We live in a world driven by fast technologies. The same technologies that make information more accessible have created a dilemma by which the same conduits have also enabled access to mass amounts of counter-factual information. It is the assertion of this thesis project that counter- factual information poses a growing risk to the security and stability in liberal democratic societies and warrants a proportional response. The body of work which follows will explore what I have characterized as an information crisis. The information crisis, so presented, is a multi-faceted issue. It's constituent causes and outcomes concern both scholars of security studies and sociology. To address breadth of scope and immediacy of the crisis, the conceptual framework purposed in this project offers an interface between actor-network theory and security studies (ANT-security interface). Actor-network theory is a material-semiotic approach that preferences engagement with human and technological actants as an assemblage. Or, in other words, a network of relationships. The first chapter will introduce the dimensions of the information crisis, providing relevant examples of how counter-factual information embodies a human, and societal security issue. It will delineate important concepts such as misinformation, and...

Background: Industrial actors see an increased relevance in adopting and promoting services within their business model in order to differentiate themselves on the market and drive growth. Service design is suggested to aid companies in this endeavor by supporting value co-creation between service provider and customer, however, new interdisciplinary methods are warranted in order to better represent and understand value co-creation in complex organizational systems.  Method: The case study adopted a mixed methods approach which incorporated tools from service design, interaction design and socio-technical systems theory (STS), used together with stakeholders at a business-to-business company. Qualitative and quantitative data was gathered and analyzed in order to assess the usability and managerial implications of implementing a STS framework in a co-creative service design process.  Results: The design process produced five themes representing prerequisites for value co-creation at the company. One of these themes was further assessed in the STS framework, resulting in a design proposition that depicted systemic interrelations between social and technological aspects.  Implications/Conclusion: The STS framework used in the current study enabled investigation of the systemic interrelations of value co-creation. It is proposed that the framework could be used as an explorative measure for developing and understanding service systems. It is not recommended as a prototyping tool for collaboration with stakeholders, as the data suggest that the framework might have a learning curve which is not convergent with the comprehensibility of service design tools. More research is warranted in order to generalize these findings.

