Adoptees’ experiences of education; a positive psychology perspective.

Adopted young people from care are likely to have experienced profound adversity. Understanding the enduring impact of their early life experiences has been historically overlooked by educational professionals, with adoption perceived to be as a ‘happy ever after’ ending. However, increasingly, research has shown that adopted young people are achieving poorer educational outcomes than their peers. Few studies have elicited the voices of adopted young people about their experiences of education, those that have, are predominantly negative in their discourse. This study seeks to focus on strengths and resilience from a positive psychology perspective so that positive educational outcomes can be facilitated and understood better for adopted young people. The current study sought the views of four adopted young people (aged 17-23 years) about their positive educational experiences through semi-structured interviews. Thematic analysis of the data identified the following themes of positive educational experiences: 1. Academic success; 2. Supportive teachers; 3. Other nurturing adults; 4. Awareness and support for adoption related needs; 5. Positive peer interactions and 6. Identity. Participants further identified three factors of resilience (sense of relatedness, sense of mastery and sense of emotional reactivity) to be of importance in their educational experiences as well as identifying further sub-themes that were of increasing importance to this group. Participants also suggested that there are three ways in which educational settings can do better: 1. Upskilling teachers to show that they care and to support them to have greater knowledge in understanding the needs and ways in which to support adopted young people; 2. Adapting the school curriculum to ensure that it is sensitive to the life experiences of adoptees; and 3. promoting support for mental health to enable adopted young to seek out support when needed. Findings highlight the need for whole school relational approaches centred around viewing young people with unconditional positive regard. Implications of the research are further outlined for educational professions, Educational Psychologists, policy makers and researchers

High yield fusion in a Staged Z-pinch

We simulate fusion in a Z-pinch; where the load is a xenon-plasma liner imploding onto a deuterium-tritium plasma target and the driver is a 2 MJ, 17 MA, 95 ns risetime pulser. The implosion system is modeled using the dynamic, 2-1/2 D, radiation-MHD code, MACH2. During implosion a shock forms in the Xe liner, transporting current and energy radially inward. After collision with the DT, a secondary shock forms pre-heating the DT to several hundred eV. Adiabatic compression leads subsequently to a fusion burn, as the target is surrounded by a flux-compressed, intense, azimuthal-magnetic field. The intense-magnetic field confines fusion $\alpha$-particles, providing an additional source of ion heating that leads to target ignition. The target remains stable up to the time of ignition. Predictions are for a neutron yield of $3.0\times 10^{19}$ and a thermonuclear energy of 84 MJ, that is, 42 times greater than the initial, capacitor-stored energy

Hypoxic Culture Conditions as a Solution for Mesenchymal Stem Cell Based Regenerative Therapy

Cell-based regenerative therapies, based on in vitro propagation of stem cells, offer tremendous hope to many individuals suffering from degenerative diseases that were previously deemed untreatable. Due to the self-renewal capacity, multilineage potential, and immunosuppressive property, mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) are considered as an attractive source of stem cells for regenerative therapies. However, poor growth kinetics, early senescence, and genetic instability during in vitro expansion and poor engraftment after transplantation are considered to be among the major disadvantages of MSC-based regenerative therapies. A number of complex inter-and intracellular interactive signaling systems control growth, multiplication, and differentiation of MSCs in their niche. Common laboratory conditions for stem cell culture involve ambient O-2 concentration (20%) in contrast to their niche where they usually reside in 2-9% O-2. Notably, O-2 plays an important role in maintaining stem cell fate in terms of proliferation and differentiation, by regulating hypoxia-inducible factor-1 (HIF-1) mediated expression of different genes. This paper aims to describe and compare the role of normoxia (20% O-2) and hypoxia (2-9% O-2) on the biology of MSCs. Finally it is concluded that a hypoxic environment can greatly improve growth kinetics, genetic stability, and expression of chemokine receptors during in vitro expansion and eventually can increase efficiency of MSC-based regenerative therapies.Article Link: http://www.hindawi.com/journals/tswj/2013/632972

Multiphoton excitations in vibrational rotational states of diatomic molecules in intense electromagnetic field

A theory is presented and a calculational procedure is outlined for evaluating transition amplitudes of multiphoton excitations of vibrational-rotational levels in diatomic molecules. This theory can be utilized in studying behavior of molecules in intense electromagnetic fields

A new approach to detect similar proteins from 2D Gel Electrophoresis Images.

This paper addressed the problem of identification errors due to protein mobility, common in earlier methods. A generalised shape matching algorithm is described that achieved and accuracy of greater than 90% on the test samples. The algorithm was also highly selective in defining the search space, thereby offering a significant computational speed advantage. The output from this work later formed part of an image object keying database, that offered significant benefits to other researchers

Features affecting the quality of Sustainability Reporting: Theoretically informed insights and empirical evidence from the Global Fortune 100 (2011-2015)

Sound Corporate Governance (CG) requires business entities to take responsible regard for the equitable interests of all stakeholders and appropriately align their individual concerns. Given that society generally is one significant stakeholder, it then becomes relevant to determine how such entities take regard for and report upon the social and environmental issues that currently threaten the sustainability of our globe. Accordingly, this research focuses on such sustainability issues and how they are reported, through Sustainability Reporting (SR). Verifying corporate social and environmental activities to stakeholders through Sustainability Reporting (SR) tends to gain and maintain corporate social Legitimacy and continuity in the market. This is because, SR is an effective and efficient tool for measuring and communicating the corporate social and environmental performance, in conjunction with its economic performance to stakeholders. Despite the critical importance of Sustainability Reporting, academics and professionals claim that the Quality of Sustainability Reporting is poor. Given this poor quality, it is recognized that several Sustainability Reports do not fulfill the needs of stakeholders. Consequently, based on the theoretical foundation of Legitimacy Theory and relevant literature, this research aims at hypothesizing and testing the effect of four features on the Quality of Sustainability Reporting (QSR). These features are Adherence to Regulation (ATR), External Assurance of Report (ASR), Independence of Board (IOB) and Type of Information (TOI). QSR is determined via the Index of the Global Reporting Initiatives (GRI). The GRI is regarded as the international proxy for Sustainability Reporting. Its Index identifies the performance indicators that should be included within the Sustainability Report, in order to fulfill the needs of stakeholders. The relationship between these features and QSR are tested/evaluated within 500 reports. These 500 are the Sustainability Reports of the Global Fortune 100 (G100) companies over the five-year period 2011-2015. Employing an ordinal dependent variable (QSR), the research applies an Ordinal, Logistic Regression (OLS) to statistically test hypothesized relationships. The SPSS statistical software package is used to implement that regression and to statistically analyze the collected data. The research concludes that Adherence To Regulations, External Assurance of Report, Independence of Board and Type of Information significantly affect, (representing 37.1% - 41% of the change in) the Quality of Sustainability Reporting. It also concludes that, Adherence to Regulations and External Assurance of Report have an Extremely Significant and Positive, relationship with the Quality of Sustainability Reporting. Moreover; there is a Significant and Positive, relationship between the Type of Information and Quality of Sustainability Reporting. Regarding the Independence of Board, two main phenomena are identified from the empirical results. The results identify that, there is a Non-significant relationship between Independence of Board Members and the Quality of Sustainability Reporting. However; there is a Significant, Positive, relationship between the Independence of Board Chair and the Quality of Sustainability Reporting. Therefore, Adherence to Regulations, External Assurance of Report, Independence of Board Chair and Type of Information are significant influencing factors that should be seriously considered by reporting firms in order to improve the Quality of Sustainability Reporting