Two ecological models of nitrogen processes in treatment wetlands have been evaluated and compared. These models have been implemented, simulated, and visualized in the Modelica language. The differences and similarities between the Modelica modeling environment used in this thesis and other environments or tools for ecological modeling have been evaluated. The modeling tools evaluated are PowerSim, Simile, Stella, the MathModelica Model Editor, and WEST. The evaluation and the analysis have been performed using McCall?s factors for software quality (McCall et al, 1977), a correlation analysis and the Constant Comparative Method (Glaser&Strauss, 1999).

The fast developments in information and data technology during the recent years have accentuated the need for the business manager to interpret and act on information from the surrounding environment. Today we know little about what information is really used in the unique decision-making. Further, little is known about how information should be designed to fit people with a more intuitive approach to interpreting information. This study is therefore about the difference between peoples approach to interpreting information and how information should be designed to fit those with a more intuitive approach to interpreting information. The application is made to dairy farms in Sweden. The literature review describes the strategic leadership, the decision-making process and the intuitive and the analytic thinking.

The study aims to describe and analyse the relationship between norm and practice regarding social services casework on honour-related problems. The relationship between norm and practice involves the difference between the way it is intended that social workers shall operate in these cases and how they perceive that this works in practice. We interviewed two focus groups of eight Swedish social workers, four in each group. We also held an individual interview with a social services business developer. Focus group interviews were based on two vignettes; one depicting an honour-related case and the second an "ordinary" case.

In the farrowing pens the amount of bedding material and the quality of the concrete floor has a huge impact on both the sow and the piglets. In this study imbedding of rubber flooring on the solid area in the farrowing pen was used to see if it had any effects on the sows lying behaviour when compared to concrete. Another important aspect was to evaluate if the rubber floorings had a high enough durability to resist the normal wear in a farrowing pen. Concrete flooring is assumed to have a higher thermally conductive effect then rubber which can affect the sow?s chance to cool down.

Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion, OTEC, a technology using the temperature difference between cold deep seawater and warm surface water, can extract the work in the form of electricity. OTEC gives also synergies of drinkable fresh water. The temperature difference has an impact on the efficiency of the technology, which means that the feasibility of OTEC is geographically limited. The project intends to explore the possibility of replacing the atoll Tarawa?s present electricity generation with an OTEC plant and to explore synergies. In the present situation all of Tarawa?s electricity is generated by fossil fuels.

Rapid population growth and the fact that phosphorous is a limited resource implies that the question regarding an efficient use of phosphorus is of great importance, and consequently,that the phosphorous use efficiency should be as high as possible. The view on phosphorous use efficiency, and how this is calculated, has varied over time. This has had great implications on what type of research that has been conducted, which have resulted in an inconsistency between the academic?s view on the subject and recommendations received by farmers. The purpose of this paper is to calculate the phosphorus use efficiency in the Swedish long term fertility experiments.

I have written an essay called ?All children are equally worth - A qualitative analysis of how children are produced in KappAhls commercials?.The purpose of this thesis is to do a study of the swedish clothing company KappAhl?s commercials. My purpose is divided into three questions: With which clothing colours are girls and boys represented in the commercials? Is there any difference in the making of ?non-white? and ?white? children in the commercials? and What is being transmitted in KappAhl?s commercials, where the focus should lay on the clothes?My material consists of three selected video clips from KappAhl?s Youtube channel. The three commercials are named: 1, Back to school, 2, Children?s christmas and 3, KappAhl 3 för 2 på alla överdelar för barn (translation: KappAhl 3 for 2 on all children?s tops).

Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion, OTEC, a technology using the temperature difference between cold deep seawater and warm surface water, can extract the work in the form of electricity. OTEC gives also synergies of drinkable fresh water. The temperature difference has an impact on the efficiency of the technology, which means that the feasibility of OTEC is geographically limited. The project intends to explore the possibility of replacing the atoll Tarawa?s present electricity generation with an OTEC plant and to explore synergies. In the present situation all of Tarawa?s electricity is generated by fossil fuels.

According to TCO (The Swedish Confederation for Professional Employees) the worst threat to the Swedish welfare is that so many people because of bad health and unemployment are not a part of the labour force. If Sweden could make the number of people with health and unemployment problems half the size as today, the GDP would increase with more than five percent. In real money this means 110 billion Swedish kronor a year. According to SCB (Statistics Sweden) the difference between women?s and men?s absence owing to illness should be investigated more closely in order to get at better understanding of the problem.

Close to the city center of Reykjavik lies the combined national- and university library of Iceland. Usually, these two types of institutions are separated. The purpose of this essay is to investigate how the library in fact selects the new digital material to offer the users in Iceland, and if the combined mission creates any problems or conflicts.The investigation examines the planning and the content of the digital library, what user groups are addressed and how the organisation is held together despite the different missions. If cultural context in Iceland makes a difference for what is selected and offered to the users is also discussed.Six informants in strategic library positions dealing with the digital national- or university library, were interviewed. The answers have been analysed in light of the library&information literature on building and maintaining digital library collections and organizational and marketing theory.The main result of the study is that the informants do not see a conflict between the missions of the organisation, although traces of a struggle were found in some areas.

Abstract The purpose of the study is to examine how children perceive the relation between play and sex and analyse it from a gender perspective. This by answering the questions: "Is the children?s choice of place, materials and company in play dependent on gender?" and "Is there a significant difference between the sexes and/or ages?" The study was done through twelve focusgroup interviews with three children in each group except two groups of two children in each. Eight boys and nine girls of six years old and nine boys and eight girls of nine years old were interviewed. Boys and girls were interviewed in separate groups and the questions were open ended and followed up.

Lately it has become more common to question the companies? actions in how they affect their surroundings. Today, the expression ?Corporate Social Responsibility? often is mentioned in this connection. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), is a concept whereby companies voluntarily integrate social and environmental concerns in their business operation.In Sweden there is a big difference between different businesses when it comes to their Corporate Social Responsibility.

The storm Gudrun January 8-9 2005 felled about 70 millions cubic metres forest in southern Sweden. The majority of the wind damaged forest was spruce (Picea abies). In order to decrease the risk of wind damages in the future other trees species are of interest for forestry in southern Sweden. The purpose of this master thesis was to study if larch were more wind tolerant than spruce. The method was to compare larch, Japanese larch (Larix kaempferi Lamb.), European larch (L.

Starch is a naturally occurring substance in most plants and is used as energy storage. It is a component that mainly consists of amylose and amylopectin. Together they build a complex pattern which gives starch its specific properties. The proportion of amylose and amylopectin varies in different plants but generally starch consists of 25 % amylose and 75 % amylopectin. There have been discoveries of barley varieties containing 100 % amylopectin called ?waxy starches? or ?waxy barley? as well as varieties that have a high content of amylose, around 70 % and these are called ?amylotypes?.

Financial bubbles are characterized by a large increase in the economic growth on the market as a whole or in specific industries. The change gives rise to an increase in the capital needed to finance this growth. Companies typically have a choice between equity and debt capital to finance its business and the mix of these types of capital is often referred to as the company?s capital structure. There has been a lot of research done in the field of financial bubbles and ofcapital structure, as of yet no studies seem to address these two areas in combination.The aim of this study is to examine if financial bubbles affect a company?s capital structure and through this also examine if the supposed changes in capital structure can be generalized.The study comprise of two identical time-series which examines the changes in leverage and the choice of financing during the Swedish real estate bubble in the early nineties and the IT-crash at the end of the 2000th century.