Expert system to calculate the cofficient of friction : an approach to enhance traffic safety

Friction plays a key role in causing slipperiness as a low coefficient of friction on the road may result in slippery and hazardous conditions. Analyzing the strong relation between friction and accident risk on winter roads is a difficult task. Many weather forecasting organizations use a variety of standard and bespoke methods to predict the coefficient of friction on roads. This article proposes an approach to predict the extent of slipperiness by building and testing an expert system. It estimates the coefficient of friction on winter roads in the province of Dalarna, Sweden using the prevailing weather conditions as a basis. Weather data from the road weather information system, Sweden (RWIS) was used. The focus of the project was to use the expert system as a part of a major project in VITSA, within the domain of intelligent transport systems

Creating Prestige and Global Networks through Conference Rituals

An international conference is a secular ritual which serves to create, recreate and shape global-wide translocal cultural sharings. Social anthropological theories and methods are used to show that, besides being an information flow junction, the international conference is a network crossroad and a way of socialising new members into aninternational research community. It is also capable of creating prestige and honour for the individual researcher,for the arranging research team, university and city. Rituals do not merely reflect the social relations or cosmology of a society, but are events that in themselves do important things through ritual forms and symbolic statements.

Report on IEA Task-14 activities on solar collector systems conference in Rome, 25-29 Jan. 1993

The memebers of IEA (International Energy Agency) Task 14 (Advaced Active Solar Systems) met in Rome during January 1993. The latest developments in several countries were presented and discussed during this meeting. This report describes briefly the recent work carried out on small scale systems in the Domestic Hot Water (DHW) working group of Task 14, as reported by the representatives from Canada, Denmark, Germany, Holland and Switzerland. Klaus Lorenz, SERC, attended the meeting as observer and presented our work on small-tube heat exchangers. Several participants expressed their interest. A summary of his presentation is included in this report.

Rapport från 20th European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference and Exhibition : Barcelona 6-10 juni 2005

På uppdrag av STEM bevakade Eva Lindberg från Centrum för solenergi-forskning, SERC, Högskolan Dalarna, 20th European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference and Exhibition, Barcelona, 6-10 juni 2005. Ca 1700 personer fanns på deltagarlistan. På grund av konferensen omfattning kan endast ett litet urval av föredrag och utställare kommenteras i rapporten. Konferensprogrammet var indelat på följande områden:1. Grundläggande fakta, nya komponenter och material2. Kristallina kiselsolceller and materialteknologi3. Amorft och mikrokristallint kisel4. CIS, CdTe och andra (II-VI) ternära tunnfilmsceller5. PV-moduler och komponenter i PV-system6. PV-system i nätanslutna applikationer7. Globala aspekter på PV-solelektricitet8. PV-industrins resultatFoU om kristallina solceller dominerade stort, sedan tunnfilmsceller av främst amorft kisel. Intressant var att återvinning är föremål för FoU; dels återvinning av kiselsolceller när panelen tjänat ut; dels återvinning av Cu, Cd, Se och Te när tunnfilmscellerna tas ur bruk.237 företag fanns representerade i utställningen, varav 20 från Kina. Tyskland dominerade stort. Utställningen teman var följande: 1) Tillverkare av kiselplattor, solceller, PV-moduler, koncentratorer, solföljare (se bild nedan) 2) Tillverkare och återförsäljare av utrustning och material 3) Integrering och distribution av system 4) Mätningar och kontrollteknologi 5) Forskning och laboratorier 6) Service, teknik, konsulting 7) Myndigheter och föreningar 8) Media och förlag 9) Tillverkare av inverterare 10) Övrigt.

