Background: As a part of a national health control program, Statens VeterinärmedicinskaAnstalt performs diagnostics to screen flocks for certain pathogens causing high mortality,morbidity and/or serious economical losses. There are several viruses in the programincluding IBDV (infectious bursal disease virus), IBV (infectious bronchitis virus) and NDV(Newcastle disease virus). Method: 96 serum samples were collected from different poultryflocks in Sweden and analyzed by ELISA, which are currently used in the health controlprogram as well as by a commercial prototype of a multiplex immunoassay manufactured byLuminex Corp., which is currently under evaluation at the United States Department ofAgriculture USDA. This 4-plex assay detects antibodies for the three above-mentionedviruses as well as antibodies of avian reovirus. In the context of this study the ELISAs run inroutine diagnostics as well as a REO ELISA were used as the standard for comparison.Result: The antibody concentration in serum from vaccinated chickens was high while theantibody concentration level in serum from not vaccinated chickens was low.

Sheep have played a very important part in rural history. In Sweden there were many kinds of small native breeds, kept for their meat and fleece. Women cared for the flock that often had very little to feed on during the cold and sometimes harsh winter months. This meant that these sheep over time acquired special phenotypic properties depending on the environment they lived in, and easily fed compared to modern breeds kept for meat. Most of these sheep have since become extinct.

For several years Uppsala University together with several companies has been involved in a WISENET project aimed at improving railway transport security. By placing a sensor system near the wheels of each wagon, the temperature of the bearings can be measured and transmitted to a collector placed centrally on the wagon. This in turn transmits the collected data to RFID receivers placed intermittently along the railway.As the signals are transmitted wirelessly, problems may occur as the antennas get dirty or coated with ice and snow. To determine the effects of these coatings, several tests were performed examining the reflection coefficient S11, the impedance Z11 and the efficiency eta of an antenna, and how they varied when various coatings were placed over the antenna. Examined coatings were ice, snow and water to determine the effects of weather, and various metal-based coatings: powdered iron both pure and partially oxidized, and iron ore granules.

The world?s population reached more than 6.9 billion people in July 2011. It is expected that the population growth during the next 40 years will take place mostly in low-income countries and the population increase will be 2.3 billion people during 2011-2050. A rapid urbanization is also expected to result in 57.7 per cent of Africa?s population living in urban areas in 2050.

This report deals with the performance of a batch flow treatment of landfillleachate compared with a continuous flow system. The parameters in focus were total Kjeldahl nitrogen (TKN), BOD5 and COD. The pilot-scale experiment used eight barrels with a volume of 150 liters. Each barrel was constructed differently concerning its flow, its bed material grain size and its presence of plants or not. Four of the barrels worked in batch mode, thus four in continuous flow mode.

For several years Uppsala University together with several companies has been involved in a WISENET project aimed at improving railway transport security. By placing a sensor system near the wheels of each wagon, the temperature of the bearings can be measured and transmitted to a collector placed centrally on the wagon. This in turn transmits the collected data to RFID receivers placed intermittently along the railway.As the signals are transmitted wirelessly, problems may occur as the antennas get dirty or coated with ice and snow. To determine the effects of these coatings, several tests were performed examining the reflection coefficient S11, the impedance Z11 and the efficiency eta of an antenna, and how they varied when various coatings were placed over the antenna. Examined coatings were ice, snow and water to determine the effects of weather, and various metal-based coatings: powdered iron both pure and partially oxidized, and iron ore granules.

This paper deals with prehistoric charred organic material, interpreted as bread, found in graves and in the underlying settlement at Kalvshälla, Järfälla parish in Uppland. The aim was to categorize the organic material morphologically and with the help of Fourier transformed Infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) to see whether it was bread or not. Material from 13 graves (dated to Late Roman Iron Age until Viking Age) and 3 finds from the settlement have been analysed. Differences were noted both in shape, porosity and structure. Some of the material has been interpreted as cereal based foodstuff instead of bread due to morphological discrepancies.

