Why and how to integrate non-standard linguistic varieties into education: Cypriot Greek in Cyprus and the UK

• Greek Cypriot education remains largely oriented towards promoting standard language ideologies and only accepts Standard Greek as the language of teaching and learning. • Cypriot Greek, the students’ home variety, is still seen as an obstacle to academic achievement by teachers and educational authorities. • Cypriot Greek needs to be integrated into policies and practices of teaching and learning both in Cyprus and in the UK’s Greek Cypriot community. • This will: o hone pupils’ awareness of different varieties; o foster the development of their critical literacy; o facilitate the acquisition of Standard Greek; o counter negative perceptions, stereotypes and feelings of inferiority associated with the use of Cypriot Greek; and, o aid in the maintenance and intergenerational transmission of Cypriot Greek as a heritage and community language in the UK. • Teachers and learning activities should promote and cultivate: o awareness and respect of the different varieties spoken in class, Cypriot Greek and Standard Greek; and, o awareness of vocabulary and grammar in the contexts of use of the two varieties and their social meanings. •This approach will ultimately change the way we view language and literacy learning

Impact of Compost Application on Fall-seeded Camelina Yield and Seed Quality

Camelina sativa (L). Crantz is a novel promising oilseed plant that can be grown as a spring annual crop or as a winter annual, in milder climates, providing distinct advantages. The objectives of this 3-year study were to evaluate the agronomic potential of fall-seeded camelina in Mediterranean conditions and the effect of compost application on its yield and quality characteristics. The response of fall-seeded camelina to organic fertilization resulted in tripling the seed yield and enhance the weight of seeds, compared to the unfertilized control. Concerning, seed quality characteristics compost application significantly enhanced only seed ash percentage (3.71%) as compared to control (3.05%) and lesser the crude fiber, crude protein and oil content. Results indicated that camelina is a feasible winter crop for Southern Greece and further studies must be carried out to optimize its production

Why and how to integrate non-standard linguistic varieties into education: Cypriot Greek in Cyprus and the UK

Greek Cypriot education remains largely oriented towards promoting standard language ideologies and only accepts Standard Greek as the language of teaching and learning. • Cypriot Greek, the pupils’ home variety, is still seen as an obstacle to academic achievement by teachers and educational authorities. • Cypriot Greek needs to be integrated into policies and practices of teaching and learning both in Cyprus and in the UK’s Greek Cypriot community. • This will: o hone pupils’ awareness of different varieties; o foster the development of their critical literacy; o facilitate the acquisition of Standard Greek; o counter negative perceptions, stereotypes and feelings of inferiority associated with the use of Cypriot Greek; and, o aid in the maintenance and intergenerational transmission of Cypriot Greek as a heritage and community language in the UK. • Teachers and learning activities should promote and cultivate: o awareness and respect of the different varieties spoken in class, Cypriot Greek and Standard Greek; and, o awareness of vocabulary and grammar in the contexts of use of the two varieties and their social meanings. • This approach will ultimately change the way we view language and literacy learning

Transformation of Hotel Food Waste into Animal Feed: Two Operational Periods of the Food for Feed Pilot Unit

Food waste represents 25–35% of the European Municipal Solid Waste (MSW), thus its diversion into innovative utilization streams is critical for sustainable waste management and the achievement of circularity. Opportunities are even higher in the island of Crete, Greece, where landfilled food waste is 39% of MSW. In this context, the LIFE-F4F Project implements a pilot scale modified solar drying process that provides an innovative, low-tech and low emissions method for safe transformation of source separated food waste into animal feed

Determination of the optimal priming interval of rumen fluids used as inocula for the in vitro digestibility trials through radial enzyme diffusion method

Context: Determination of the neutral detergent fibre digestibility is one of the important parameters to consider when formulating diets. However, the in vitro determination shows low repeatability because of the source of rumen-fluid inoculum. Priming of the rumen fluid inocula, obtained through an oesophageal probe, has been proposed to overcome this issue. Aim: The objective of the study was to investigate the evolution of the microbial enzymatic activities of different rumen fluids during a priming procedure, to establish the fermentation interval that minimises the differences among rumen-fluid degradative potentials. Methods: Three farms for each type of diet were involved in the study. Rumen fluids were obtained from dry and lactating cows fed the following four diet types: 100% hay or a diet with 80: 20 forage: Concentrate ratio (F: C) as dry-cow diets, and ad libitum hay and concentrate, or a total mixed ration (both at 60: 40 F: C) as lactating-cow diets. On each farm, rumen fluid was collected from three Holstein cows by using an oesophageal probe, and mixed. Two aliquots of each rumen fluid mix were added to the medium containing the same priming substrate in an in vitro batch-fermentation system. During the incubation, the fermentation fluids were sampled in duplicate at 0-, 1-, 2-, 4-, 8-, 24- A nd 48-h intervals. Enzymatic activities of amylase, cellulase and xylanase were determined by radial enzyme diffusion method. Key results: Initial enzymatic activities were quite variable and increased with an increasing incubation time. By 24 h, amylase showed similar values among high-concentrate diet fermentation fluids, and a lower data dispersion in comparison to the other intervals cellulase was characterised by similar values in all the fermentation fluids derived from diets including concentrates, and xylanase showed similar activity in the fermentation fluids derived from high-concentrate diets. Development of the enzymatic activity of the fermentation fluids derived from the 100% hay diet differed from the others. Conclusions: A 24-h priming procedure was needed to stabilise and equalise the enzymatic activity of the rumen fluid from cows fed high-concentrate diets. This was not observed in rumen fluid from cows fed hay-based diets. Implications: The 24-h-primed rumen fluid can be used to increase the repeatability of neutral detergent fibre digestibility determination

