Our study illustrates the nature and characteristics of the virtual world Second Life. We have identified that the online community aims to satisfy hedonistic needs through social and conspicuous consumption, for online use only, concentrating on socially accepted identity construction..

In order to suggest improvements for the logistics of STARKA, we felt that we had to analyze all the activities which were related to STARKA's logistic processes. Our primary analysis consisted of a rough but comprehensive description of different functions in the company, and the relationship between them. This was performed by following a typical order through the company to see which functions were affected by the order.Since we needed a more thorough view of the company, we decided to analyze the different products STARKA currently has on the market, focusing on economic data such as turn-over, profit, profit margin, deficiency cost and cost of warehousing. We also analyzed the company's choice of manufacturing processes, organization, warehousing processes, strengths and weaknesses.These analyses gave us a clear understanding of the company and its processes. STARKA is a small, function oriented company with a wide range of products.

Författarna har haft ett samarbete med Panduro Hobby i samband med deras årliga miljökampanj. Syftet med examensarbetet har varit att med hjälp av befintliga produktutvecklingsprocesser och livscykelanalyser (LCA) ta fram en hållbar textil produkt med växtfärgning. Tanken var att konsumenter sedan själva skall kunna ta fram och växtfärga denna hållbara textilprodukt. Miljömedvetenhet och hållbarhet inom textilindustrin är ett aktuellt ämne. Trots det saknar dagens konsumenter förståelse för textilindustrins påverkan på miljön och har bristande kunskap om textila material för att kunna göra miljövänliga val ute i handeln.

The degree project at hand investigates how large areas of older forest (80 plus years) suitable for clear cutting there is on the Swedish island of Gotland. Large areas of older forest on Gotland are situated on land with shallow soil depths which are economically uninteresting and often unsuitable for clear cutting forestry. Other forests hold big nature conservation values and should not, or cannot, be used for forestry purposes. The survey is made as a GIS analysis based on the old but carefully made ?Brief forest inventory? (ÖSI) made in the 1980s and early 1990s. A sample from the inventory is combined with studies of orthophotos, satellite photos and other GIS layers that display estimated soil depth and nature conservation values. Partly contrary to common belief, the survey shows that there are still large areas of older forest suitable for clear cutting forestry on the island.

Aim: The aim was to describe adult patients quality of life after cardiac arrest and resuscitation with CPR. Method: A literature overview based on eight scientific articles and one master thesis. Results: The result is presented in three categories, physical, psychological and social quality of life. Sleeping disorders, fatigue and low energy level affected the physical quality of life in a negative way. The psychological quality of life was often impaired the first time after the cardiac arrest, to be improved over time.

Effects of Menstrual Cycle and Oral Contraceptives on Sport Performance During the menstrual cycle, there is a variation of the female steriod hormones estrogen and progestogen. These hormones has mainly reproduktive functions, but do also affect other physiological systems, which may have an influence on athletic performance. The use of oral contraceptives among female athletes matches the use among the general population. There is a concern among female athletes and there coaches weather oral contraceptives can affect the performance. The purpose of this litterature review is to determine the effect of the menstrual cycle and the use of oral contraceptives on athletic performance.

The aim of this study was to increase the knowledge about and deepen our understanding for people who are treated with dialysis in aspects of quality of life and coping strategies. The research questions were: How does the scientific literature describe quality of life and coping strategies from people?s perspective who are treated with dialysis? How does dialysis affect patients and their lives? How/what can the nurses do for people who are treated with dialysis to keep or improve their quality of life. The result is based on eight scientific articles and after interpretation of the result we found six themes that describes how patients have to restructure their lives to a new normal life, how they adapt to a life with dialysis treatment, how dialysis affect their physical condition, witch meaning does the family and others have, how they keep their self-esteem in relation to the dependence of dialysis treatment and which factors are associated with a long life with dialysis..

This study sheds light on the firm-lifecycle and the impact of leadership and how itdevelops negatively when the entrepreneurial firm becomes administrative andmanagerial. The ambivalent fact is that the firm, when growing in size, need to becomemore managerial, though without undermining the previously entrepreneurial mind-setthat pervade the organization. The term corporate entrepreneurship has emerged andcomprises that the firm can continue to be entrepreneurial in the managerial stage. Thatis to resume the firm?s work to keep innovative.

