Today?s climate changes will probably give rise to precipitation in Sweden, which will cause more floods in Swedish rivers. Many of the Swedish rivers are regulated and have lots of hydro-electro power plants. Higher floods in the rivers will give greater water loads on the dams, which mean that a higher discharge through the sluice gates and in the spillway channels is needed. High discharge of water in a spillway channel can create scour of the material in the channel.

The purpose of this paper is to examine and analyze past development of mutual funds in large and small mutual fund companies and see if there are any differences between these two segments. Limitations on the number of funds have been made by choosing Nordic mutual fund companies that invest in emerging markets over an 11-year period. The study is made on 66 mutual funds managed by 13 mutual fund companies in which the segment of small fund companies includes seven fund companies with assets under management less than 100 billion SEK and the segment of large mutual fund companies includes six fund companies with assets under management more than 400 billion SEK. In the comparison of the segments the Sharpe ratio has been used to calculate the risk-adjusted return. The study shows small differences of the risk-adjusted return between the segments.

This is a field study based on participant observations and interviews, describing the cooking teacher's complex everyday life. The school's restaurant is a unique arena, freely hovering between two worlds: The school world and the restaurant reality. Here, the students are confronted with real situations and problems, similar to the ones occurring in a restaurant, still having the school's safety net beneath them. It is for real, but still not, a bit like a flight simulator.It is on that arena the cooking teacher works, combining the two roles of the teacher and the chef. Two roles built on their own traditions and values.

The field of coping has become more developed during the past decades but there is still a lot to be discovered and discussed. Theories of developmental psychology describe the possibility to map a general developmental structure of how the human mind expands. The aim of this study is to contribute to further research in whether there is a reason why we cope the way we do in relation to age. The questions answered in this study was, what coping two girls, whom lived during the Holocaust, used and how the coping found, were possible to interpret from theories of developmental psychology. In order to answer the questions asked a method called Template Analysis Style and three different theories have been applied.

During the past years fire has been identified as an important factor for nature conservation in the forest landscape. To accurately quantify the size of a burnt area is obviously important, but also to quantify the degree of fire damage to the tree canopy. Such data are important for assessing the conservation value, and to support planning and management of the burned area in the future. I have examined how to estimate the status of tree crowns after fire from interpretation of aerial photographs. This is possible because fire changes the structure of tree crowns and this influences the colours in aerial photographs by spectral reflection. Included in the study are four areas, three of which burned in 2005 and one in 2006.

This study aims to investigate how federations manage to balance the economies of scale through collaboration and autonomy. This is done through a case study on Länsförsäkringar. The lack of modern research on federations makes the federative structure an interesting field of study. Previous research has shown a general perception that an increased pressure on efficiency and economies of scale creates a stronger common unit that eventually creates an imbalance in the federation. It is therefore interesting to look at the balance, which exists between the member units and the common unit of a federation.

The purpose of this report is to examine the possibilities to decrease the number of insects and other pathogens in a crop of pak choi (Brassica rapa), grown with different types of cover and living mulches. Included in the report is a study of literature where amongst others, a summary on the vegetable pak choi and theories of living mulches and different kind of covers are to be found. To examine the amount of predators in the field, traps were used. During the autumn 2002 the tests were conducted in Alnarp. The pak choi and the living mulches were planted/sawn at the same time, the different covers were also applied at this time. The total experiment was divided into six different treatments (plus control) of which three were with covers and three were with living mulches. Once a week the number of leaves, the height and damages were read on ten of the plants from each parcel.

The recent development in society, such as the increased digitalisation, has brought new terms for both production and consumption within the cultural field. One of the main goals within Swedish Cultural Policies today is that everyone should have the same opportunities to practice and participate in cultural activities, with the right to develop their creative abilities. The cultural policies also contain the possibility to encourage spontaneous culture practice. The question is how to reach this goal.During the spring of 2012 I have been examining the term ?spontankultur? (spontaneous culture practice) as it appears in the discussion around participation in cultural activities and its connection to creativity.

During the second part of the 20th Century celebrities became more commonly used for commercial purposes as they could enhance purchase intentions, word-of-mouth- intentions and change attitudes towards brands and products. Over the last few years blogs and bloggers have become more and more used for product placing and the bloggers? power over consumers? behaviour has grown rapidly. The aim of this study is to compare a celebrity?s and a blogger?s impact on consumer behaviour and try to understand the underlying reasons why they do have such power over their audiences.

The usage of internet is growing significantly every year in today?s society and whether you like or not, the internet has an influence in your life. It is therefore important to find out how people are affected by its use. We have through our study interviewed a number of people that uses internet on a day to day basis, who have agreed to live without internet access for a period of time. We started out by interviewing these people about their internet usage and what it means to them, then proceeded with their non-internet access period.

This research analyzed differences in measurements of magnetic field strength and frequency response in five audio induction loops installed in rooms of wooden construction materials and five audio inductive loops installed in rooms of steel reinforced concrete constructions. The inductive loops were installed at floor level and the measurements were made at the listening height of 1.2m. Measurements of background noise, field strength and frequency response were made at fifteen different measurement points across the room. The research measurements showed that there are differences in field strength and frequency response between these two conditions, whether the audio induction loop is installed in a wooden construction or the audio induction loop is installed in a reinforced concrete construction. The results had a significance level of p=0,05..

The development of productivity in the construction industry has long been at a steady state compared to the manufacturing industry. Studies have shown that, amongst other things, waste on construction sites can reach up to one third of the total production cost. This has been observed from different aspects, and change is forthcoming.This thesis aims to provide a foundation for an increased productivity at production sites of building bridges. It is primarily based on a field study at Skanska, at a bridge construction site near Grängesberg. Via continuous interviews with the whole production crew, construction workers and management, information on interference and possibilities of improvement at the work site has been documented.

Through this thesis, we want to discuss how the marginalization of people, several precedent political, city planning- and engineering decisions resulted in a catastrophic outcome after hurricane Katrina in New Orleans 2005. We also put forward a case study of the Make It Right Foundation, to demonstrate how the residents of the Lower Ninth Ward are involved in the urban development of their community. We would like to draw attention to the power of citizens and how they can influence the urban development of a community after a trauma. This study also focuses on the mission of The Make It Right Foundation: which is to rebuild the Lower Ninth Ward with firm concepts on sustainable development where all dimensions are accounted: ecological, social, cultural and economic. The empirical data was collected by a field study in New Orleans 2010-03-22 and semistructured interviews were made during the same days..

In several cases, systems that have been developed have been very time consuming and cost a lot of money, but they still do not fulfil the users requirements and requests. To make new systems better, you have to find a way to communicate that allows the developers to understand the needs of the user. The aim for our thesis is to highlight the importance of communication in system development. To investigate this we have choosen to do a study of the real-estate system. The work methods that have been used include mock-ups and informal conversations with the user, who is employed by the Church of Sweden in Ronneby.

Large amounts of birch-timber are imported to Sweden, from particularly the Baltic States, since the domestic production can?t support the pulp industry. The goal of this study was to show the potential of birch and the area?s most suitable for birch production. The study was limited to Gävleborg County. Using site characteristics, site index (SI) for birch was estimated on all National Forest Inventory plots in Gävleborg County.