| 1. |
- Hedenborg White, Manon
(författare)
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The Eloquent Blood : The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism
- 2017
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The study analyses the changing construction of femininities and feminine sexuality in interpretations of the goddess Babalon, a central deity in Aleister Crowley’s (1875–1947) esoteric religion Thelema. Femininity has occupied a problematic position in feminist theory, frequently associated with lack, artifice, and restriction. However, this study assumes that femininities are multiple, neither exclusively heterosexual nor limited to women, and can be constructed in ways that challenge the existing gender system. Based on historical and contemporary written sources, qualitative interviews, and ethnographic fieldwork in the Anglo-American esoteric milieu, the study utilises Mimi Schippers’ model of multiple femininities to analyse the Babalon discourse from the fin-de-siècle until today, against the background of shifting perceptions of femininity and feminine sexuality. Inspired by Luce Irigaray’s theorisation of sexual difference, Rosi Braidotti’s concept of feminist figurations, and Catherine Waldby’s notion of erotic destruction, a central question is whether Babalon can function as a figuration enabling new ways of articulating and inhabiting femininities. Reworking the negative feminine stereotype of the femme fatale, Crowley connected Babalon to an initiatory imperative of ego-annihilation, epitomising both feminine, erotic otherness and a feminised receptive modality required of all seekers. Crowley also linked Babalon with liberated female sexuality. Babalon has subsequently been interpreted by other esotericists, including John W. Parsons (1914–1952), who constructed the goddess as a feminist revolutionary; and Kenneth Grant (1924–2011), who equated Babalon with the sex magical priestess and notions of non-dual void preceding manifest creation, linking femininity to the dissolution of stable meaning. Growing awareness of feminism and LGBTQ issues in Anglo-American esotericism from the 1990s on has coincided with the increased visibility of female esotericists as ideology producers within the Babalon discourse. The contemporary Babalon discourse emphasises the feminine, desiring subject as sacred, and connected to the simultaneous threat and promise of the undoing of bounded subjectivity. The study shows how a previously derogatory feminine stereotype is reworked over time in ways that both reproduce and challenge hegemonic notions of femininity, arguing that Babalon functions as a situated and contingent figuration supporting the articulation of alternative ways of doing femininity and feminine sexuality.
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| 2. |
- Javadi, Mohammad Saleh, 1986-
(författare)
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Computer Vision Algorithms for Intelligent Transportation Systems Applications
- 2018
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Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- In recent years, Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) have emerged asan efficient way of enhancing traffic flow, safety and management. Thesegoals are realized by combining various technologies and analyzing the acquireddata from vehicles and roadways. Among all ITS technologies, computervision solutions have the advantages of high flexibility, easy maintenanceand high price-performance ratio that make them very popular fortransportation surveillance systems. However, computer vision solutionsare demanding and challenging due to computational complexity, reliability,efficiency and accuracy among other aspects. In this thesis, three transportation surveillance systems based on computervision are presented. These systems are able to interpret the imagedata and extract the information about the presence, speed and class ofvehicles, respectively. The image data in these proposed systems are acquiredusing Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) as a non-stationary sourceand roadside camera as a stationary source. The goal of these works is toenhance the general performance of accuracy and robustness of the systemswith variant illumination and traffic conditions. This is a compilation thesis in systems engineering consisting of threeparts. The red thread through each part is a transportation surveillancesystem. The first part presents a change detection system using aerial imagesof a cargo port. The extracted information shows how the space isutilized at various times aiming for further management and developmentof the port. The proposed solution can be used at different viewpoints andillumination levels e.g. at sunset. The method is able to transform the imagestaken from different viewpoints and match them together. Thereafter,it detects discrepancies between the images using a proposed adaptive localthreshold. In the second part, a video-based vehicle's speed estimationsystem is presented. The measured speeds are essential information for lawenforcement and they also provide an estimation of traffic flow at certainpoints on the road. The system employs several intrusion lines to extractthe movement pattern of each vehicle (non-equidistant sampling) as an inputfeature to the proposed analytical model. In addition, other parameters such as camera sampling rate and distances between intrusion lines are alsotaken into account to address the uncertainty in the measurements and toobtain the probability density function of the vehicle's speed. In the thirdpart, a vehicle classification system is provided to categorize vehicles into\private car", \light trailer", \lorry or bus" and \heavy trailer". This informationcan be used by authorities for surveillance and development ofthe roads. The proposed system consists of multiple fuzzy c-means clusterings using input features of length, width and speed of each vehicle. Thesystem has been constructed by using prior knowledge of traffic regulationsregarding each class of vehicle in order to enhance the classification performance.