The impact of rumen-protected amino acids on the expression of key- genes involved in the innate immunity of dairy sheep

Rumen protected amino acids inclusion in ewes’ diets has been proposed to enhance their innate immunity. The objective of this work was to determine the impact of dietary supplementation with rumen-protected methionine or lysine, as well as with a combination of these amino acids in two different ratios, on the expression of selected key-genes (NLRs, MyD88, TRIF, MAPK-1, IRF-3, JunD, TRAF-3, IRF-5, IL-1α, IL-10, IKK-α, STAT-3 and HO-1). Thus, sixty Chios dairy ewes (Ovis aries) were assigned to one of the following five dietary treatments (12 animals/ treatment): A: basal diet consist of concentrates, wheat straw and alfalfa hay (control group); B: basal diet +6.0 g/head rumen-protected methionine; C: basal diet + 5.0 g/head rumen-protected lysine; D: basal diet +6.0 g/head rumen-protected methionine + 5.0 g/head rumen-protected lysine and E: basal diet +12.0 g/head rumen-protected methionine + 5.0 g/head rumen-protected lysine. The results revealed a significant downregulation of relative transcript level of the IL-1α gene in the neutrophils of C and in monocytes of D ewes compared with the control. Significantly lower mRNA transcript accumulation was also observed for the MyD88 gene in the neutrophils of ewes fed with lysine only (C). The mRNA relative expression levels of JunD gene were highly induced in the monocytes, while those of IL-10 and HO-1 genes were declined in the neutrophils of ewes fed with the C and D diets compared with the control. Lower transcript levels of STAT-3 gene were observed in the neutrophils of ewes fed with either C or with E diets in comparison with the control. In conclusion, our results suggest that the dietary supplementation of ewes with rumen-protected amino acids, down regulate the expression of some genes involved in the pro-inflammatory signalling

Is There a Common Cypriot Subjunctive?

The aim of this paper is to discuss similarities between the Cypriot Turkish and the Cypriot Greek subjunctive/optative paradigm(s), to account for these similarities in terms of a theory of language contact, and to suggest an explanation for the similarities in the paradigms of the two dialects that can also account for the points of divergence from the respective standard languages. Modal complement clauses in Turkic languages are usually nominal infinitive constructions or, in very restricted instances, adverbial clauses of purpose with imperative-optative, while in some Turkic languages (Gagauz, some Azeri and Uzbek dialects, Karaim), as well as in several Turkish dialects (Balkan Turkish, Eastern Anatolian Turkish) the imperative-voluntative and the second person singular & plural optative are used in non-matrix clauses, following models of non-Turkic languages with which they are in contact. Cypriot Turkish is a Turkish variety which displays very regular use of this mixed paradigm to express various types of modality in complement clauses with a broad range of matrix verbs and nominal predicates as well as in some temporal clauses; moreover the paradigm is used for optative constructions in matrix clauses, as in Standard Turkish. Through the contrastive analysis of these different semantic and syntactic functions of the Cypriot Turkish in comparison with the Cypriot Greek subjunctive, the paper aims to show that Turkish Cypriot, like other Turkic varieties under strong syntactic influence from Indo-European languages, has introduced the “subjunctive” possibly through influence from Cypriot Greek, rather than from Standard Greek, where the use of the subjunctive is more restricted. The paper further discusses the various types of modality associated with the Cypriot Turkish ‘subjunctive’ and their Greek Cypriot parallels

Not all positive: on the landscape of thanking items in Cypriot Greek

Language Use in Past and Presen

Association of dietary soy with expression of various pro-inflammatory genes in porcine phagocytes

Soybean and whey are two common protein sources used in piglet feeding; however, their effects on pro-inflammatory responses remain unclear. The present study investigated the expression of various genes implicated in the activation/deactivation of porcine phagocytes post-weaning. Eighteen piglets were divided into two groups based on the main protein source of their diet; soybean (SB) or whey proteins (WP). Blood phagocytes were isolated at 72 days of age. Expression of urokinase plasminogen activator (u-PA), u-PA receptor (u-PAR), plasminogen activator inhibitors 1 and 2, intercellular adhesion molecule 1 (ICAM-1), inducible NO synthase (iNOS), cyclo-oxygenase-2 and interleukin-10 (IL-10) in activated monocytes and neutrophils (except IL-10) was determined by quantitative PCR. Expression of u-PAR, ICAM-1 and iNOS were lower  in both cell types obtained from SB-fed piglets compared to WP-fed piglets. In conclusion, a SB-based diet, compared with a WP diet, is associated with reduced expression of crucial pro-inflammatory genes in porcine phagocytes