Mesoscale dynamics and boundary-layer structure in topographically forced low-level jets

Two types of mesoscale wind-speed jet and their effects on boundary-layer structure were studied. The first is a coastal jet off the northern California coast, and the second is a katabatic jet over Vatnajökull, Iceland. Coastal regions are highly populated, and studies of coastal meteorology are of general interest for environmental protection, fishing industry, and for air and sea transportation. Not so many people live in direct contact with glaciers but properties of katabatic flows are important for understanding glacier response to climatic changes. Hence, the two jets can potentially influence a vast number of people. Flow response to terrain forcing, transient behavior in time and space, and adherence to simplified theoretical models were examined. The turbulence structure in these stably stratified boundary layers was also investigated. Numerical modeling is the main tool in this thesis; observations are used primarily to ensure a realistic model behavior. Simple shallow-water theory provides a useful framework for analyzing high-velocity flows along mountainous coastlines, but for an unexpected reason. Waves are trapped in the inversion by the curvature of the wind-speed profile, rather than by an infinite stability in the inversion separating two neutral layers, as assumed in the theory. In the absence of blocking terrain, observations of steady-state supercritical flows are not likely, due to the diurnal variation of flow criticality. In many simplified models, non-local processes are neglected. In the flows studied here, we showed that this is not always a valid approximation. Discrepancies between simulated katabatic flow and that predicted by an analytical model are hypothesized to be due to non-local effects, such as surface inhomogeneity and slope geometry, neglected in the theory. On a different scale, a reason for variations in the shape of local similarity scaling functions between studies is suggested to be differences in non-local contributions to the velocity variance budgets.

Skyddandets förnuft : En studie om anhöriga till hjälpbehövande äldre som invandrat sent i livet

This dissertation aims to examine and deepen the knowledge of family member caregiving where the care recipient is an elderly person who immigrated late in life. It also aims to contribute to the knowledge of the complexities underlying informal care giving and add to our understandings of what it means to be an immigrant in Sweden. The caregiver is in focus. The research conducted is explorative and partly inductive. The main material used is a qualitative interview study carried out with family members from different countries who are providing informal care to elderly immigrant relatives. The analysis gives three patterns of caregiving. One shows help from informal caregivers only who are not compensated economically. Another shows help from family members who are compensated. The third shows help from family members and staff from the public care system. Three ideal-typical informal caregiver roles show different positions vis-à-vis the new: “guardian”, “filter” and “reinterpreter of traditional care ideals”. Swedish born and immigrated informal caregivers are also compared through analysis of data gathered in telephone interviews with a representative selection of inhabitants in the County of Stockholm. A philosophy of action together with theory on integration and multiculturalism serves as theoretical frameworks to understand discrepancies and ambiguities in the data. Young immigrants experience different integration processes than do the older ones. They strive to protect older family members from changes linked to the migration experience. Talk about dependence on culture underlines family feelings and legitimates the processes of protection. Preconceptions about great differences between Swedish born and immigrant families are not supported by quantitative data. A conclusion is that protection can be understood in relation both to the traditional and the new, the latter in the forms of meetings with Swedish society where unequal relations prevail. It is a kind of counter-strategy where the range of actions is diminished, and thus it has its own logic. Protection can be loosened up when the circumstances change and the range of actions grow.

Group I Introns and Homing Endonucleases in T-even-like Bacteriophages

Homing endonucleases are rare-cutting enzymes that cleave DNA at a site near their own location, preferentially in alleles lacking the homing endonuclease gene (HEG). By cleaving HEG-less alleles the homing endonuclease can mediate the transfer of its own gene to the cleaved site via a process called homing, involving double strand break repair. Via homing, HEGs are efficiently transferred into new genomes when horizontal exchange of DNA occurs between organisms. Group I introns are intervening sequences that can catalyse their own excision from the unprocessed transcript without the need of any proteins. They are widespread, occurring both in eukaryotes and prokaryotes and in their viruses. Many group I introns encode a HEG within them that confers mobility also to the intron and mediates the combined transfer of the intron/HEG to intronless alleles via homing. Bacteriophage T4 contains three such group I introns and at least 12 freestanding HEGs in its genome. The majority of phages besides T4 do not contain any introns, and freestanding HEGs are also scarcely represented among other phages. In the first paper we looked into why group I introns are so rare in phages related to T4 in spite of the fact that they can spread between phages via homing. We have identified the first phage besides T4 that contains all three T-even introns and also shown that homing of at least one of the introns has occurred recently between some of the phages in Nature. We also show that intron homing can be highly efficient between related phages if two phages infect the same bacterium but that there also exists counteracting mechanisms that can restrict the spread of introns between phages. In the second paper we have looked at how the presence of introns can affect gene expression in the phage. We find that the efficiency of splicing can be affected by variation of translation of the upstream exon for all three introns in T4. Furthermore, we find that splicing is also compromised upon infection of stationary-phase bacteria. This is the first time that the efficiency of self-splicing of group I introns has been coupled to environmental conditions and the potential effect of this on phage viability is discussed. In the third paper we have characterised two novel freestanding homing endonucleases that in some T-even-like phages replace two of the putative HEGs in T4. We also present a new theory on why it is a selective advantage for freestanding, phage homing endonucleases to cleave both HEG-containing and HEG-less genomes.

Att marknadsföra med musik : en studie kring musik i reklamfilm och en artistprofils påverkan på ett varumärke

Due to the current digitalization of the music industry it has become more important than ever for musicians to get their music placed in advertising. This process is frequently described as a win-win situation for both sides: the musician gets money and exposure while the brand gets to ride on the musician’s pop-cultural position in society. The following thesis is focused on identifying the different ways brands work with music in their TV-advertising, and what effects the brand of the featured artist might have on the brand itself. Using text analysis, six advertisements all shown on Swedish TV during the first half of 2016 were analyzed, with the result that four major recurring themes were identified: nostalgia, text-related usage, making the advert memorable and making the advert into entertainment. The study also found three ways in which a band profile could serve a brand: (I) to make the advert an artifact of popular culture, (II) to let the brand ride on the bands success, (III) to give credibility to the brand. The study was based on brand theory, sensory branding and semiotics as well as David Hurons theory on the different usages of music in advertising.