Background: Reshoring is a growing phenomenon that refers to a company’s decision to move production back from a previously offshored location. There are many drivers and barriers to such decisions that display an increased complexity for managers. It gets even more challenging in a world with high levels of uncertainty shown in the past decade.    Purpose:  This study aims to investigate the drivers and barriers of reshoring and how managers perceive the risk of disruptive events as a driver of reshoring.    Method: This study uses a qualitative method and deductive approach, where empirical evidence was collected through semi-structured interviews with eight managers at clothing companies.   Conclusion: The findings of this study confirm several already established drivers and barriers to reshoring in the particular context of the clothing industry. Furthermore, the study shows that managers perceive an increased willingness to reshore as a response to disruptive events. This was to a large extent due to long lead times and higher coordination costs. Managers can use the findings as support in making decisions of where to locate their production.

M. Tech (Department of Information and Communication Technology, Faculty of Applied and Computer Sciences) Vaal University of Technology. / The author addressed the need of parents, school teachers and athletic coaches to be able to assess the level of performance and to compare performances of individual athletes of either gender and in any age group. This was achieved by creating formulas for the following areas in track and field athletics: • Correctly set base standards for all events from the results of 5 year weighted average performances. • Use the base standards to determine comparative standards for all events in all age groups. • Define a function to compare male and female performances in all events. • For all events, generate tables with a range from 0 to 1000 as a comparative measurement. These formulae were created using data from international and national meetings. Different case studies were used for each of the areas and the results were evaluated using the data. In all four areas, it was possible to define hybrid functions with a confidence factor better than 99%. The final performance tables can be updated during revision periods (every 2 to 4 years) by using the national results for the last 5 years. These revisions will be required as implements, tracks and training methods change with time and this will then in turn influence the performances. This is evident from the continuous improvement of records in all events. These tables will not only assist coaches to improve training techniques but it will also facilitate team managers to improve team selections, and it will open the options of meeting organizers to arrange meetings using different formats. As this is a new and unique formulation for measuring performances at junior level in world athletics it can be used as a basis for future improvements in the field of comparative measurement for athletics. Using these tables at senior level it may assist to settle arguments of performance comparisons that are not addressed by the current tables used by the International Amateur Athletics Federation (IAAF). It will also avoid the use of different tables for the same events in standard track and field athletics compared to those used for combined event competitions. The author of the tables used by the IAAF has recognised this work as a new and unique development. Future development will include the automatic update of all functions and creation of tables for publication from a standard Windows® based application. A companion application, using the results from this research, will be developed. This application will address all the administration functions required to conduct a meeting. It will include the preparation for the meeting, capturing of results during the meeting and result reporting after the meeting.

Teknik och data är nyckeln till att Bonnier Business Media (BBM) ska kunna nå sina mål och leverera ytterligare tillväxt. Därför vill man ligga i framkant när det gäller att undersöka nya tekniker som kan förbättra plattformarna och göra dem mer tidsenliga. BBM har bland annat velat ta fram ett rekommendationssystem som ska användas till att göra innehållet individanpassat på webbplatserna och på ett effektivt sätt presentera detta så att de olika målgrupperna får den information de förväntar sig. Till exempel ska besökaren kunna få förslag på artiklar och evenemang som kan vara av intresse. Målet med detta examensarbete har varit att ta fram en prototyp för ett rekommendationssy- stem med tillhörande algoritmer. Prototypen skulle kunna användas som ett “koncepttest” för att undersöka möjligheten att skapa personliga rekommendationer till läsare på Veckans Affärers webbplats, va.se. Implementationen av rekommendationssystem som togs fram till BBM bestod av en objektbaserad kollaborativ filtrerings algoritm som använde besökarnas beteende, publiceringsdatum och popularitet på artiklarna och evenemangen för att skapa individuella rekommendationer. Efter genomförda tester och analyser visar resultatet att det är fullt möjligt att skapa personliga rekommendationer som har en högre precision än vad ett grundläggande rekommendationssystem, till exempel en popularitetslista, kan erbjuda. / Technology is the key for Bonnier Business Media (BBM) to reach their goals and deliver future growth. Therefore they want to be in the very forefront when it comes to exploring new technologies that can improve their platforms and make them more up to date. BBM has among other things aimed to develop a recommendation system that is supposed to make the content of their web sites personalized and in an efficient way present this so that the different target groups will get the information that they expect. For example the visitor should be able to get suggestions on articles and events that might be of interest. The aim of this thesis has been to develop a prototype of a recommendation system with associated algorithms. The prototype could be used as to examine the possibility to create personalized recommendations for the readers on BBM:s website va.se (Veckans Affärer). The implementation of the recommendation system that was developed for BBM consisted of an object-based collaborative filtering algorithm using visitor behavior, publication date and popularity of articles and events to create personalized recommendations. After com- pleting tests and analyzes the results show that it is possible to create recommendations with a higher precision than a basic recommendation system, like a popularity list, can of- fer.

