multiple sclerosis (MS) patients, minimizing injury occurrence is essential for preserving quality of life. Objectives By documenting the incidence of particular injuries, establishing relative risks of particular injuries in different subsets of MS patients and analyzing when the injuries occurred following diagnosis, we aim to provide information to encourage injury prevention recommendations and to provide preliminary data for further clinical research. Methods This study utilized a questionnaire consisting of 40 fill-in-the-blank or multiple choice questions. It was administered to previously diagnosed MS patients at office visits, infusion center visits, hospital stays, MS clinic visits and MS support groups. Results The years following definite MS diagnosis with the highest injury rates (injuries/people years lived) were 25 years or more (.0594 injuries/year, 95% CI [0.0771 - 0.0449]). In addition, people below the age of 40 have nearly a doubled risk of injury compared to people above the age of 40 (p= .033). Primary progressive MS patients had the greatest past incidence of fractures, 55.6% (5/9) (p=0.033). Patients reported that only 17.4% (19/109) of injuries occurred during exercise. Conclusions Overall, risk factors for injury include male gender, living longer with MS, being younger and having the diagnosis of primary progressive MS. Patient education, along with specific treatments and regimented physical activity, can lead to a more robust and injury free lifestyle in this patient population

Synaptic and peptidergic connectome of a neurosecretory centre in the annelid brain

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from eLife Sciences Publications via the DOI in this record.Neurosecretory centers in animal brains use peptidergic signaling to influence physiology and behavior. Understanding neurosecretory center function requires mapping cell types, synapses, and peptidergic networks. Here we use transmission electron microscopy and gene expression mapping to analyze the synaptic and peptidergic connectome of an entire neurosecretory center. We reconstructed 78 neurosecretory neurons and mapped their synaptic connectivity in the brain of larval Platynereis dumerilii, a marine annelid. These neurons form an anterior neurosecretory center expressing many neuropeptides, including hypothalamic peptide orthologs and their receptors. Analysis of peptide-receptor pairs in spatially mapped single-cell transcriptome data revealed sparsely connected networks linking specific neuronal subsets. We experimentally analyzed one peptide-receptor pair and found that a neuropeptide can couple neurosecretory and synaptic brain signaling. Our study uncovered extensive networks of peptidergic signaling within a neurosecretory center and its connection to the synaptic brain.The research leading to these results received funding from the European Research Council under the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013)/ European Research Council Grant Agreement 260821. The research was supported by a grant from the DFG - Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (Reference no. JE 777/1)

Elvis’ Gospel music: Between the secular and the spiritual?

Do fans sanctify their heroes? In the past, I have argued that Elvis fandom is not a neo-religious practice but that attention to a modified version of Durkheim’s theory of religion can, nevertheless, help to explain it as a form of social interaction. I take that argument further here, first by revealing the ethical and analytical advantages of neo-Durkheimian theory, then by pitting this theory against three aspects of Elvis’ sincere engagement with gospel music. Elvis Presley won three Grammy awards for his gospel albums and was the musician who did most to bring the gospel quartet tradition to the mainstream. His eclectic personal ties to spirituality and religion have become a focus of debate within his fan culture. They offer a set of discursive resources through which to explain the emotional impact and social influence of his music. If star musicians are positioned as centres of attention, what happens when they use their privileged position in the spotlight to offer a “spiritual” message

Domestic Footprint of the EU and Member States: methodology and results (2010-2018)

Towards assessing the environmental domestic impacts of production and consumption activities in the European Union (EU), the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission (EC-JRC) developed the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)-based Domestic Footprint indicator. The Domestic Footprint aims at assessing the environmental impacts associated to emissions and resource extraction occurring within a Member State boundary (or the whole EU boundary) by adopting a production- and territorial-based perspective. Therefore, it accounts for both production and consumption activities taking place within the Member State’s domestic territory, e.g., from economic sectors such as industry, agriculture, energy, mining, and services; and also encompass those impacts from households and government’s activities (e.g., transport, heating). It is meant to be used in association with the consumption footprint, which instead account for the trade-related impacts as well. Both indicators are essential for providing integrated assessment, e.g. in the context of zero pollution. Assessing the Domestic Footprint of individual Member States and the EU allows for identification of environmental hotspots, setting baseline for monitoring of environmental performance progresses and against which testing policy options and scenarios. Domestic footprint focuses exclusively to what is happening within MS boundaries. The Domestic Footprint builds upon an extensive data collection of detailed information of emissions to the environment and resource extraction within the EU and Member State boundaries resulting into a comprehensive inventory of the environmental pressures due to domestic production and consumption. This inventory is then characterized with the Environmental Footprint (EF reference package 3.0), including 16 environmental impact categories which can be normalised and weighted into a single score. This report, building and expanding previous JRC studies, details the updated methodological approach for the data collection of the Domestic Footprint indicator for each impact category. The exercise entailed a systematic review of data sources and collected data. Furthermore, the assessment of the Domestic Footprint at both the EU and Member States level for the period 2000-2018 is presented, including an analysis of the decoupling of environmental impacts from economic growth and the assessment of the domestic footprint against the Planetary Boundaries (PBs). The EU Domestic Footprint showed a steady decrease for the period 2000-2018, confirming an absolute decoupling of domestic environmental impacts from economic growth. Most of the impact categories also showed absolute decoupling for this period, apart from mineral resource use and land use which increased along time although at a slower pace than the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), leading to relative decoupling. Considering an absolute sustainability perspective, the EU Domestic Footprint transgresses the PBs on climate change and particulate matter (being both in the high-risk area), and the PB regarding fossil resources (located in the uncertainty area). Member States showed a different contribution to the EU Domestic Footprint and to the different impact categories. The role of individual countries and their differences in impact per capita depended on the level of economic growth, the technological context (e.g., energy technologies and electricity market) and the availability of natural resources. Three impact categories contributed the most to the EU Domestic Footprint single score: climate change, particulate matter and human toxicity, non-cancer. An analysis at the elementary flow level (i.e. environmental pressures) unveiled that several indicators are driven by a small group of environmental pressures (i.e., resource, substances emitted to the environment), some environmental pressures contribute to diverse environmental impacts, and some environmental pressures are linked to the same anthropic activities (e.g., agricultural production, combustion of fossil fuels).JRC.D.3 - Land Resource

