After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 the satellite states of the former Communist bloc immediately departed on a journey towards democracy and market capitalism. Among the many tasks of the newly elected governments, one was to transform the paternalist Communist welfare state into a social system that would decrease the oversized role of the state, at the same time as protecting the citizens from the hardships ensued from the transition.I have studied the evolution of new welfare systems in the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary, three countries generally agreed as the most similar and most successfull transition countries of the Eastern bloc. Gøsta Esping-Andersen's prominent typology of welfare regimes, consisting of the liberal, corporatist and social democratic regime-types, has constituted the theoretical basis of the analysis. Simultaneously, applying new cases to the typology implies an element of theory testing.The study shows that 40 years of Communism and partial isolation from the West has not prevented these three countries from developing welfare states fully compatible with those of Western Europe and the Anglo-Saxon nations and that all three of them in fact fall within the scope of the corporatist regime-type..

Bipolar disorder is a severe, affective illness which causes a person to alternate between episodes of pathologically elevated mood (mania) and depression ? in between these episodes the mood is normal. The length and intervals between the episodes are highly variable among the ill, as are the severity which is divided into two major subgroups: bipolar I and II. Bipolar I disorder is the most severe because of the patient?s inability to realize that he or she is currently in a manic phase, in the case of bipolar II disorder, the patient is aware that he or she has an abnormally raised mood, a state which is called hypomanic state instead of manic.

This pre-study investigates the possibility of U-value measurements through an acoustic method. A hypothesis about an acoustic model built on acoustic theories combined with U-value theories is presented to answer the questions: ? Can U-value theory be combined with acoustic theories? ? Can the coefficient of heat be affirmed trough an acoustic measurement? The idea for this dissertation begun with a logical idea in mathematical similarity, between the coefficient of heat transmission units and sound intensity units. The U-value theory is based on assumptions such as initial resistance for inner walls and initial resistance for outer walls. The resistance in the material is interpreted through sound intensity theory. The argument is built upon mass law theory, which means if the frequency or thickness of the material layer doubles it implies an increase of sound reduction by 6 dB.

This project will search for the sound in the contemporary landscape architecture, an attempt to combine music and land­scaping. In a first stage, I have searched for outdoor environments where loudspeakers are used, and sites with a concious sound design. The project will result in a sound design created for the park Frodeparken in Uppsala, Sweden. In my search for sites and examples of conscious sound, I have talked to the people behind the projects I found - landscape architects, sound artists and architects. Influences from different areas have been essential for me in the project.

This degree project has been performed along with Classic Garden in Gothenburg andBallongfirman Far & Flyg in Stockholm. Together we have developed a sun- wind- andrain protection. The protection is permanently assembled and mainly intended for publicenvironments as restaurants and outdoor cafés.The design on the sun protection was already done so our task has been to develop theconstruction and to build a prototype in scale 1:4 and one in scale 1:1. The look of thesun protection is approximately as the name implies, equal an igloo. The lamellae aregoing to fold out in different steps all the way down to the ground and the both sides willbe independently of each other.The first stage in the project was to develop differently principle proposal on how thefunction will work when folding in and out the protection.

Several studies has identified the locker room experience as a potential deterrent for participation in physical education. Both psychological and physical issues arise due to several factors. Psychological issues include different kinds of verbal and physical violations, comparisons between pupils, feeling of vulnerability along with a stressful schedule. The physical environment can contribute to negative experience for pupils in terms of filthy premises and cold showers. These factors may contribute to higher absentee rates in physical education.

Background: Sweden and the rest of the world went through the biggest financial crisis at the end of 2008 since the 1930s. The major Swedish banks have goodwill related to their acquisitions inside and outside Scandinavia. Swedbank, SEB and Nordea has acquired in the Baltic countries and Russia, however Handelsbanken has established itself in Great Britain. The crisis in the Baltic countries led that real wages fell, unemployment rose, real estate prices collapsed and the number of borrowers who had trouble repaying their loans increased rapidly. All this led to the problem of impairment of goodwill in the Swedish banks that had expanded rapidly in the Baltic countries.Aim: The aim of this study is to investigate the application of IFRS 3 in Swedish banks before, during and after the financial crisis, and to investigate the low-downs in the four majorSwedish banks in 2006-2010.Completion: The study is primarily based on the case studies by the examination of the annual reports from all banks as well as evaluation of the interviews.The authors have chosen to makea strategic choice of a small number of cases through the concentration on the impairment of goodwill in the bank sector of Sweden.Results: The result of this study is that there are problems for banks in implementation of IFRS 3 in practice because of insufficient information in the banks' financial statements.Generous estimates used in the calculation of impairment testing.

There have been, in some rare cases, difficulties with clamping of inserts with U-holesin their tool holder. According to the complaints, the inserts could not be properlyclamped or could fracture when clamped. A study has shown that variations inclamping behaviour are mainly depending by the position of the screw hole in the toolholder and the centering of the screw hole in the insert.The focus of this project has been the centering of screw hole in insert. It has beenshown that the screw holes are not always enough centered in the insert. Theproblem may occur after a certain step in the production, i.e.

