GU-Journal no 1 2013

UNIVERSITY OF GOTHENBURG

no 1 | february 2013

Knows why organizations work Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist is head of Gothenburg Research Institute page 8 Fewer dissertations

Arvid Carlsson 90 years old

Studying for her life

Worst for the Humanities

The Nobel Prize winner is still going strong

Lauren Meiss wants to learn about her disease

page 4

page 14

page 16

2

Vice Chancellor

A magazine for employees of the Universit y of Gothenburg

We have to keep our eyes on the world Gothenburg has been the target of renewal efforts for several years now. The background to this is the greater demands, interest and needs of the world around us. Different actors in society emphasise the significance of higher education and research. They would also very much like to have an influence on our development.

As a university, we have to be able to live up to our surrounding society’s expectations and at the same time be free of political, ideological and financial interests. It is therefore important to have a clear direction and goal for our activities. We have clarified this in our new vision with goals and strategies, Vision 2020, that will cover the period from 2013 up to 2020.

Co n t r i b uti n g to a long-term sustainable society, where consideration is given to social, financial and ecologic aspects, is a great challenge – but this is also an opportunity for us as a university. I see it as a part of the tasks given to the University by society. In this is included being able to offer our students educations, programmes and courses that give each of them the competence to meet a labour market in constant change. Society’s need of specialist and general competence

Eva Lundgren 031 - 786 10 81 eva.lundgren@gu.se

photogr aphy: Julia L andgren

implement our new vision, the goal is to safeguard and develop all of the University’s areas. On the basis of the action and business plan that the University management and the University’s four deputy vice-chancellors developed last fall, faculties and departments have worked out their own action and business plans. The University’s management met the council of department heads and the management groups for the University library and common administration during a couple of weeks in January.

The purpose here was to discuss action plans and how the work on developing them had been done. These were meetings with active participation and exciting discussions.

Recruitment is consistently emphasised as being one of the most important issues for the future. We also noted that all the faculties described sustainable development to be an important area to work with.

Editor-in Chief and Publisher

Allan Eriksson 031 - 786 10 21 allan.eriksson@gu.se Editor and Vice Publisher

T h e U n i v e r s it y o f

N ow, a s w e

February 2013

P h oto g r a p h y a n d R e p r o d uct i o n

Johan Wingborg 031 - 786 29 29 johan.wingborg@gu.se G r a p h i c F o r m a n d L ayo ut

Anders Eurén 031 - 786 43 81 anders.euren@gu.se C o n t r i b ut i n g G r a p h i c F o r m a n d L ayo ut

Björn Eriksson T r a s l at i o n

Janet Vesterlund address

GU Journal

is growing. It is thus of great importance that both the private and the public labour markets open up for recruiting broad competence. We all have a responsibility to supply future competence.

All education must rest on scientific or artistic foundations. In order for this to happen, our teachers must be given the conditions to run high quality research and must also be the good teachers that are needed to give students the knowledge and ability for creative and critical thinking.

Ag a i n st t h e bac kg ro u n d of our desire to develop the University as an actor in society and the greater interest in our society, we have to carefully follow what is happening in the world. The greater the knowledge we have about what goes on beyond the University’s walls, the better are our conditions for developing as a school and achieving success in terms of increasing the competitiveness of the University of Gothenburg in research and education and attracting new students, teachers and researchers.

University of Gothenburg Box 100, 405 30 Gothenburg e-post

gu-journalen@gu.se internet

www.gu-journalen.gu.se ISSN

1402-9626 issues

7 issues/year.

The next issue will come out on March 26, 2013.

D e a d l i n e f o r m a n u s c r i pt s

March 8 M at e r i a l

The Journal does not take responsibility for unsolicited material. The editorial office is responsible for unsigned material.

Feel free to quote, but give your source.

Change of address

Inform the editorial office of the change in writing.

C ov e r

Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist, director of Gothenburg Research Institute Photography: Johan Wingborg

Reg.nr: 3750M

Pam Fredman

Reg.nr: S-000256

Contents

GUJOURNAL 1 | 2013

3

Vice-Chancellor

2 The way to increase GU’s competitiveness news

4 The number of doctoral theses has declined over 30 per cent in five years 6 Where to get help with Swedish and English

profile

8 Organisation researcher Ulla ErikssonZetterquist is tired of all the new trends news 11

Richard Neutze and Gergely Katona on the top ten list

8

Report 12 American Lauren Meiss looks for a cure at GU

Organisation researcher Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist studies what ­happens when IT takes over at work.

