Benthic diatoms are used in Sweden for monitoring water quality in run-ning water; the method is also frequently used in other countries in Europe. One of the problems of the diatom method is the need for sedimentation of the fresh sample, to be able to decant the over standing water and add alco-hol as a preservations solution. To my knowledge, no results have been published about how long the settling time must be to ensure that the ben-thic diatoms really have settled down to avoid a loss of the diatoms when decanting the over standing water. The aim of my investigation was to improve the Swedish method where the benthic diatoms are used for water quality monitoring. I wanted to find out the appropriate time necessary to wait until all diatoms have settled down before decanting the over standing water. First, fresh benthic diatom samples were taken in the river Fyrisån and the lake Mälaren on different days. After arriving in the laboratory, I waited three different times (30 min, 60 and 180 min) for the diatoms to settle.

In this report a study is carried out with the aim to identify added values of EPC projects implemented in schools in order to increase the interest of EPC projects on the market. The report examines how the planned maintenance, supervision, maintenance and corrective maintenance is affected, how insurance premiums and terms are affected, the indoor environment and how the tasks of the operating staff is changing. A literature study of energy savings, energy use in schools, maintenance and insurance as well as how energy efficiency improvements are related to the Swedish environmental objectives has been made. Visits were carried out in Ludvika, interviews were also carried out with operation technicians and local strategists in Ludvika as well as employees of insurance companies.Schools often have neglected maintenance and problems with ventilation and indoor environment. Schools also have a large energy saving potential due to their low utilization, mainly because they are empty parts of the year.

The aim of this master thesis was to create a dynamic model for the processes in a solid fuel boiler of the moving grate type. Another aim with the model was to keep it as simple as possible but still able to catch the dynamics of the processes in the bedplate of the boiler. The creation of the model had its origin from drying and combustion equations used in earlier modeling work of boilers. The represented model has been used to simulate different kinds of disturbances in a boiler and different ways to control the boiler. These tests show that controlling a number of parameters in the bed of the boiler is an effective way to keep the grate stable during disturbances.

To be able to provide the growing human population with food, the productivity of the animals as well as land use needs to be improved and intensified. Hence, understanding the behavior of animals is crucial both for animal welfare and productivity as well as the management of the cattle. There are many factors affecting the grazing behavior of cattle in tropical conditions, such as human-animal interactions, herd management, breed, season and temperature. The purpose of this study was to investigate the grazing behavior of two tropical cattle breeds, Ankole and Boran cattle. Kenyan Boran belongs to a zebu type of cattle and is preferred to many other breeds due to the higher productive and reproductive capacity and adaptability to tropical conditions.

What is creativity? Why is it important? How can you stimulate pupils to becomemore creative? These are some of the questions that are studied in this thesis.The discussion is focused on programming as the medium of creativity and theresult is a setup for a course book that teaches programming at the same time asit makes the reader more creative. The results are based on literature study aswell as observations and interviews with teachers and pupils from three differentschools in Stockholm, Sweden. The study shows that gets more important everyday as more and more jobs are replaced by computers and we live in an age ofabundance. The teachers would like the pupils to be more creative but don?tknow how achieve that at the same time as they have to teach them everythingthat they are supposed to know when the course ends..

Logistics and supply chain management in the construction sector is an area with great potential for improvements. Today, a lot of the workers time is spent on non-value adding activities. Research has shown that waste is a large proportion of the total production cost in building projects today.The purpose of this report is to analyze problems concerning logistics in the construction sector. Two of Skanska?s construction projects in Uppsala have been analyzed to identify problems.

Swedish childcare has undergone radical changes in the last 15 to 20 years. It has evolved from kindergarten to pre-school, in other words, gone from simple childcare to an active learning environment with the child as the center. Official documents, such as the pre-school curriculum and other guide documents, define the role and work ethics of the pre-school teacher. In my thesis I argue that it is essential to have an ongoing and continuous discussion at pre-schools on the practical applications of these frameworks and ambitious goals.What do you do when you simply cannot give every child the individual time they should have according to rules and regulations? How do you stay an active and present pedagogue in today?s pre-school with large classes and heavy workloads? How do you establish a common professional work ethics within a pre-school so that all children are treated equally? In my scientific essay, I examine these issues based on a real-life situation: Ellen in the hallway.A pedagogue must continuously make balanced decisions based on rules and regulations, on life- and work experience which, in many cases, contradict each other.