In multiband superconductors, different bands at the Fermi surface contribute to the superconductivity with different magnitudes of superconducting gaps on different portions of the Fermi surface. Each band in a multiband superconductor has a condensate with an amplitude and phase that weakly interacts with the other bands’ condensate. The coupling strength between the bands determines whether one or two superconducting transition temperatures are observed, and it is the key to many peculiar properties. In general, if there are two gaps of different magnitude, there are two different length scales associated with the suppression of these gaps in applied magnetic fields, for example. Therefore, effects of multigap superconductivity can be observed in superconducting vortices, which are twirls of supercurrents that are generated when a superconductor is placed in a magnetic field. Furthermore, the two superconducting order parameters in different bands are characterized by a magnitude and phase. In multiband superconductors, there are collective excitations corresponding to fluctuations of the relative phase of two order parameters, so-called the Leggett mode. The first material identified as multiband superconductor is Magnesium Diboride (MgB2) in 2001 with a critical temperature Tc of 39 K. MgB2 is a superconducting material with the highest transition temperature among all conventional BCS superconductors. It has two superconducting gaps \Delta_\pi ~ 2 meV and \Delta_\sigma\ ~ 7 meV and they arise from the existence of two bands \pi and \sigma bands of boron electrons. The discovery of superconductivity in MgB2 renewed interest in the field of multiband superconductivity. MgB2 has attracted many scientists’ attention both for the fundamental importance of understanding the multiband superconductivity and possible applications such as magnets, power cables, bolometers, Josephson junction-based electronic devices, and radio-frequency cavities. Afterward, other materials have been identified as multiband superconductors such as NbSe2, the family of iron-based superconductors, heavy fermion superconductors, multilayer cuprates, borocarbides, etc. This dissertation uses tunneling experiments to highlight multiband superconductivity features in two systems, namely MgB2 thin films and ultrathin films of Pb. Further, we use multiple techniques to study a superconducting material, nitrogen-doped niobium, used for superconducting radio-frequency cavities. For the project on MgB2, MgB2/Native-Oxide/Ag planar junctions are fabricated and characterized down to 2.1 K and in the magnetic field parallel to the sample surface up to 6 Tesla. This work investigates how pairbreaking affects the magnitude and phase of the order parameter in a multiband superconductor. The tunneling spectra are analyzed in the framework of a two-band model developed by our theory collaborator Prof. Alex Gurevich, Old Dominion University. The model allows the extraction of the pair-breaking parameters among other quantities. The analysis shows that the order parameter in the ? band is quickly suppressed in the field, the ? band is cleaner than the ? band. The ratio of pairbreaking parameter in the ? band to the ? band rapidly increases at fields higher than ~0.1 T and then plateau at higher fields. This transition around 0.1 T magnetic field suggests a phase decoupling in the two bands of MgB2. Below the transition, the two bands are phase-locked, so mostly, the superconductivity in the ? band is affected, and after phase decoupling, both bands are affected by the applied field. These results are important for a basic understanding of multiband superconductors and the application implications of this material. This phase decoupling has a new and profound consequence on the superconducting state of a multiband superconductor that has been theoretically predicted and never observed experimentally. For the Pb project, ultrathin films of Pb in ultrahigh vacuum conditions are deposited by e-beam evaporation and characterized with low-temperature scanning tunneling microscopy and spectroscopy (STM/STS). The STM/STS allows measuring the electronic density of states with the highest spatial resolution down to atomic scale. The shape of a superconducting vortex core is determined by the superconducting gap and the Fermi velocity, and the STM allows to map anisotropies of these quantities spatially. The vortex cores of Pb film show a complex shape that evolves from triangular at short distances from the center to a six-fold symmetric star shape farther away from the center. These details are very subtle, and they can be highlighted only if one works within the clean limit (to avoid the averaging effect of the scattering) and by fabricating the heterostructure that pins the vortices spatially. The complex vortex core shape reflects the anisotropy of the two bands that contribute to superconductivity in this material. For the project on Niobium, cold and hot spots from nitrogen-doped Nb cutouts are characterized by low temperature scanning tunneling microscopy and spectroscopy (STM/STS) combined with X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The radiofrequency (RF) measurements of the quality factor and temperature mapping on an N-doped Nb superconducting resonator cavity are carried out at Jefferson Laboratory before cutting out the samples. This work aims to identify possible sources of excess dissipation in hot spots and relate them to the surface chemical composition and superconducting properties. The temperature mapping revealed a strong effect of the cavity cooldown rate on the intensities of hot spots and their spatial distribution, which indicates a significant contribution of trapped vortices to the RF dissipation. SEM images acquired on the cold and hot spots using a secondary electron detector show absence of residual hydride scars and niobium nitrides on their surface. Angle-resolved XPS measurements on the native surface of these samples revealed higher oxidized Nb 3d states on the N-doped Nb cold spots, which is supported by XPS depth profiles done on the samples by Argon ion sputtering. Argon ion sputtering of oxidized Nb removes oxygen preferentially from Nb2O5 and diffuses to bulk, thickening the lower oxidation state layers. The proximity theory framework’s tunneling spectra analysis suggests hot spots have stronger pairbreaking due to a weakly reduced pair potential, a thicker metallic suboxide layer, and a wide distribution of the contact resistance. STM imaging of vortex cores shows a triangular vortex lattice in both samples, and the coherence length is nearly the same in hot and cold spots. The experimental data analysis suggests weakly degraded superconducting properties at the surface of hot spot regions are not the primary sources of RF losses. Instead, they are the regions where vortices nucleate first and get trapped during cooling down. These experimental techniques and findings will be crucial in helping to qualify new recipes for SRF cavity production and to boost their performance. / Physics

Klimatdebatten är mycket aktuell idag, frågorna är många och de entydiga svaren är få. Detta fick en klass gymnasieelever uppleva i ett rollspelsprojekt där de tilldelades åsikter från ett antal olika källor. Eleverna fick representera dessa åsikter under en debatt som utgjorde avslutning på ett tre veckor långt projekt. Vid starten hade majoriteten av eleverna mycket liknande åsikter men under projektets gång kom de till insikter om varför denna typ av komplicerade frågor sällan har entydiga svar. De insåg också att vi människor är mycket lättpåverkade och att personliga känslor och åsikter ofta påverkar möjligheterna till en rationell debatt. Rollspel visade sig i detta projektet vara en mycket användbar metod för att engagera elever och vidga deras vyer kring denna typ av frågeställningar.

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Scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) images and scanning tunneling spectroscopy (STS) spectra of galena (PbS) and hematite (a-Fe203) were calculated using ab-initio methods in order to interpret experimental images and spectra that were taken in previous studies. These calculations have helped to understand which states of the mineral surfaces were imaged depending on the bias voltage and tip-sample separation. The computational results also gave insight in electron transfer processes that take place during surface adsorption/oxidation/reduction processes. In this context, different oxidation (using O₂ and ferric iron as oxidants) and gold adsorption/reduction mechanisms on galena were evaluated at an atomic level. On hematite, the main emphasis was determining the differences in the local electronic structure of specific sites above the surface and the electronic structure of the bulk. Hereby, step sites turned out to have an increased local density of states at certain electron binding energies that are absent on flat surfaces. states can explain the highly increased reactivity of step sites as compared to terraces. X-ray photoelectron spectra (XPS) were calculated to compare the photoelectron peaks of the calculated specific surface structures (that do not have a bulk equivalent) with experimentally obtained XPS spectra. Most of the calculated peak chemical shifts coincided with those that were found in experiments and that were previously interpreted in terms of known bulk structures. Therefore, it can be inferred that the conventional way of interpreting XPS spectra might be incomplete if specific surface structures are neglected. In order to understand step velocities on a gypsum (010) surface, step energies of different step directions were calculated using an ab-initio approach. An approximately linear relationship was found between the calculated step energies and the experimentally determined step velocities. / Ph. D.

