With an estimated 250 ethnic groups, Nigeria, no doubt, has been grappling with the problem of pluralism of ethnic nationalities. It is not news in Nigeria that extreme ethnic consciousness of its citizens has led to the victimization of one ethnic group by another. This victimization has come in the form of exclusions in the distribution of both wealth and power in the country.Amidst all the exclusions, the unity of the country has been ironically regarded as sacrosanct, and should not be negotiated. It is often said that fate brought all the ethnic nationalities in order to form one great country. I subscribe to this belief that fate brought us together for the above purpose, especially now that several countries around the world are merging in one way or the other to form a formidable force to reckon with both politically and economically.

Today, equine breeding is based on performance and conformation, resulting in a vast variation in fertility among different horses, with noticeable economic losses as a consequence. The horse breeding industry is therefore in need of methods that diagnose the spermatozoa concerning their quality and provide the best sperm for AI. The commonly used selection methods for sperm today are: centrifugation, where extender is added, the sample is centrifuged and then resuspended; swim-up self-migration; adherence separation; and density gradient centrifugation. However, none of these methods are in used routinely in practice before inseminating mares with fresh or cooled semen. The aim of this study was to evaluate a new selection method, Single Layer Centrifugation (SLC), and its effect on sperm viability. The viability was analyzed with regard to membrane integrity and membrane stability of ejaculated spermatozoa.

Background: Folate is a water - soluble vitamin necessary for normal DNA synthesis among  other mechanisms. Folate deficiency can cause megaloblastic anemia resulting from abnormal erythrocyte d evelopment. At the Department of Clinical Chemistry, Linköping, analysis of folate is performed with Siemens ADVIA Centaur® XP which uses an immunochemical method with chemiluminimetric detection. Currently, the assay is conducted on serum, is poured off and frozen after 48 h and treated with light protection because folate is considered to be light sensitive.Methods: This study tested lithium heparin plasma for analysis of folate with Siemens ADVIA Centaur® XP with the aim to be able to perform a package of analyzes in anemia investigation from the same collection tube. Furthermore, the stability of folate was studied for up to 168 h and examined regarding light sensitivity.Results: Statistically significant higher values were obtained in the analysis of folate in lithium heparin plasma than folate in serum (p < 0,001).

This essay deals with development in Latin America. We have picked out some factors that the theories in development theory emphasize on. The first section of the study consists of a statistical analysis, were the main purposes are to study the relationship between the independent variables and the dependent and to choose which two countries we should focus on in the next section. The countries we decided to study were Costa Rica and Nicaragua, because these countries have shown very different levels of development. From this study we have concluded that political stability, economical investements and human investments are the most important factors when creating development..

Large amounts of phosphorus (P) are lost from the arable land due to water erosion. Both phosphorus attached to particles and dissolved phosphorus (mainly phosphate) are transported away with drainage-water and surface runoff. Good soil structure is important in minimizing these losses. In this study, soils from 50 fields were analysed with respect to aggregate stability as measured by dispersion of clay together with the content of total phosphorus (TotP), particulate phosphorus (PP) and phosphate phosphorus (PO4P) in the water phase. All soils were clay soils with clay content varying between 21 and 54%.

System based models of plants rely on descriptions and assigned functions of genes, and currently 50% of the genes in Arabidopsis thaliana has either no assigned function or a function based on homology only. Mitogen activated protein kinases (MAPK's) are key players in cell signalling and are conserved among eukaryotes, though their targets are highly diverse. A recent study has described a small Arabidopsis protein (80), without homology to any described protein, as a phosphorylation target of the MAPK's MPK3/6. Further work established ?-glucan phosphorylase (PHS) as interacting with 80 and described a delayed senescence phenotype for 80 knock-out plants.

An inflammatory reaction is induced after release of proinflammatory mediators such asinterleukin 1 and 6 and tumour necrosis factor ?. These mediators stimulate the liver tosuppress the syntheses of albumin and endure the syntheses of acute phase protein forinstance C-reactive protein. The aim of this paper was to perform a method validation on animmune turbidimetric assay to quantify C-reactive protein in canine serum at the laboratory atSkara Animals Hospital, Skara, Sweden. The validation involved evaluation of the assaylinearity, precision, stability and recovery.The method was proved to be linear for both TruLab control and Medinor control.

The thesis aims to increase our understanding about parents reasoning about the elementary school choice by studying which factors parents perceive as important during the decision making process and also by giving meaning to Pierre Bourdieu?s concept of capital through the parents perspective. The empirical material comes from seven BNIM-interviews made with parents, which has been analyzed according to the thematic field analysis.The results show that the parents are not especially concerned about making an active school choice. Stability, closeness, friends, rumors, development and adaptability to the reality are the factors that are perceived as the most important in the decision making process. The school choice has a limited meaning as an investment in social capital, from Bourdieu?s perspective.