Borna disease virus (BDV) is a virus with capability to cause neurological disease in several species of mammals and of ostriches. Also humans are suspected to be susceptible to the virus, as the viral RNA and antibodies against BDV have been found in some humans with psychiatric diseases, like schizophrenia and depression. In Sweden there is a disease called staggering disease in cats, associated to BDV-infection. This disease often has a fatal progress. Definite diagnosis is reached by histo-pathological and immunohistochemical examination of the central nervous system.

This study was made for the Swedish forest company Sveaskog because the sawmills they delivered timber to had noticed a high frequency of bucking splits in their products. Coworker Jim Edström at Sveaskog also wanted to know if there was a big difference between different felling heads. The purpose with this study has been to find out the amount of bucking splits and if there is any felling head brand that did a bigger damage that the others. The study was made in two steps, where the first part was a literary review to find out results and conclusions in earlier studies. The best measuring method to check bucking splits was the known ?trissmetoden?.

The calcium homeostasis in the body is normally strict regulated to be kept within very narrow limits. This regulation is due to the action of parathyroid hormone (PTH) which is synthesized in the chief cells of the parathyroid glands. In different diseases, the calcium homeostasis is disturbed and this could either be due to a dysfunction of the parathyroid gland itself, or it could have a completely different explanation. To investigate disturbed calciumhomeostasis, ionized calcium and PTH can be analyzed from a blood sample. There are a lot of different assays to measure PTH in humans.

Hyperthyroidism and chronic kidney failure (CKD) are common diseases in older cats. It can be difficult to evaluate kidney function in cats suffering from both conditions simultaneously. In the daily clinic serum creatinine is the analysis of choice when evaluating kidney function and secondary glomerular filtration rate (GFR). This marker does not, however, detect kidney damage until about 75 % of the function is lost. There are several other techniques available when investigating GFR but none are readily available for the small clinic.

There is considerable variation between stallions in semen quality and fertility due to the fact that selection of stallions for breeding is not based on fertility or semen quality but on performance. The increasing use of cooled semen for artificial insemination has resulted in decreasing pregnancy rates. Therefore the equine breeding industry needs new methods for evaluation and development of sperm quality and fertility. This study is a part of such a project and is performed by SLU in cooperation with Flyinge AB. Ten stallions at the Flyinge National Stud were used in the study and three ejaculates were collected from each stallion.

Several diseases increase the risk of thrombosis in dogs and cats, often with a fatal outcome. Currently there are no definite treatment guidelines for the use of thrombolytic and thromboprofylactic agents in veterinary medicine. None of these drugs are approved for dogs and cats in Sweden. Medicines aimed for humans have been used tentatively. This literature study is an investigation of what is currently known about the effects and safety of these pharmacological agents when used for dogs and cats.

The main interest of this study was to investigate whether there is hyperglycemia or hypoglycemia in cows suffering from abomasal displacement and to evaluate the effect of transport on blood glucose. Thirty-six cows with left- or right-sided abomasal displacement were included in the study together with 17 cows with other diseases for comparison. Fifteen cows with abomasal displacement and 7 cows with other diseases were sampled before transport. One third of the cows with abomasal displacement had hyperglycemia when the transport effects were corrected for. Separating this group in left- and right-sided abomasal displacement we found significantly higher blood glucose and insulin levels among cows with right-sided abomasal displacement. An explanation for this difference may be a strong stress response secondary to the right-sided dislocation.

This work is about silage contaminated with slugs (Arion lusitanicus). The hypothesis was: Do slugs affect the nutritional value and hygiene quality of silage? During the winter season 2007/2008 silages were discarded in big amounts due to the contamination of slugs. Both the Swedish Farmer Association (LRF) and the National Veterinary Institute (SVA) received phone calls from farmers and animal owners about contaminated silage. The Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) and SVA decided to initiate this project as a master thesis.