This thesis was made possible by the company Verendus system AB, which is the leading developer of dealership management systems in the caravan and camper market. The goal of the thesis was to create a statistics module for a new producer system envisioned by Verendus. The new system is aimed at manufacturers and importers of caravans and campers, with the goal of enabling its users to create more effective production lines. By providing statistical data to mentioned users they will be able to predict market trends and customize their production lines accordingly. Today such software does not exist which leads Verendus to think that its arrival would lead to a success on the market.Before the development and design of the producer system began, a new agile method had to be developed, MAM (Minimum Agile Method).

The master thesis, conducted at Metrima AB, concerns the development of a non-intrusivedistribution meter as a basis for individual tap water billing in apartments.The project is conducted in response to the market interest in individual tap water billing inapartments as an answer to environmental concerns regarding water consumption. Due to thehigh installation cost of traditional water meters, a new method of determining waterconsumption, without having to cut water pipes, is proposed.The proposed method distributes the total water consumption for an apartment complex toindividual apartments according to distribution meters, measuring water run-time, in eachapartment. The water run-time is estimated by measuring the water pipe?s outward vibrationsand temperature changes.A test environment was established and a prototype built, using a tilt- and vibration sensor forvibration sensing and a precision temperature sensor to measure temperature changes. As bothsensors work well in the test environment, further testing was done in 3 apartments for aduration of 5 days.

Problem formulation: This paper will examine how the capital structure of firms affects their market valuation by applying the Modigliani-Miller theory on Swedish listed companies in a boom and a recession. The study will examine whether it is possible to draw any conclusions as to whether companies with high debt to equity ratios are valued lower in a recession, in comparison to companies with low debt to equity ratios.Purpose: To empirically test the Modigliani-Miller theory of capital structure in a boom and a recession in order to see if the companies? market value is affected differently depending on whether they have a high or a low debt to equity ratios.Methodology: The essay has a deductive and a quantitative methodological approach. Data analysis was done through a correlation analysis, a regression analysis and a hypothesis testing.Theory: The Modigliani-Miller theory of capital structure with taxes states that companies with a high debt to equity ratios has a higher value. One of the risks with a high level of debt could be that during a financial downturn companies have more difficulty realizing capital and are thus more likely to go bankrupt.Conclusions: The study shows results that are contrary to the Modigliani-Miller's theory; all the correlation analyses between debt to equity ratios and market value are negative.

Along with rising energy prices and increasing awareness of environmental issues, the criteria for buildings energy performance have been sharpened through the years. Today, ?passive house? and ?low energy house? are commonly used phrases in the construction industry and is expected to become increasingly common in the future.For houses with well-insulated building envelope the importance of well constructed details increases when minimizing the heat losses. Examples of these details are floor-wall junction and window openings in the wall. In such connections thermal bridges occur, which means that heat more easily is transported out of the building, compared to the rest of the building envelope.This report deals with detail solutions around windows and a comparison between a traditional slab and a foundation from Koljern consisting of foam glass.

By applying a segmentation procedure to two different sets of computed tomography scans, two geometrical models of the abdominal aorta, containing one inlet and two outlets have been constructed. One of these depicts a healthy blood vessel while the other displays one afflicted with a Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm. After inputting these geometries into the computational dynamics software FLUENT, six simulations of laminar, stationary flow of a fluid that was assumed to be Newtonian were performed. The mass flow rate across the model outlet boundaries was varied for the different simulations to produce a basis for a parameter analysis study. The segmentation data was also used as input data to a surface description procedure which produced not only the surface itself, but also the first and second directional derivatives in every one of its defining spatial data points.

This literature study concerned the use and function of the radioactive isotope carbon-14, as a dating method of organic material, within the scientific field of physical geography. In this report it is presented the need of atmospheric calibration curves and the development of these as a necessity to translate carbon-14 years to calibrated calendar years. A number of common age-depth models that is used to give an approximation of an accumulation sequence and its related dates over the actual time period in different natural archives is presented and discussed. Different problems that commonly occur when age-depth models are utilized as for instance reservoir effects, contaminations or other age deviations are addressed and analyzed. The software CLAM in presented and discussed and was also used to produce age-depth models.

The project, Flexible Snowboard System, has been carried out by the project group independently and is a module developed for snowboarders, ski rentals and ski schools. The problems of today?s solutions are that they cause the user an inconvenient standing position when riding the ski lift or skating the transportation slope, also mounting, adjustments and disassembling of the bindings are time consuming and brings undesired wear to the screws and screw holes. In addition any adjustments require that the user steps out of the bindings and have tools at hand. Flexible Snowboard System is a universal module which means that it can be assembled with all of today?s snowboards and bindings.