At Sandvik Materials Technology, Argon gas is used as furnace atmosphere when heattreating hot rolled wire. Upon heating chromium steel wire, a rich oxidelayer forms on the wire surface. The abstract of this masters thesis is to enhance the understanding of the constitution of the oxidelayers and the influence of the furnace atmosphere. This will be achieved by performing a number of annealing experiments on laboratory level. Also, the aim is to understand the chemical reactions and physical mecanisms controlling the pickling process.

På Ovako i Hofors, framställs stål via götgjutning. Göten har ett kvadratiskt tvärsnitt som varierar mellan 300 och 700 mm. Dessa transporteras från stålverket, till valsverket för uppvärmning. Varpå de varmvalsas till färdiga ämnen. Under tiden i ugnen när göten värms upp, oxiderar järn och andra legeringar och bildar glödskal.

The purpose of this retrospective study was to investigate the prescription of antibiotics to dogs at the small animal clinic at Ecole Nationale Vétérinaire, Nantes, France. The purpose was also to compare the possible prescription patterns in France with those seen in a similar study by Petersson (2003) at the small animal clinic at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala. Antibiotics are very important in veterinary medicine and are used both to treat infections and to prevent them. The use of antibiotics however is not without complications and the risk of developing antimicrobial resistance is of most concern. Resistance has been shown to exist against all currently known antibiotics and potentially all pathogenic bacteria could develop resistance to one or more antibiotics. This study analysed the case records for all dogs presented to the small animal clinic at Ecole Nationale Vétérinaire, Nantes, France during October 2001 and March 2002 to identify patients which were treated with systemic antibiotics. For these cases the antibiotic used, classified according to the ATCvet system, and the indication for use was noted. A total of 292 cases (146 per month) resulted in administration of systemic antibiotics.