The purpose of the study was to discover how nurses can maintain a good quality of life for cancerpatients at the end of life. We examined seven scientific articles in accordance with Polit, Beck & Hungler (2001) criteria for scientific validity. We used Carnevali's (1996) model of demand and resources as a frame of reference. The results showed that physical, psychological, social and spiritual needs affect quality of life in different ways. It also came out that it was difficult to measure something as individual as quality of life..

Opcon Powerbox is a product developed by Opcon together with the underlying company SRM (Svenska Rotor Maskiner) where surplus heat from the industry is used through an Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC)?process to produce electricity. An ORC-process is a thermodynamic circle process in which a refrigerant is used as the working fluid. The refrigerant makes it possible for the circle process to operate at lower temperatures than the conventional Rankine process.In this master?s thesis a data analysis software for the Opcon Powerbox has been developed in which measurement data is retrieved and handled from the Opcon Powerbox.

With increased deployment ofintermittent renewable energy, such aswind and solar power, energy storagebecomes necessary to help reduceproduction peaks. Thermoelectric EnergyStorage is a method still in researchphase, which stores electricity in hotwater at a temperature of 120 ° C. Thisthesis aims to examine whether theThermoelectric Energy Storage would bepossible to integrate into existingpower generation such as a combined heatand power plant, and how the technologypotentially could function in theelectricity market. ThermoelectricEnergy Storage consists of a chargingprocess and a discharging process, bothoperating by the working fluid CO2. Toincrease the efficiency of theThermoelectric Energy Storage, wasteheat from the district heating networkis integrated.A model of the Thermoelectric EnergyStorage has been developed and it wascalculated by thermodynamic propertiesof the working fluid, CO2, in thevarious process steps.

The aim with our paper has been to get a picture of which factors one of the heterogeneous group that we've chosen of old persons, 75-90 years, in Scania, in south Sweden, have experienced to be of importance for their life quality today and what they wish to preserve of their actual life style when they eventually shall use the elderly care. Also how their individual life course has influenced their experience of the quality of life.We found this subject interesting as the group of old people in the society is constantly increasing and when the group becomes bigger, then greater demands will be put on the elderly care. We have proceeded from a standpoint that all people are unique individuals and that people become what they are from their life histories and from the choices they have made during their life. We have used the life course theory that says that one should see the individual in his/her wholeness and the whole life history of a person in order to understand him/her. We have also studied earlier research concerning the different determinants of the life quality.

AbstractThe Municipality Council decided in 2010 to develop a comprehensive energy efficiency strategy with financial and methodological support from Energimyndigheten (The Swedish Energy Agency). The strategy should include 3 major parts: an inventory of the 2009 energy use defining the current situation, the 2014 and 2020 goals for energy use, and an action plan for goal achievements. According to Energimyndigheten, the strategy must include all municipal administration premises, vehicles, and all majority-owned companies (as Laholmshem, the municipal housing company).The report describes the inventory work in order to obtain the 2009 energy use and the sources of information used. The inventory values are used as the base year values for the 2014 and 2020 goals. The inventory showed that information about the vehicles is dispersed in the municipal administration and no clear structure exists with respect to mileage and fuels used.

The forests of Sweden are constantly changing. Map studies indicate that the amount of deciduous trees in Sweden has decreased in recent years in favor of the coniferous trees. The National Forest Inventory has since the early 1920s monitored the Swedish forests and in recent years has made the old data digitally available. In the present project, we have investigated how the numbers of stems in different diameter classes have changed for birch and other deciduous trees. The inventory was conducted in the same manner as in the first forest inventory.

This qualitative study examines if an interest in soccer can give the same meaningfulexperiences in a person's life as a religion would. Five soccer fans were interviewedregarding the meanings and impact of soccer in their lives. Two theories in the fields ofsport and religion were used to analyze the data: Antonovsky's sense of coherence (SOC)with its components meaningfulness, manageability and comprehensibility and Heelasand Woodheads "life-as" and "the subjective-life? derived from the concept "thesubjective turn". It was concluded that the interest in soccer affected the respondents?views of life.The respondents? personal identities were strongly associated with groupmembership, meaning that their interest in common with others was perceived to makeeveryday life meaningful and manageable.