14 Arvid Carlsson – a 90-year-old who always has new projects 16

Meet Laura J Downing, Sweden’s only professor of African languages

6 Free language help John Löwenadler and Carina Carlund help you with Swedish and English.

14

16

Arvid Carlsson, 90 years

Chichewa and Tumbuka

has no plans to retire – he’s still waiting for new research results.

There are 2 000 languages in Africa, explains Professor Laura J Downing.

Editorial Office: How do you handle the flow of information?

It m i g h t n ot exactly be a New Year’s resolution, but our ambition this year is still to make more comparisons with other schools, not just in Sweden, but also with our Scandinavian neighbours. We are a part of a Scandinavian network that collects editors from the majority of universities and colleges, and that gives many opportunities for cooperation on theme articles and exchange of ideas.

That we live in an information society, where social media dominate, can hardly have escaped anyone.

We are flooded by more and more information, in more and more chan-

nels, and the question is how much we can deal with. In the book The Information Diet – A Case for Conscious Consumption, the American writer Clay A Johnson compares revelling in information with the junk food culture.

We get fat and sick of fats, salt and sugar. And we get stressed, jaded and stupid of too many delusions and too easy confirmations on the Internet. How aware are we of this overload and how do we handle all these constant impressions? Research is also undergoing J u n k i n , ju n k o ut.

a paradigm shift, where enormous amounts of data must be managed with new technology. Another way that is becoming increasingly common is for research groups to use interested amateurs who can treat information in huge amounts, so called crowd sourcing. It makes research that would otherwise not be possible into something that researchers and amateurs can do together. Today’s technology thus gives us new possibilities, but at the same time it provokes difficult questions.

Did you know that the University of Gothenburg has Sweden’s only profes-

sor in African languages? Her name is Laura J Downing and you can read a little about her exciting background in this number. She’s also surprised that languages are being phased out.

That’s what makes us people!

M e e t L au r e n M e i s s from Arizona, who suffers from cystic fibrosis. The average life expectancy for people with cystic fibrosis in the United States is 35 years. In Sweden, it’s 50.

Her goal is to learn more about the disease and, in that way, help others and hopefully live longer.

4

News

Fewer doctorates But the number will decrease even further

The number of doctoral dissertations at the University of Gothenburg has dropped dramatically in the past five years.

The Faculty of Arts is hardest hit – but things will get worse.

2 0 0 8 wa s s o m e t h i n g of a record year, with 322 published theses at the University of Gothenburg.

There have otherwise been about 300 a year during the past decade. But 2012 is a record low, with only 242 published theses.

We have to go back fifteen years to find similar numbers.

The greatest decrease is in the Faculty of Arts, where the number of theses has gone down to about half in the past five years.

several reasons,” says Dean Margareta Hallberg.

“Because of large deficits, followed by demands for savings from the University’s board, the Faculty had to severely reduce the number of doctoral candidate positions as of 2000.

In 2009, when the financial situation – despite savings – was

“There are

catastrophic, no new graduate students were admitted at all.

That means that the number of theses will decrease even further around 2015–2016.

A s m a ll n u m b e r of graduate students means small research environments. An argument for why the Faculty of Arts merged several small departments into the current six departments was to create cooperation over disciplinary boundaries.

Furthermore, the Faculty went over to the so called Århus model in 2010, which means that it is the Faculty, not the individual disciplines, that is responsible for creating research environments and choosing suitable doctoral students. However, since the University’s new organisation says that the responsibility for

selecting doctoral students is now with the departments, this isn’t possible any longer.

“So, especially for the small disciplines, it’s important that we create more courses for the Faculty in common and cooperate more with other schools,” says Margareta Hallberg.

T h e n u m b e r o f theses has also declined at Sahlgrenska Academy, although Vice-Dean Kristoffer Hellstrand can’t give any simple explanation.

“If you look at the number of doctoral students accepted in 2012, the trend is the opposite: we accepted 156 students, which is an unusually high number! It means that more than half of the University’s doctoral students are at Sahlgrenska Academy. We have about seven applicants per doctoral position so, from that perspective, I’m not worried. But if the University doesn’t support

Kristoffer Hellstrand

Olof Stenman Johansson

Margareta Hallberg

the doctoral education centrally, there will be a strong decrease in the number of graduate students in basic research in a few years.”