This comparative case study examining epidemiological practices in Vietnam and the US revealed three pandemic influenza paradoxes: The paradox of attribution which asserts that pandemic influenza comes exclusively from Asia even though historical evidence points to the contrary; the paradox of prevention which encourages industrial methods (i.e., factory farming) for combating influenza even though there is conflicting evidence for any superiority of this method in terms of means of production or disease prevention; and the paradox of action where epidemiologists act in ways not consistent with prevailing epidemiological recommendations.  The existence of these paradoxes may, in fact, impede efforts at stopping and preventing pandemic influenza.  In order to find the root causes of these paradoxes, this study examined indigenous media and historical and contemporary research reports on pandemic influenza.  This archival information was juxtaposed to viewpoints garnered from ethnographic interviews with epidemiologists who have worked in Vietnam, the United States, or in both countries.  This study found that these paradoxes endure because of the dual nature of science " the known and the unknown elements of current knowledge " and assumptions made between the two.  The dual nature of science describes both the information that has been codified and information that has not been codified and the implications between the two. In other words, in between the spaces of known information, there are attempts to fill in the gaps in knowledge, which results in paradoxes. Of particular importance in this gap-filling process are the three "C's" of collaboration, conflict, and competition.  Collaboration is integral to the successful prevention of influenza pandemics; however, it is this same collaboration wherein which epidemiologists are trained to be so highly specialized that they often depend on unvetted external expert information.  Conflict and competition occur from the geopolitical level all they way down to the level of the individual epidemiologist and are influenced by the political and scientific economy along with social and cultural factors. / Ph. D.

This thesis analyzes Badan Tenaga Atom Nasional (BATAN, the Indonesia National Nuclear Energy Agency and the the Ulama of Pengurus Cabang Nahdlatul Ulama (PCNU, the Islamic scholars of District Branch of Nahdlatul Ulama) Jepara’s different risk assessments of the purposed nuclear power plant in Muria, Indonesia. Using a discourse analysis combined with the social construction of risk from a science and technology studies (STS) perspective, this thesis focuses on the Ulama’s risk assessments, and looks at how the Islamic interpretations of fiqh (Islamic Jurisprudence) and the knowledge of perceived risk of the State’s nuclear inexpertise, environmental degradations, the type of the reactor, and foreign technological dependence are used simultaneously by the Ulama of the PCNU Jepara to construct maslahah (benefits) and mafsadah (disadvantages) on the fatwa to the proposed Muria nuclear power plant. I argue that the different risk assessments converge on the proposed Muria nuclear power plant, which are based on not only scientific and political discourse but also Islamic beliefs. In contrast to alternative forms of knowledge, Islamic belief not only has orientations to the social world but also the afterlife. I found the Ulama’s concerns regarding perceived risk of the State’s nuclear inexpertise did not change whether from the authoritarian regime to the democratic model. Across the contesting political regimes, the Ulama articulated their concerns of perceived risk of the State’s nuclear inexpertise through distrust of the State’s capacities and capabilities in handling a commercial nuclear power plant. Furthermore, the different ways of constructing risk through BATAN and the Ulama depict the contested meaning of national identity after the Indonesia independence. Lastly, this thesis offers a unique view of studying Islam and the social construction of risk from a non-Western context. / Master of Science