An increase in the frequency and intensity of storm events is predicted by numerous climate researchers for the north of Europe. Not only this but also landuse change in form of clear-cutting can have an impact on the discharge of rivers and with that on road drainage structures. Extensive societal costs can be the consequences of blockage and underdimensioned structures. Hydrological models are powerful instruments that can be used to assess the future dimension requirements for road drainage structures especially in specifically vulnerable areas. In this thesis the hydrological model MIKE SHE was set up to study the discharge and water level at two pipe bridges and one culvert within the catchment of the river Hakerud in Västra Götaland, Sweden. Three scenarios were considered including a changing climate until 2050 and 2100 and a clear-cut scenario aiming to find out if the current design is sufficient for the future. This model can be used as an example model set-up for similar studies taking the recommendations of the experience gained in this thesis into consideration. For the Swedish Transport Administration further studies on this basis can contribute to decision making on the dimensioning of road drainage structures in the future to ensure a safe and robust infrastructural system.

<div>Since the discovery of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) in retired professional football players, the long-term neurological safety of these athletes has been called into</div><div>question. Studies revealed that those who play football are at higher risk for developing neurological deficits such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases. It has also been observed that participation in contact sports can result in neurological changes detectable with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) that do not present with any easily observable clinical symptoms. Changes in brain chemistry, structure, and blood flow have been observed over the course of a season of contact sports. These changes are thought to be caused by the repetitive head acceleration events (HAEs) sustained by contact sport athletes, with the magnitude and number of HAEs correlating with some changes. This dissertation aims to characterize and reduce the HAEs sustained by contact sport athletes with a specific focus on football players.</div><div><br></div><div>Studies of middle school and high school football players revealed that there are likely offsetting effects that result in similar HAEs between the two groups. As one plays at higher levels of play with typically bigger, stronger, faster athletes that should result in higher magnitude HAEs, there is likely an improvement in tackling technique used at higher levels that make it so there are similar HAEs among different levels of play. Examining middle school football and high school football and girls’ soccer athletes indicate that players that play on two teams (i.e. a player that plays both Varsity and Junior Varsity) may be at an increased risk for neurological changes due to over-exposure. It was revealed when studying post-collegiate football the up stance offensive linemen may help reduce the frequency of HAEs compared to the down stance. However, the skill of the offensive lineman needs to be accounted for to determine if it is beneficial for players to start in this stance.</div><div><br></div><div>Repetitive HAEs (rHAEs), whether due to body or direct head impacts arising from participation in contact sports, are correlated with alterations in white matter health. Fractional anisotropy (FA) and mean diffusivity (MD), two metrics used to assess white matter structural integrity, typically change in opposite directions (one increases while the other decreases) after brain injury. This study investigated the manner in which participation in American football affects the percentage of white matter exhibiting the four possible change combinations: increased FA, increased MD; decreased FA, increased MD; increased FA, decreased MD; decreased FA, decreased MD. Diffusion tensor imaging data of 61 high school football and 15 non-contact athletes were analyzed. After a season of participation, football athletes exhibited a significantly greater percentage