Starting on July 1, 2015, all doctoral students at GU will be formally employed from the beginning of their doctoral studies. Until that time, the present education grants will be phased out successively. But this reform is expensive and has already had an effect for the Faculty of Sciences, which has accepted considerably fewer doctoral students than before. And with

Notice

GUJOURNAL 1 | 2013

5

QUOTE Faculty of Arts 2008

School of Economics

IT Faculty

5

5

43

47

Fine and Applied Arts

2009

25

12

3

7

2010

34

25

4

5

2011

29

22

3

8

2012

21

19

4

4

Faculty of Sciences

Sahlgrenska Academy

Faculty of­Social Sciences

Faculty of Education

2008

47

130

34

11

2009

37

159

37

15

2010

42

136

26

18

2011

49

106

32

15

2012

49

105

31

9

»There are signs of a protest mentality, especially among younger academic persons and researchers that have seen through the freedom bluff – that is, that academic freedom is the right for university managements to decide over colleagues who often stand above in eminence and probity. That would be something to wish for – that 2013 became the year of academic ­disorder.« Anders Björnsson, who is looking for an uprising for academic freedom during 2013.

Total number of published doctoral theses

2008 322

2009 295

2010 290

2011 264

2012 242

»Basic research will suffer.« Kristoffer Hellstrand

the current number of education grants, the additional cost for Sahlgrenska Academy will be 25 million crowns a year, explains Kristoffer Hellstrand.

“Basic research will suffer, since that’s where education grants have been used the most.

They’re tax free and there’s a minimal amount of administration fee, in contrast with employed positions. It’s hard to see any other solution than that research groups choose not to employ doctoral students. But a smaller number of doctoral students also means that it will be harder for the Academy’s younger teachers to gain merits. The additional cost for a doctoral student salary alone corresponds to a large part of the funds from Vetenskapsrådet, for example. So it will be harder for young researchers to gather merits for higher positions, since research supervision is a requirement for appointing lecturers and professors.”

O lo f J o h a n s s o n St e n m a n , Vice-Dean of the School of Business, Economics and Law, agrees that employing doctoral students will make it difficult, particularly for small departments, to finance these students.

“Actually I think that the

education grants were pretty generous. But if all schools in the country employ their doctoral students we’ll have a unified system, and uniformity in itself is of course good. However, I’m not sure that all schools will actually do the same thing.”

Olof Johansson Stenman also points out that schools are paid by the state for basic education, while each university has to decide itself how much faculty resources should be allocated to doctoral studies. That gives weak incentives for putting resources into that. At the same time, he feels that there can be good reasons for giving priority to quality instead of quantity. naturally a limit for how small a research environment should be. The Department of Economics for example has handled the problem by only accepting students to doctoral studies every other year. Another way can be to start research schools and cooperate more with other schools in Scandinavia.”

In Sahlgrenska Academy, external grants are a natural way to finance clinical research.

But it’s difficult at other faculties to find other sponsors.

“The big financers, such as Veteskapsrådet, don’t give

“ But t h e r e ’ s

grants for doctoral projects.

Doctoral students may possibly be included in the project,” Olof Johansson Stenman explains.

“There are areas in the labour market that lack post graduate personnel and if the government sees that as a problem, maybe they’ll give extra resources, but it isn’t something that we know about now.”

E x t r e m e ly fe w humanity departments have external financed doctoral students, according to Margareta Hallberg.

“But I think it’s completely reasonable for doctoral students to be employed and get a salary for what they do, just as it’s been at our faculty for a long time. And my opinion is that we have to take consideration to other things than stopping accepting doctoral students if a financial deficit happens again, because doctoral studies are of the greatest importance for the development of a subject and supplying competence in the future.”

Eva Lundgren & Allan Eriksson

Plus 44 million last year The financial result was 44 million crowns better than was thought at the beginning of 2012.

The explanation is the strong rise in grants from research councils.

“It’s of course basically positive that we’re getting more external grants, but we should have better follow-up and control of this,” says Director of Finance Lars Nilsson.

The Vice-Chancellor will now require the faculties to submit detailed plans for how they will use their surpluses in the coming years.

In spite of good times, GU currently has fewer teachers and researchers compared with 2011. The only bright spot is that there are more employed doctoral students. However, the greatest decrease has been among administrators.