Advancing on comparability aspects for Product and Organisation Environmental Footprint

The Environmental Footprint (EF), with its Product and Organisation Environmental Footprint (PEF and OEF), is the method adopted by the European Commission to assess the environmental impacts of products, services, and organisations throughout their life cycle. Granting comparability of EF results is a key objective, in particular thanks to the definition of PEF category rules (PEFCRs) and OEF sector rules (OEFSRs). However, as following the experiences during the EF pilot phase (2014-2018), several issues relating to comparability call for more detailed guidance. Building on the existing Recommendation (EU) 2021/2279, we analysed further on: how to compare environmental impacts of organisations; how to compare environmental impacts of intermediate products; and how best define granularity of PEFCRs and OEFSRs. Each of these topics is discussed in a separate chapter of the report

Development and function of brain photoreceptors in the annelid Platynereis dumerilii

The aim of this thesis was the molecular, developmental and functional characterization of brain photoreceptors in the annelid Platynereis dumerilii. These results shed new light on the evolution of photoreceptors and circadian centers within Bilateria. Ciliary-type photoreceptors expressing c-opsin1 and the circadian marker bmal were previously identified in the dorsal brain of Platynereis larvae (Arendt et al., 2004), indicating that these brain photoreceptors might be involved in the entrainment of the circadian clock. To study their development, I used EdU incorporation analyses, together with time lapse imaging of embryos expressing fluorescent markers of histones and membranes. This showed that the brain circadian center (demarcated by the expression of bmal and cry1) is mostly formed by cells that belong to the same lineage. These cells are generated by asymmetric cell divisions of neural progenitors expressing the transcription factor rx (retinal homeobox), a crucial regulator of vertebrate pineal, retina and hypothalamus development. Next, I established methods to study gene function in the developing Platynereis embryos (morpholino-mediated knockdown, overexpression of mRNA, knockout with zinc finger nucleases). I applied these methods to study the role of Rx in the development of the ciliary photoreceptor lineage. Rx knockdown resulted in the loss of ciliary photoreceptors and in extensive changes in brain development, consistent with a role of Rx in the maintenance and/or multipotency of neural progenitors. The analysis of the molecular identity of these cells showed that they all express a peropsin gene, the melatonin synthesis marker hiomt and several markers of the pineal complex, the structure that in vertebrates releases the hormone melatonin. Among these cells, a new photoreceptor type was identified, which is an asymmetric serotoninergic cell expressing c-ops1 and several pineal markers. Hierarchical clustering of Platynereis and vertebrate cell types revealed that this serotoninergic cell and the “canonical” ciliary photoreceptors are the Platynereis cells more similar to the vertebrate pineal and retinal photoreceptors. To understand the function of these brain hiomt expressing cells, I investigated the expression of melatonin receptors. In the trochophore larva, the only site of ex- pression of melatonin receptors was the prototroch, a belt of ciliated cells used for locomotion. Melatonin can specifically decrease the activity of the prototroch cells. Ciliary locomotion follows a circadian rhythm (with higher speed during daytime, and lower speed at night), which can be reset by phototransduction. This suggests that melatonin is the clock output mediating nighttime decrease of locomotor activity. This study indicates that serotoninergic and melatonin releasing ciliary photoreceptors existed at the base of Bilateria. These photoreceptors have a conserved regulatory signature (rx, tbx2/3, lhx2/9, miR-7) and their ancestral function was the direct control of ciliary locomotion

Critical review of methods and models for biodiversity impact assessment and their applicability in the LCA context

Global biodiversity is in rapid decline and halting biodiversity loss is one of the most important challenges humanity must tackle now and in the immediate future. The five main direct drivers of biodiversity loss are climate change, pollution, land use, overexploitation of resources and the spread of invasive species, which result from indirect drivers such as unsustainable production and consumption. It is therefore of paramount importance that scientifically robust methods are developed to capture impacts on biodiversity from a value-chain perspective. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology allows to quantify the impact of products and organisations throughout their whole life cycle. In the LCA framework, several methods for biodiversity impact assessment have been developed. Building on previous reviews, this article aims to critically analyse methods and models for biodiversity impact assessment in LCA and beyond as comprehensively as possible, and to select those that may be most suitable for application in an LCA context. 64 methods were reviewed and 23 were selected for a detailed analysis based on availability of documentation, domain of application, geographical scope, potential to be used in LCA, and added value. The analysis addressed their goal and scope, data use and needs, and impact assessment characteristics, revealing strengths and weaknesses of the methods. There is currently no method that takes well into account at the same time the variety of pressures on biodiversity, ecosystems, taxonomic groups, essential biodiversity variables classes, and the fundamental aspects to consider in biodiversity impact assessments – but for each of these five criteria, we show which methods perform best. For the future development of biodiversity impact assessment, it is required to improve the coverage of drivers of biodiversity loss, increase ecosystem and taxonomic coverage, include the assessment of ecosystem services, and develop robust indicators that allow for complementary analysis of more essential biodiversity aspects