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| 3. |
- Oude Groeniger, Hans, 1993-
(författare)
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Quiescent regimes in cosmology
- 2023
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis is about cosmological solutions to Einstein’s equations of general relativity, in particular spacetimes whose mean curvature diverges. Moreover, we consider anisotropic spacetimes with big bang singularities. In this setting the singularity is expected to generically be oscillatory if no matter is present. However, complementary to an oscillatory singularity is the notion of quiescence, i.e. the convergence of the eigenvalues of the expansion-normalized Weingarten map . This thesis contains results related to two regimes in which quiescence is expected to occur, namely the presence of certain geometrical features or the satisfaction of an algebraic condition on the eigenvalues of .Paper A is concerned with Bianchi type spacetimes with an orthogonal perfect fluid, and we show that generically their initial singularity is anisotropic and quiescent. The quiescence that occurs may be understood as a consequence of the Abelian subgroup of the isometry group acting orthogonally-transitively. These results are then used to obtain asymptotics for solutions to the Klein-Gordon equation on backgrounds of this type.Paper B is about Bianchi type spacetimes with an orthogonal stiff fluid. Bianchi type is known as exceptional, for the fact that the dynamics of vacuum and orthogonal perfect fluid cosmologies of this type have the same degrees of freedom as those of Bianchi type or . This is due to the not necessarily acting orthogonally-transitively for type . The main result is that, generically, the initial singularity of such solutions is anisotropic and quiescent, and the eigenvalues of converge to strictly positive values. Here quiescence is a result of the stiff fluid matter, which allows for the algebraic condition on the eigenvalues of to be satisfied. Complementary to this generic behaviour are the spacetimes with special geometrical features, in particular those in which the does act orthogonally-transitively, and those that (asymptotically) satisfy a polarization condition. In these cases it occurs that the smallest limit of the eigenvalues of is negative. This is in contrast with type or cosmologies with an orthogonal stiff fluid, for which the eigenvalues of always converge to strictly positive limits. As a secondary result we obtain a concise way to represent the dynamics.In paper C, which is joint work with Oliver Petersen and Hans Ringström, we consider CMC initial data to the Einstein-nonlinear scalar field equations for a certain class of potentials. The main result is that if a certain bound on expansion-normalized quantities holds, if an algebraic condition on the eigenvalues of is satisfied, and if the eigenvalues of remain separated over the manifold, then there exists a threshold for the initial mean curvature, which, if surpassed, guarantees that the development has a quiescent big bang singularity. By this we mean past global existence of the development until the blowup of the Kretschmann scalar, and convergence of the eigenvalues of . We also obtain asymptotics for the eigenvalues of and expansion-normalized quantities relating to the scalar field. Combining the main result with results by Ringström concerning Bianchi class A solutions leads to a proof of the future and past global non-linear stability of a large class of spatially locally homogeneous solutions.
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| 4. |
- Viktorin, Mattias, 1975-
(författare)
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Exercising Peace : Conflict Preventionism, Neoliberalism, and the New Military
- 2008
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This study takes the changing role of the military as a starting point for exploring a set of broader ongoing processes at the intersection of security and humanitarianism. The focus is on one particular assemblage, described here as conflict preventionism. This notion brings together the transformation of the military, the proliferation of civil-military cooperation, and the increasing interest in managing and preventing violent conflicts within a single framework. As such, conflict preventionism helps render visible how various actors, concepts, and organizational techniques converge in emergent forms of intervention.The research was carried out during the planning, execution, and evaluation of Viking 03, a civil-military exercise organized in 2003 by the Swedish Armed Forces. An examination of Viking 03 evinces intriguing resemblances between conflict preventionism and organizational facets of neoliberalism, epitomized by increasingly ubiquitous concepts such as “partnership,” “transparency,” and “evaluation.” Also, it shows that conflict preventionism does not settle on one particular understanding of conflict, but rather imposes directionality on contemporary engagements with the world.