The purpose of this essay was to find out if it is possible to:? Detect different groups of gender among children in grave materiel and church art and if that was the case, in what way?? What different groups of children can be seen in these two categories?? What does the material say about children's position in society? The time span is from early Christian time to 17-th century and the geographical region is Sweden and Denmark. I got my information from published literature and different pages on the Internet. The conclusions were that gender among children can be detected in both types of material but different groups were not ?visible? to the same degree.

The purpose of this paper is to clarify and understand the difference between Brunius?, Zettervall's and Graebe's valueing of a historical building, the cathedral of Lund. Between 1833 and 1963 the cathedral of Lund went through three larger restorations. The character of the restorations however differs a lot between the three church architects, Brunius, Zettervall and Graebe. In a time of low interest for the Middle Ages and of many demolitions of churches in the countryside, Brunius stood out as a researcher and an enthusiast of that special time.

To investigate adoptions are part of the social worker's duties. The aim of our study was to examine some adoptive parents, to internationally adopted children, experience of adopting, the time before the adoption, the adoption process, and the time after the adoption. The study is based on qualitative interviews with seven adoptive parents. Theoretical frameworks that have been used are a phenomenological perspective, the dramaturgical perspective of Goffman and the theory of rites of passage.The result of our study shows that the adoptive parents have tried ?everything? to be-come parents in a biological way before they came to the decision to adopt.

The purpose of this master's thesis is to examine and compare the process of starting a school library at schools which haven't had a school library before, and to examine and compare the experience of this process according to the principals and the persons responsible for the school library.I have examined two Swedish independent primary schools (age 6-15 years). I have made qualitative interviews with the principals and the persons responsible for the new school library. In all, I have made seven interviews. As requested by the new Swedish Educational Act, both schools had recently started creating school libraries. One of the schools had recruited a half-time teacher-librarian and the other had no staffing at all.In the interviews, I have examined the attitudes of the informants towards school libraries, if this attitude has changed during the process of starting the school library, the informants' experiences during this process and the informants' views on the school library as an agent for student achievement.

The main purpose of this bachelor thesis is to create a product in the form of a database that can be used for cost estimates of equipment within bio refineries. Through interviews and literature searches the key components and their costs were identified. The database was constructed in Microsoft Excel with different tabs for different categories of components; these tabs are further divided into three parts: one part with costs, one part with calculations and an information part. Most of the part with costs contains the expenses found in scientific papers during the literature study, the calculating part converts different capacities according to user preferences and the currency to euro (?) from 2010 and the information part consists of references and information about what is included in the cost.The database is a good tool for making cost estimates for bio refineries.

The main purpose of this bachelor thesis is to create a product in the form of a database that can be used for cost estimates of equipment within bio refineries. Through interviews and literature searches the key components and their costs were identified. The database was constructed in Microsoft Excel with different tabs for different categories of components; these tabs are further divided into three parts: one part with costs, one part with calculations and an information part. Most of the part with costs contains the expenses found in scientific papers during the literature study, the calculating part converts different capacities according to user preferences and the currency to euro (?) from 2010 and the information part consists of references and information about what is included in the cost.The database is a good tool for making cost estimates for bio refineries.

This report describes a new foundation method and compares it with a traditional founding of concrete. This new method is called the Koljern technique and uses cellular glass which is called Foamglas. The Foamglas is compounded to founding elements by lightweight steel beams. Foamglas is an insulation material with high compressive strength, and is rot, insect, vermin and acid proof. The cellular glass is also fire proof and watertight, which makes it a very good construction material.The report contains a study of a number of cases for which the Koljern technique is compared with a foundation of concrete.

The purpose of this Master's thesis is to contribute to a betterunderstanding of children's free time reading book practices by studyingpupils in the school library and their processes of finding and borrowingbooks for themselves to read silently in the classroom, so called free timereading books. The study also includes observations of the staff's role,particularly the school librarian's in supporting pupil's book selection.The empirical material consists of field notes from an etnographic studywhere pupils in 4th grade (aged 10-11) and staff were observed duringthree school library visits. The theoretical framework is inspired byLennart Björneborn's concepts of information practices in libraries:serendipity, integrative library interface, mediation flow and affordancespaces.The study shows that pupils' search for free time reading books in theschool library is relatively routine-based at the same time as it isspontaneous. The process is an interplay with factors such as time,display and interaction in the integrative library interface. In the presenceof adults, finding books becomes an imposed task for the pupils.