A Consumer Surplus Estimate of Peace & Love festival in Borlänge : A Travel Cost Approach

This thesis uses zonal travel cost method (ZTCM) to estimate consumer surplus of Peace & Love festival in Borlänge, Sweden. The study defines counties as zones of origin of the visitors. Visiting rates from each zone are estimated based on survey data. The study is novel due to the fact that mostly TCM has been applied in the environmental and recreational sector, not for short term events, like P&L festival. The analysis shows that travel cost has a significantly negative effect on visiting rate as expected. Even though income has previously shown to be significant in similar studies, it turns out to be insignificant in this study. A point estimate for the total consumer surplus of P&L festival is 35.6 million Swedish kronor. However, this point estimate is associated with high uncertainty since a 95 % confidence interval for it is (17.9, 53.2). It is also important to note that the estimated value only represents one part of the total economic value, the other values of the festival's totaleconomic value have not been estimated in this thesis.

International conference site selection criteria : And a case study of Stockholm as an international conference city

The purpose of this thesis is to identify the destination site selection criteria for internationalconferences from the perspectives of the three main players of the conference industry,conference buyers (organizers and delegates) and suppliers. Additionally, the researchidentifies the strengths and weaknesses of the congress cities of Stockholm and Vienna.Through a comparison with Vienna, the top city for hosting international conferences, a roadmap for Stockholm has been designed, to strengthen its congress tourism opportunities, thus,obtaining a higher status as an international congress city. This qualitative research hascombined both primary and secondary data methods, through semi-standardized expertinterviews and secondary studies respectively, to fulfil the study’s aim. The data have beenanalysed by applying the techniques of qualitative content analysis; the secondary dataadopting an inductive approach according to Mayring (2003) while the expert interviewsusing a deductive approach according to Meuser & Nagel (2009). The conclusions of thesecondary data have been further compared and contrasted with the outcomes of the primarydata, to propose fresh discoveries, clarifications, and concepts related to the site selectioncriteria for international conferences, and for the congress tourism industry of Stockholm. Theresearch discusses the discoveries of the site selection criteria, the implications of thestrengths and weaknesses of Stockholm in comparison to Vienna, recommendations forStockholm via a road map, and future research areas in detail. The findings andrecommendation, not only provide specific steps and inceptions that Stockholm as aninternational conference city can apply, but also propose findings, which can aid conferencebuyers and suppliers to cooperate, to strengthen their marketing strategies and developsuccessful international conferences and destinations to help achieve a greater competitiveadvantage.

Peace & Love 2011 : Uppskattning av festivalens ekonomiska betydelse via segmenteringsansatsen

Syftet med denna rapport är att kartlägga samt värdera och presentera ekonomiska effekterkopplade till Peace & Love festivalen 2011 genom att tillämpa segmenteringsansatsen.Utgångspunkten är en uppdelning av festivalbesökarna i olika kategorier (segment) som därefteranvänds för att skatta den direkta ekonomiska effekten av festivalen. Uppskattningen av deekonomiska effekter som presenteras är baserade på enkätsvar från 1036 festivalbesökare samt1540 intervjuer vid entréerna. Resultatet från studien pekar på att den traditionella metoden med uppskattning av effekter via enuppdelning av konsumtion mellan turister och icke turister överskattar den totala effekten jämförtmed uppskattning via boendesegmentering med ca 10 procent. Den totala effekten viaboendesegmentering uppskattas till dryga 185 Mkr. Besökarnas konsumtion i samband medPeace & Love festivalen kan omräknas till 61,85 helårsverken. Peace & Love festivalen beräknasskapa drygt 22 helårsverken inom restaurang och handel i Borlängeregionen utöver de 23helårsverken som festivalorganisationen skapar.