Primarily three faculties report better results than expected: the Faculty of Social Sciences, the School of Business, Economics and Law, and Sahlgrenska Academy. It doesn’t look at all as bright in the Faculty of Sciences and the Faculty of Fine, Applied and Performing Arts, both of which are fighting to turn around the financial situation.

Lars Nilsson wants to see strong efforts not to further increase the accumulated surplus, which is now at 850 million crowns.

“Carefulness lies over us like a wet blanket. I think it’s wrong not to employ more teachers and researchers when there’s a surplus in education and research.”

A preliminary prognosis for 2013 is 50 million crowns in a calculated minus result.

Soon time for new external members Work has begun to nominate external representatives to the University board. This is a new nomination procedure that means for GU that Lars Bäckström, governor of Västra Götaland, will be chairman of the nomination group. The group also includes Christina Rogestam, former director of Akademiska Hus, and student representative Klara Gustafsson. The mandate period of new members will begin on May 1. presentanten Klara Gustafsson. Mandatperioden för de nya ledamöterna börjar 1 maj.

6

News

Percussion music

Cycle Challenge 2013

at Artisten, February 20. The following day there will be lunch jazz with musicians from Estonia. Bach will be played at lunch on February 28.

These are just a few examples of events at Artisten during the spring. View the whole programme at www.hsm.gu.se

Challenge yourself, and other teams, departments and workplaces in the Cycle challenge! The challenge starts on April 29, but you can register from ­February 28. The teams should consist of 4–15 participants who cycle or walk at least 1 kilometer per day to and from the University. For further information about prizes and how to register, go to cykelutmaningen.se.

Language help for everybody Free language counselling in two languages – for both students and staff – is a service that the University of Gothenburg as the only university in Europe can offer. Maybe the only University in the whole world, according to language counsellor Carina Carlund.

L a n g uag e s up e rv i s i o n for students has existed for over 10 years but the personnel department extended this service to the university personnel a year and a half ago. It started on a modest scale, however, and until an e-mail was sent out last fall, there were few who were aware that it existed. Suddenly people started to notice.

“Questions poured in, about 60 or 70 right away. I was actually quite surprised at the response. People were very enthusiastic and some even said that the help saved them,” says university lecturer John Löwenadler, who works at the Department of Education and Special Education. He’s one of four counsellors in English.

So, what kind of help can you get?

Well, most things, except for pure

translation or language revision: for example, shorter memos, course information, examination questions, lesson materials, Power Point texts, research articles and even giving lectures.

To day l a n g uag e supervision is given in Swedish corresponding to 40 per cent of a full-time position. The

T h e n e e d s i n Swedish vary more and help is available much faster.

Both emphasise that in the end, the point of language supervision is to increase language awareness at the University.

»The more aware you become of your own language, the easier it is to spread this knowledge to the students.« language supervision given in English corresponds to 60 per cent of a fulltime position.

“The needs in English are much greater than in Swedish,” says Carina Carlund. “We could easily double the number of hours and it still wouldn’t be enough. Unfortunately, there aren’t enough resources for that at this time.”

Peo p le w h o want to get help have to ask in good time.

“We handle the questions in consecutive order but at the moment we have a queue of 40 people. Hopefully we’ll be able to help more quickly when we’ve caught up with the list,” says John Löwenadler, who estimates that at least 80 per cent of all the questions concern theses or scientific articles.

And it’s not restricted to correcting grammar mistakes.

“No, I focus on linguistic and grammar problems more generally, but also on structural aspects: how parts of the text are linked together and

“It can be sensitive to give away your texts. But the more aware you become of your own language, the easier it is to spread this knowledge to the students,” says Carina Carlund, who feels that good language ability also has to do with availability and democracy. is a lot of fun and very rewarding, but it’s also hard work. For that reason, it’s important that there are a number of people who share the supervision and that it’s part of your employment. We would very much like to have more resources to be put into supervision and, in time, to get a language centre at GU.”

“ L a n g uag e s upe rv i s i o n

Allan Eriksson

Foto: Johan wingborg

Yo u d o n ’ t h av e Swedish as your native language and you’re about to give your first lecture. Don’t panic. You can give a practice lecture for a language counsellor who helps you through it step by step. Or maybe you’re writing a scientific article in English and are tripping over your choice of words or you’re unsure about the grammar or structure.

These are just two examples of the help that GU’s employees can get.

Furthermore, it’s free and a service that’s open to everyone.