In industrial control systems PID-control remains the prevalent strategy, also for processes that would benefit from model based control. The purpose of this thesis is to evaluate whether model based control can be readily implemented in an industrial control system. To this end a simulated surge tank with a simulated industrial control system is studied. For evaluation two scenarios with specified objectives are selected.Following a review of LQR and versions of MPC, Predictive Functional Control (PFC) is considered the most suitable for implementation. PFC is a form of MPC developed with industrial applications in mind and therefore has several advantages for implementation in an industrial control system.

Denna rapport beskriver arbetet med utvecklingen av en ny modell för kaplanturbiner. Utvecklingen bygger på två kopplade differentialekvationer som under arbetets gång anpassats och implementerats i turbinmodellen.Modellen beskriver hur vattenflöde och turbinmoment påverkas av avvikelsen från den optimala kombineringskurvan för vinklarna på turbinens ledskena och löphjul, och är anpassad för ett referensaggregat med tillgängliga provdata. Även övriga enheter i vattenkraftaggregatet modelleras och sätts samman med frekvensregulator och elnät för att simulera aggregatets reglerstabilitet i önätsdrift.Verifieringen av turbinmodellen sker genom försök att återskapa de befintliga verkningsgradskurvorna med hjälp av modellen. Resultatet visar en god följning av de verkliga kurvformerna, dock med något lägre maximal verkningsgrad.Verifieringen av önätmodellen sker genom att prova stabiliteten i nätfrekvens och turbineffekt vid stegpålastningar. Resultatet ger en stabilare reglerstabilitet än i verkligheten, men uppfyller ändå förväntningarna på en fungerande modell.This report describes the development of a new kaplan turbine model.

The stability of railway embankment is essential for safe transport. In order to ensure safe transport, water should be allowed to freely drain. Furthermore, as the engine driver has to be able to see signs, and people working on the embankment are supposed to easily see flaws on the rails to ensure safety for the passing trains, plants should not be allowed to grow on the embankment. In Sweden there are 12 000 kilometers of railway tracks and 25?30 % of them are treated for weed control every year.

The result from Requirements Engineering is a Requirements Specification. Characteristics of a good Requirements Specification are unambiguity, completeness, verifiability, consistency, modifiability, traceability, correctness and ranked for importance and/or stability.This work defines these quality attributes and answers the questions how to reach these attributes and the diffuculties which exist in this area.This work should be read to get an overwiew of the area Requirements Engineering and Requirements Specification..

The purpose of the thesis Masculinities ? Gender and its Impact on the Social conditions of individuals is to perform a critical study of how gendered norms influence the social conditions of individuals. This has been done by a problematization and the attempt to answer the question of how the hegemonical masculinity can be analyzed as a discourse, and how the structural aspects of this discourse inflict on the social conditions of masculinities.The question was divided into the analytical themes: the boarders of the discourse, the institutionalization of the discourse, the actuation of the discourse and the agents of the discourse. The theoretical frame is constituted by the theory of discourse by Michel Foucault, the theory of the hegemonical masculinity by R.W. Connell and a subversive identity theory by Judith Butler.

The goal with our research has been to describe how often and in what way female athletes are represented in the sport section in Sweden?s biggest evening newspaper Aftonbladet. The material we?ve used are the newspapers that we collected during two weeks in 2008, the 3rd of November to the 9th of November and the 11th of November to the 17th of November. We?ve conduced two qualitative researches ? a text analysis and an image analysis ? and one quantitative analysis on our material.

TitleSystems, Stability and Power. The Discourse of Information in Organizing Knowledge.AbstractThe aim of this Master's thesis is to inquire into the consequences of an unequal distribution of power between information discourses in the field of knowledge organisation. A deconstruction of Jennifer Rowley's and John Farrows introductory textbook Organizing Knowledge from 2000 is related to the major discourses of information in LIS. Questions posed in this study are: What meaning is ascribed to information in the material studied? Which information discourses are given a dominant position? Which are excluded? and: How does this affect the construction of the library and information science student's identity, in relation to practices of knowledge organisation? The theoretical framework is provided by Ernesto Laclau's and Chantal Mouffe's theory of discourse and combined with techniques for text analysis originating from the work of Norman Fairclough.The analysis reveals a strong domination of a cognitive discourse of information that underlines the importance of information systems for the organisation of knowledge.