Peace & Love 2010 : Värderade och icke-värderade ekonomiska effekter

Denna rapport syftar till at kartlägga samt värderat och presenterat ekonomiska effekter koppladetill Peace & Love festivalen 2010. Utgångspunkten är en definition av festivalens intressenter.Uppskattningen av de ekonomiska effekter som presenterats är baserade på enkätsvar från 519festivalbesökare. Resultaten från studien pekar på att festivalbesökare definierade som turister igenomsnitt spenderar drygt 2000 kr i samband med sitt besök exklusive utgifter för resa ochfestivalbiljett. Den totala festivalkopplade konsumtionen beräknas till 154 Mkr genom attmultiplicera siffrorna för genomsnittlig festivalkonsumtion för en besökare med det totala antaletbetalande besökare. Studien visar också att det finns ett betydande läckage ur den regionalaekonomin till följd av att försäljare inom festivalområdet kommer från andra delar i Sverige.Peace & Love-festivalens bidrag till den lokala ekonomin inklusive biljettintäkter beräknas istudien till 89 Mkr. Slutligen pekar studien på att fördjupade studier innehållande en mernoggrann uppskattning över besökargruppernas andelar respektive konsumtion krävs vid nästaårs festival för att säkerställa de resultat denna studie redovisar.

Distance teacher education – some experiences from Dalarna University, SwedenPaper presented at the 33rd Annual ATEE Conference Brussels, Belgium, 23rd – 27th August 2008

Distance teaching is now-a-days used in different shapes. However, it is something different from traditional campus organised education as it systematically uses Information Communication Technology (ICT) as a key element. When the distance teacher education started in Sweden many teacher educators doubted the wisdom of this. They expressed that the educational process to become a teacher would be deteriorated. For instance, they feared for high drop out rates and difficulties to examine in a proper way. The Swedish National Agency for Higher Education has recently edited a report that showed that this form of teacher education was well adapted to the labour market, but the possibilities for the teacher students to shape their education were relatively limited. However, we still know quite little about the effects of this way to educate teacher students. This paper explores the possibility of using distance teacher education.In a case study 20 students, who were the first to finish a complete a distance teacher education at Högskolan Dalarna, were asked in a questionnaire how they had apprehended their education. We also interviewed four of these students, as well as five teacher educators.One of our findings were that the distance teacher education reached new target groups, who not had been able to participate in university studies if it not had been offered in this form. Especially, this was valid for the middle-aged women, living a long distance away from a university, with social responsibilities for children or old parents. Other findings were that these students in general were target oriented and ambitious, wrote more than the campus students and developed that kind of skill better. Marratech, an ICT system for small groups, e-mail and chat were used for the communication. Marratech was considered to permit free and spontaneous communication, both of the teacher educators and the students. Initially the teacher educators were sceptical to distance teacher education, but afterwards they were surprised of how well it had worked. They declared that they had better and nearer contact with their students and more control over the students´ performance, but some parts of the teacher education were better suitable for campus education, for example, power of creating characters. Distance teacher education was considered time consuming and demanded much activity from the teacher educators as the students wanted rapid responses. This study indicates that distance teacher education works well for mature individuals with high motivation. However, it demands more time from the teacher educators, but it gives in general good results. Still, there are pedagogical challenges to overcome. Maybe we should reflect on a mix of distance teacher education and campus based teacher education, instead of separated ways of accomplishing teacher education?

Forskningscirklar - en arena där lärares syn på vad deras arbete resulterar i kan utmanas. : Paper presented at NFPS:s conference in Copenhagen 7-9 March, 2003

Lärare kan i första hand antas bilda sig sin uppfattning om resultatet av sitt arbete genom vad de kan observera av det som sker med deras elever. Vad har då denna erfarenhetsbaserade kunskap för betydelse för hur de uppfattar sitt arbete? I Sverige har t ex forskningscirklar använts i skolan, där lärare arbetar tillsammans med forskare, för att bearbeta frågeställningar som lärare möter i sin vardag. Kan forskningscirklar då vara ett sätt att utmana lärares syn på vilka resultat som deras arbete leder till?Från dessa utgångspunkter förefaller det vara relevant att ställa frågan om dessa sk forskningscirklar också kan vara en mötesplats där lärares syn på vilka resultat som deras arbete leder till utmanas? Följande frågeställning formuleras:• På vilken utsträckning kan forskningscirklar fungera som ett sätt att öppna nya infallsvinklar på hur lärare ser på resultatet av sitt arbete?