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| 5. |
- Högberg, Björn, 1988-
(författare)
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Vulnerability and inequalities in health and wellbeing : the role of social policy
- 2019
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The aim of this thesis is to investigate the moderating role of social policies for the association between vulnerable social positions and health and wellbeing. Vulnerable social positions are identified in relation to age-related transition points in to or out of the labour market. Specifically, the focal groups are young adults, on the route to establish themselves in the labour market, and older persons, having just left the labour market, and inequalities by labour market status, class, or gender within these age groups. The thesis moreover aims to contribute to the theoretical development of the comparative health literature, by developing and implementing a theoretical framework for analyzing the role of social policy for the health and wellbeing of vulnerable groups.Data and methods: The aim is addressed through a cross-country comparative approach, by fitting multilevel regression models on harmonized individual level data from the European Social Survey. Specifically, cross-level interactions between social position and social policies are estimated, with self-reported general health and psychological wellbeing as outcomes. The focal social policies are pension systems and elderly care policies, as well as education policies.Results and conclusions: Overall, the empirical results showed that public investment in, and public organization of, elderly care was associated with smaller health inequalities by both social class and gender, and that redistributive minimum pensions were associated with smaller inequalities by social class, while more status-maintaining standard pensions were associated with larger gender-based inequalities. Regarding the role of education policies, the analyses showed that inclusive policies – specifically low degree of tracking, generous second chance opportunities, low out-of-pocket costs for, and a larger supply of, education – were associated with smaller inequalities by both social background and employment status. The overall conclusion of the thesis is that redistributive social policies, which distribute essential resources to vulnerable groups, have the potential to reduce inequalities in health and wellbeing between vulnerable and more advantaged groups.
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| 6. |
- Staffas, Eric
(författare)
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Nonspherical black holes and spacetime reconstructions
- 2018
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis consists of three papers in mathematical general relativity. The first paper concerns inverse problems and reconstruction of spacetimes from boundary data. We consider boundary data in the form of broken geodesics with different causal types, which have the physical interpretation of relativistic fireworks. Using this data, we show that it is possible to completely reconstruct the topology, smooth structure, and metric of the spacetime.The second paper is about the topology of black holes. When black holes are shown in illustrations, they are typically shown as spherical, and a natural question is whether this spherical topology is necessary. Would it not be possible for black holes to have other topologies? It is previously known that an apparent horizon of a black hole must admit a metric of positive scalar curvature, and this imposes restrictions on the possible topologies. However, there is a large class of topologies which cannot be excluded by this result, but where there are no examples or constructions showing that they are actually possible. This means that it is possible that there are further restrictions which have not yet been found. In the second paper of the thesis, we describe a construction which gives rise to a large class of new examples of topologies for apparent horizons. This decreases the gap between the topologies which are known to be possible and those which are known to be impossible.The third paper in the thesis also concerns apparent horizons of black holes, and the main result is more technical in character than those of the other papers. It is a special case of a generalization of a regularity theorem for apparent horizons, which is previously known in low dimensions. It is not immediately obvious from the definition of an apparent horizon that it should have any particularly good properties, but it is previously known that it is a smooth hypersurface if the dimension is sufficiently small. We show in the third paper for time-symmetric initial data in any dimension that an outermost apparent horizon is a smooth hypersurface, apart from a singular set of large codimension.