of deviant voxels in each of the four categories than were observed from test-retest of non-contact athletes. Even prior to a season of participation, football athletes exhibited significantly more voxels in each of the categories, relative to controls. Of particular concern is that voxels exhibiting jointly decreased FA and MD—a change typically associated with cell death—were observed at a significantly higher rate within football athletes than non-contact athletes. This finding suggests that rHAEs may increase the incidence of cell death, and argues for the greater adoption of methods aimed at reducing mechanical loading on the brain from rHAEs, both through reduction of the number of HAEs, and development of better protective equipment.</div><div><br></div><div>Rugby is a sport that is very similar to football in terms of physicality and overall objective, but there are marked differences in protective equipment and style of play. These differences in protective equipment result in different tackling rules and styles between the two sports that may influence the effect repetitive HAEs can have on neurological health. Therefore, the HAEs experienced over the course of the season by New Zealand collegiate (ages 16+) rugby athletes were characterized. The number of HAEs were compared by position (forward vs. backs) and the peak translation acceleration (PTA) of the HAE was analyzed by position, possession (offense vs. defense), and cause of HAE (tackle vs. ruck). Forwards (although not significantly) tended to sustain more HAEs than backs, but there were no differences in the magnitude of the HAEs by any of the types of comparisons. However, when considering possession and type of HAE simultaneously, it was found that HAEs in a defensive ruck are more severe than those sustained in an offensive ruck. This could be a potential place to work on player technique to reduce the PTA during these situations.</div><div><br></div><div>There are numerous studies that have utilized accelerometers to quantify head motion during a contact event, but a current gap in the field is quantification of the impact force. In order to capture high force events, an instrumented helmet using strain was built to capture this data. Strain gauges were adhered to the inside of a Riddell Speedflex helmet shell and then mounted onto a Hybrid III Headform for testing. The helmet was hit at four different locations (front, right, back, and left) and at different impulse ranges (2-5 Ns, 5-8 Ns, 8-11 Ns, and 11+ Ns). The strain gauges were able to classify the location of the hit with about 95% accuracy and were correlated the impact peak force and impulse. This suggests that it is possible to build an instrumented helmet to be worn by a football player during collision events to capture real impact force and location data.</div>

In nature we find many instances of complex behavior for example the dynamics of stock markets, power grids, internet networks, highway traffic, social networks, heartbeat dynamics, neural dynamics, dynamics of living organisms, etc. The study of these complex systems involves the use of tools of non-linear dynamics and non-equilibrium statistical physics. This dissertation is devoted to understanding two different sources of complex behavior – non-poissonian renewal events also called crucial events and infinite memory of fractional Brownian motion. They both generate 1/f noise frequency spectrum. Thus, we studied examples of both processes and also their joint action. We also tried to establish the role of crucial events in biological and physiological processes like biophoton emission during the germination of seeds, the dynamics of heartbeat and neural dynamics. Using a statistical method of analyzing the time series of bio signals we were able to quantify the complexity associated with the underlying dynamics of these processes. Finally, we adopted a model that unifies both crucial events and memory fluctuations to study the rhythmic behavior observed in heart rate variability of people during meditation. We were able to also quantify the level of stress reduction during meditation. The work presented in this dissertation may help us understand the communication and transfer of information in complex systems.