La thèse étudie les applications dites citoyennes pour mobiles et web qui sont développées en réponse aux problèmes publics variés et basées sur le principe de crowdsourcing. Elle s’intéresse à la fois à la conception de ces dispositifs, à leurs usages et aux façons dont ces outils transforment la communication des citoyens entre eux, et avec les pouvoirs publics. Elle explore les nouveaux formats d’innovation, comme les hackathons civiques, et interroge l’usage du code informatique en tant que nouvel instrument d’action collective.La thèse mobilise une méthodologie qui puise dans les répertoires des STS, de la sociologie des problèmes publics, de la science politique, des sciences de l’information et communication. Appuyée sur l’étude d'applications citoyennes en France et en Russie, elle pose différentes questions : comment traduit-on les problèmes publics en code informatique ; qu’est-ce que ces applications font et font faire ?; comment transforment-elles la participation citoyenne ?La recherche montre que les interfaces des applications façonnent et standardisent la participation en se basant sur les documents de référence : les lois, les réglementations normatives et techniques. Cependant, la standardisation a ses limites : se focalisant sur les moments de faille et des épreuves, telles que les tests, les mises à jour, le débogage des applications, l’enquête rend visibles les détournements et les bricolages mis en place par les usagers qui dépassent le cadrage par les interfaces et participent à la fois à la réécriture des applications et à la redéfinition des problèmes publics.La comparaison entre applications développées par les administrations publiques et projets portés par la société civile permet de distinguer deux façons de communiquer : les chaînes courtes et les chaînes longues. Sans les opposer, la thèse se place dans « l’entre-deux » et analyser les articulations, les agencements de ces réseaux socio-techniques. / The PhD dissertation studies new digital participative technologies called "civic apps", applications for mobile and web developed in response to a large scope of public problems and based on the principle of crowdsourcing. The research focuses on the conception of these tools, their usages and the way these tools transform the communication among citizens and between citizens and public administrations. It also explores new formats of civic tech innovation, such as civic hackathons, and question the usage of programming code as a new tool of collective action.The thesis calls upon the methodologies of sociology of science and technology, sociology of public problems, political science and science of information and communication. Based on a case-study of several civic apps in France and Russia, the inquiry adresses the following question: how does the translation of public problems into programming code occur ? And how do these applications transform civic participation?The research shows that the interfaces standardize and format the practices of participation, using documents such as laws, technical norms and standards. However, this standardization has its limits. Focusing on the moments of failure and trial, such as tests, updates or debug of applications, the inquiry highlights the practices of bricolage and detournement, deployed by users in order to overcome the framing by design and participate in the rewriting of the applications.The thesis compares civic applications with the applications developed by public administrations and distinguishes two models of communication called the "long chains" and the "short chains". However, instead of opposing administrative and civic initiatives, the thesis proposes to think from "in-between", analyzing the articulations and arrangements of these socio-technical networks.

Flerbostadshus anses viktiga för att minska energianvändningen i byggnader, och potentialen att energieffektivisera i samband med renovering är stor. Denna studie behandlar hur arbete med energifrågor genomförs i renovering av flerbostadshus byggda under miljonprogrammet i stadsdelen Östra Sätra i Gävle. Avhandlingens analytiska verktyg baseras på perspektiv utvecklade inom teknik och vetenskapsstudier (STS) och aktörsnätverksteori (ANT) samt urbana studier. I studien utvecklas och tillämpas verktyget energisammansättningar. Genom en symmetrisk ansats studeras energifrågors definition och innehåll i renoveringen genom att spåra kedjor av översättningar. Det empiriska underlaget är kvalitativa intervjuer, mål- och strategidokument, beslutsprotokoll och observationer. Avhandlingen visar att energiarbetets innehåll flätades samman med exempelvis kommunal planering och energipolitik, med bostadsbolagets befintliga arbetssätt för renoveringar och dess relationer till sina kunder, samt med lagen för allmännyttiga bostadsbolag. Studien identifierar också att spänningar uppstod i energiarbetet inom flera områden. Dessa rör hur de ekonomiska vinsterna och kostnaderna för energiarbete ska beräknas och fördelas, översättningar av energimål, var och hur energiarbete ska prioriteras i den bebyggda miljön, i vilken takt energiarbetet ska ske och hur de boende ska delta i energiarbete. Studien visar att energieffektiviserande åtgärder prioriterades i renoveringen så länge som de beräknades vara ekonomiskt affärsmässiga och en del av det allmännyttiga arbetet, men även hur förändringar var svåra att genomföra om de utmanade eller förändrade befintliga relationer och arbetssätt. Det gällde särskilt i relationen till de boende i området och till ekonomiska kostnader för renoveringen. / Transforming the energy used in apartment buildings have become increasingly important issues. This study examines how energy issues were designed in a refurbishment project for apartment buildings built during the “Million Programme” era in Sweden in the district of Östra Sätra in Gävle. The analytical approach and tools used are based on science and technology studies (STS), actor–network theory (ANT), and urban studies. Specifically, the study applies the concept of assemblages, which in this study are called energy assemblages. Energy issues are examined as they translated and negotiated in practice by actors and how they are incorporated into the refurbishment design. The empirical data are based on qualitative interviews, analyses of documents, and observations. The analyses demonstrate that work on energy issues was intertwined with the city’s work on planning and energy issues, the housing company’s working practices, as well as the laws governing public housing companies. The study also demonstrates that sometimes tensions arose in situations in which different energy assemblage processes collided. The study identifies several areas of tension. First, tensions arose in situations of diverse translations of energy goals. Second, in negotiations about calculations of the financial costs of energy transition. Third, tensions also arose when determining where energy transition should be located. Fourth, about resident participation in energy issues. Fifth, the energy transition timeframe. The study demonstrates that energy efficiency measures were prioritized in the refurbishment as long as they were treated as financially beneficial and did not challenge or change existing relationships, work practices, and customer relations.