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| 7. |
- Vesterlund, Mattias, 1980-
(författare)
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District heating system analysis and challenges within the urban transformation of Kiruna
- 2017
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- There is currently an ongoing urban transformation in a small Swedish town named Kiruna, it is located in the very north of Sweden well above the Arctic Circle in a sub-arctic climate. Large part of the town will be relocated due to the ground deformation that is caused by the progressing iron ore mining activity and it is affecting all infrastructures of the town. This thesis aims to accomplish a holistic analysis on the district heating (DH) system for the town of Kiruna and its future challenges.Energy companies with a DH system recognize the importance in having a good understanding about the network characteristics, for obtaining an efficient and stabile heat delivery to the end-users. In this thesis, a method for modeling and simulation of meshed DH networks is described, that makes it possible to study and analyze the flow pattern in order to locate non-obvious paths, bottlenecks and overloaded pipes.For carrying out the DH simulations a fundamental input is to set the thermal losses for each pipe segment in the model, a fictitious series with all pipe diameters is created which corresponds to the annual losses in the real network. In comparison with the pipes series manufactured today the created one is best described by the series with least insulation and highest thermal losses. The studied network has its origin in the 60th and is the sum of the different piping technics that has been valid over time, this mixture is positioning the thermal performance as a close to a worst-case scenario.To the meshed DH network a number of heat production sites are connected for delivering the thermal requested by the end-users, each site consisting of several boilers and using different resources. A hybrid evolutionary-Mixed Integer Linear Programing (MILP) optimization approach is developed and applied for finding the cost-optimal heat production for three scenarios in combination of two heating demand levels. It is stated that no matter the geographically location of the site the cheapest resource should always be favorable as fuel, in the case when the same resource is viable at different sites a differentiated heat production is obtained. The supply temperature from each site is found to be the one lowest possible in order to serve all site-concerned end-users with a temperature level high enough for hot water production. The findings recommend a network temperatures reduction with the consequence in higher cost related to pumping work, but is lower than the savings due to the reduction in thermal losses.In order to provide the relocated part of the town with DH the hybrid evolutionary-MILP optimization routine is reshaped for finding different alternatives for network expansion layouts. The result is presented as a multi objective analysis between the operation cost and installation cost, showing the complete spectra of all optimal possible solutions and how the different cost correlate to each other. In this way, the outcome can be used for support in decision making, helping network owners is their planning and pipe sizing for new areas.For constructing the buildings that will populate the new city-area the Swedish government has stated a number of recommendations for achieving livable thermal indoor climate. An investigation is carried out analyzing the impact from the usage of three different heating system; air/air heat pump, air heating and floor heating in a low energy family house, where the first two system are aimed to use heat from the DH network. The analysis show that only the floor heating system satisfies the recommendations stated, but with carefully planning an air heating system could also fulfill the recommendations. Further, a techno-economical evaluation declares that the cheapest heating cost over 30 years is by using an air/air heat pump. In order to make DH competitive as heating source the needed price reduction is found for the hydronic floor and air heating system.Finally, three different building energy performance scenarios are studied in conjunction with the urban transformation in combination with the suggested energy measures from the Energy Performance certificates (EPC). In order to reach the national target entailing a reduction of 50% until 2050 all re-built buildings have to be built with passive standard and all advised measures in the EPC has to be carried out. Wort noticing is that the scenarios is analyzed as part of a 3-D City Model, which is found to be a worthwhile working tool for staff dealing with energy related issues.
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| 8. |
- Fredriksson, Henrik
(författare)
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On the use of traffic flows for improved transportation systems : Mathematical modeling and applications
- 2021
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Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis concerns the mathematical modeling of transportation systems for improved decision support and analysis of transportation-related problems. The main purpose of this thesis is to develop and evaluate models and methods that exploit link flows. Link flows are straightforward to obtain by measurements or estimation methods and are commonly used to describe the traffic state. The models and methods used in this thesis apply mathematical optimization techniques, computer simulations, and probabilistic methods to gain insights into the transportation network under study and provide benefits for both traffic managers and road users. First, we present an optimization model for allocating charging stations in a transportation network to serve owners of electric vehicles. The model utilizes a probabilistic route selection process to detect locations through which vehicles may pass. It also considers the limited driving range of electric vehicles. The iterative solution procedure finds the minimal number of minimal charging stations and their locations, which provides a lower bound of charging stations to cover each of the considered routes. Second, we present a case study, in which we argue that stationary and mobile measurement devices possess complementary characteristics. In that study, we investigate how speed cameras and probe vehicles can be used in conjunction with each other for the collection of detailed traffic data. The results show that the share of successfully observed and identified vehicles can be significantly improved by using both stationary and mobile measurement devices. Third, we present a simulation model with the intent of finding the most probable underlying routes based on hourly link flows. The model utilizes Dijkstra's algorithm to find the shortest paths and uses a straightforward statistical test procedure to find the most significant routes in the network based on replicated movements of trucks. Finally, we investigate the possibility to study how the traffic flow in one location reflects the flows in the surrounding area. The statistical basis of the proposed model is built upon measured link flows to study the dispersion of aggregate traffic flows in nodes. By considering the alternative ways vehicles can travel between locations, the model is able to determine the expected link flow that originates from a node in a nearby region.The results of the thesis show that the link flows, which are basic descriptors of the road segments in a transportation network, can be used to study a broad range of problems in transportation.