<div><div><div><p>The exponential growth of space debris poses a significant threat to humankind’s activities in orbit. It is thus worthwhile to investigate debris-generating events and uncover their causes, consequently informing debris-mitigation guidelines and safer spacecraft design. This work sets out to examine three fragmentation events pertaining to Centaur upper stages which have yet to be fully understood. Critical breakup characteristics such as breakup epoch, fragment velocities, and angular distributions for the Centaur events, as well as select historic fragmentation events are presented. Subsequently, hypotheses regarding the causes of the events are postulated. The Centaur fragmentations stray from breakup patterns exhibited by ’typical’ upper stage fragmentations such as those of the historic explosive Delta upper stage events. Only one of the three events, 2018-079B, appears to have fragmented due to the combustion of leftover propellant. 2009-047B, on the other hand, likely endured a structural failure – inferred from clustered fragments and low fragment spreading speeds. A torus-shaped fragment distribution is observed for the 2014-055B event, suggesting a collision with a small piece of debris may have taken place.</p></div></div></div>

Analysis of Spontaneous Adverse Events Reports after Tick-Borne Encephalitis Vaccine Author: Tereza Brázdová Supervisor: PharmDr. Eva Zimčíková, Ph.D. Consultant: PharmDr. Kateřina Malá, Ph.D. Department of Social and Clinical Pharmacy, Faculty of Pharmacy in Hradec Králové, Charles University Introduction and aim: Tick-borne meningoencephalitis is one of the most frequent causes of viral meningitis in Europe. In recent years, the number of cases of this infection in the Czech Republic has begun to rise. Vaccination is the only reliable protection against infection, but it also comes with some risks. Analysis of spontaneous adverse reaction reports is a key source of information for signal detection, which is used to identify drug risks. The aim of this thesis was to analyse the spontaneous reporting of suspected adverse drug reactions (ADRs), using the data from the Central Database of ADRs provided by the State Institute for Drug Control. Methodology: Descriptive statistics were performed from reporting data in the period from June 2004 to October 2017. For example, the total number of reports, the number of ADRs and the patient characteristics were analysed. We compared the adverse reactions with the Vigibase database and evaluated the expectability of reported reactions. Results: During the...

Analysis of Spontaneous Adverse Events Reports of Measles, Mumps, and Rubella Vaccine Author: Jana Kulhavá Supervisor: PharmDr. Eva Zimčíková, Ph.D. Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Pharmacy in Hradec Králové, Department of Social and Clinical Pharmacy Keywords: vaccination, measles, mumps, rubella, adverse events reports Introduction: The MMR vaccine is a combined vaccine used to vaccinate children against measles, mumps and rubella. Spontaneous reporting of adverse reactions is an important source of information to identify potential risks of medicinal products. Objective: The aim of this diploma thesis is the analytical evaluation of spontaneous reports of suspected adverse reactions after vaccination with MMR vaccine registered in the database of the State Institute for Drug Control during the period 2004 to 2017. Methods: The data were analyzed in Microsoft Excel spreadsheet software using descriptive statistics methods. The reported adverse reactions were classified into appropriate organ system classes according to the MedDRA Glossary of Medical Terminology. The expectability and severity of adverse reactions were assessed. Results: A total of 805 cases of suspected adverse reactions were reported between 2004 and 2007, which included 2,812 adverse reactions. Most suspected adverse...

Analysis of utilisation and spontaneous adverse events reports related to human papillomavirus vaccines Author: Tereza Schrommová Supervisor: PharmDr. Eva Zimčíková, Ph.D. Department of Social and Clinical Pharmacy, Faculty of Pharmacy in Hradec Králové, Charles University INTRODUCTION: HPV vaccination is one of the most effective types of prevention against the human papillomavirus infection that can lower the probability of its incidence up to 80-90 %. Besides the benefits of vaccination, there can also occur among many individuals certain risks and adverse effects. Spontaneous adverse events reports are used to identify these serious and unexpected adverse effects, their monitoring leads to increasing safety of therapy. Drug consumption is monitored to uncover the ratio of population exposure to certain drug during specific time in specific socioeconomic group. OBJECTIVE: The objective of this diploma was analysis of spontaneous adverse events reports of vaccines against the human papillomavirus that are registered in database of State Institute for Drug Control in the period from May 2007 to October 2017. Another aim of this work was to evaluate consumption of HPV vaccines in the Czech Republic in the period from 2006 to 2019 using data from State Institute for Drug Control again. METHODS:...