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| 9. |
- Rameez, Muhammad, 1988-
(författare)
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Signal Processing Approaches for Interference Mitigation in Automotive Radar Systems
- 2023
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Modern vehicles have several autonomous and semi-autonomous features, such as adaptive cruise control, lane keeping, adaptive headlights, and automatic emergency braking, ensuring a safe and comfortable driving experience. The vehicles typically rely on different sensors to "see" their surroundings and make decisions accordingly. Among these sensors, radar is particularly significant for its exceptional range and velocity estimation capabilities and plays an essential role in detecting and tracking objects within the vehicle's vicinity.Since automotive radars operate in the same frequency range, there is a chance that radars operating in close proximity might encounter mutual interference. The interference can degrade the radar's performance and cause false alarms and missed detections, which can be particularly problematic in safety-oriented systems. This research aims to develop signal processing techniques to mitigate the interference effects in frequency-modulated continuous wave (FMCW) radars operating at 77-81 GHz and contribute to making modern radar applications safe and reliable. The interference mitigation methods investigated in this thesis fall into three categories: digital beamforming, time-domain signal reconstruction, and deep learning methods.The digital beamforming approach utilizes the beam pattern of the receiving antenna array to mitigate interference by placing notches in the beam pattern. It is demonstrated that while this approach is applicable to MIMO radar systems, the notch resolution does not benefit from the extended virtual aperture. An adaptive digital beamforming approach based on the least mean squares (LMS) algorithm is also proposed to suppress interference in the received signal.The time-domain signal reconstruction approaches aim to reconstruct the parts of the received baseband signal that is corrupted by the interference. It is shown that the signal coherence in the slow-time domain can be utilized to perform signal reconstruction in the slow-time. Moreover, it is shown that by compressing the interference in the time domain using pulse compression, the duration of the interference can be shortened, and an improvement in signal reconstruction performance can be achieved.Given the complexity of the mutual interference problem, deep learning-based approaches can be instrumental in interference mitigation. This research also investigates the use of deep neural network architectures such as recurrent neural networks, convolutional neural networks, and convolutional autoencoders for signal reconstruction and denoising performance.
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| 10. |
- Sakovich, Anna
(författare)
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A study of asymptotically hyperbolic manifolds in mathematical relativity
- 2012
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis consists of ve papers where certain problems arising in mathematical relativity are studied in the context of asymptotically hyperbolic manifolds.In Paper A we deal with constant mean curvature solutions of the Einstein-scalar field constraint equations on asymptotically hyperbolic manifolds. Conditions on the scalar field and its potential are given which lead to existence and non-existence results.In Paper B we construct non-constant mean curvature solutions of the constraint equations on asymptotically hyperbolic manifolds. Our approach consists in decreasing a certain exponent appearing in the equations, constructing solutions of these sub-critical equations and then letting the exponent tend to its true value. We prove that if a certain limit equation admits no non-trivial solution, then the set of solutions of the constraint equations is non empty and compact. W ealso give conditions ensuring that the limit equation admits no nontrivial solution. This is a joint work with Romain Gicquaud.In this Paper C we obtain Penrose type inequalities for asymptotically hyperbolic graphs. In certain cases we prove that equality is attained only by the anti-de Sitter Schwarzschild metric. This is a joint work with Mattias Dahl and Romain Gicquaud.In Paper D we construct a solution to the Jang equation on an asymptotically hyperbolic manifold with a certain asymptotic behaviour at infinity.In Paper E we study asymptotically hyperbolic manifolds which are also conformally hyperbolic outside a ball of fixed radius, and for which the positive mass theorem holds. For such manifolds we show that when the mass tends to zero the metric converges uniformly tot he hyperbolic metric. This is a joint work with Mattias Dahl and Romain Gicquaud.
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