“The counselling is formed specifically according to the needs of the personnel, with anything from written feedback on shorter or longer texts, to personal meetings where we can work together to develop language skills in Swedish or English,” says Carina Carlund, lecturer in the Swedish language, who is one of four language counsellors in Swedish.

concrete advice on how to develop the text. I try to focus on what is most relevant to each person.”

John Löwenadler emphasises that it is one thing to express oneself in academic English in writing and an entirely different thing to be able to participate in a social conversation.

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“Those of us who are language counsellors work as teachers and researchers, which means that we have great experience of teaching and writing academic texts in English and Swedish,” say John Löwenadler and Carina Carlund.

Language counsellor best tips: 1. Ask for feedback from colleagues or others when you write papers or give lectures.

2. At the beginning of a new paragraph, it’s often good to clarify how it relates to the previous one.

3. If you use long, complicated sentences, they have to be very well structured.

4. English and Swedish words with the “same meaning” don’t necessarily behave in the same way grammatically.

5. Read through what you’ve written many times.

Facts Personnel language counsellors are financed via the unit for leadership and competence development.

Contact person for language counselling in Swedish: carina.carlund@svenska.gu.se Contact person for language counselling in English: john.lowenadler@ped.gu.se

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Profile

text annika hansson | photography Johan Wingborg

Reveals myths about ”Big units are in just now but in a few years the trend will no doubt be the opposite.”

Technology and gender are two main themes in organisation theorist Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist’s research.

She relaxes on her free time by ­­skiing – and mangling sheets. h i ld r e n a r e p l ay i n g noisily in the snow at the schoolyard on Föreningsgatan, but it’s peaceful and quiet in the house across the street, the School of Economic’s Gothenburg Research Institute (GRI). Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist is director here for seven cross disciplinary research groups.

“Do you want coffee?” she asks and we take the spiral stairs one floor down to get ourselves a cup.

In 2010, Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist was appointed professor with a particular orientation toward organisation and management. As an organisation researcher she studies everything from large companies to organisation in the public sector or small sports clubs. “ It ’ s r e a lly fu n to think about why people work for a common goal, what it is that makes us go along with it, maybe 40 hours a week, for something as abstract as delivering care or selling new products. Of course we do it for the money. But it has to do with much more than that. We also choose to cooperate, in fact. It isn’t as simple as the boss telling us what to do. Everything is built on people wanting to do it.”

There’s a common understanding that a person has to work and earn a living in our society. It’s something that’s taken for granted.

“If we look at those who don’t have work, we see that what we take for granted gives a

very strong picture of how society works.”

Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist started as a gender researcher with a focus on company cultures and socialisation.

She earned her doctoral degree at the School of Business, Economics and Law at the University of Gothenburg in 2000 with a thesis on the social construction of gender in companies.

“A f t e r t h e t h e s i s I was very tired of always being mistaken as having the chief responsibility for equality issues at the Department.”

She started to study what happens when new technology is introduced in organisations. It had to do with both Volvo and the school’s world.

“It was assumed in the organisations that older people wouldn’t like the new technology. But when we studied this, we often found that it was older women who ran the development in the school. The ones who were doubtful about new technology were young teachers who had recently completed their education. It was too much for them to manage new technology and the education situation in the classroom.”

This was at the beginning of the 2000s and much has happened since then. IT is today a tool that is used very much in the school.

In 2003, Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist was asked whether she would like to evaluate an EU effort that tried to get more women in leading positions. She was pregnant and

9

GUJOURNAL 1 | 2013

work life wasn’t interested but then accepted and started the project when her daughter was born.

She followed the issue for several years and later wrote a book about how equality is worked with at 15 large private and public organisations in Sweden.

S o m e t h i n g s h e ’ s interested in at the present is discrimination in the military. A new discrimination law came into effect in 2009 and the Government asked the military to investigate how discrimination was experienced among employees.

It was Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist’s research group that designed the questionnaire that the employees completed.

“It was a really exciting study.

We have

new technology being introduced in the public sector, such as electronic administration (e-Government).

Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist is studying what has happened at the tax authority and the social insurance agency.

“The organisations want to have technical solutions for taking care of economics and personnel issues, for example. The tax authority has introduced e-tax forms, which is a positive example of this. But the social insurance agency has gotten a lot of criticism for their e-solutions,” she says. being collected in the project. In the framework for it, employees and the people who have developed the IT systems are interviewed.

“We want to see how the technical solutions affect work.”

As an organisation researcher, Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist has opinions about M at e r i a l s a r e n ow

the re-organisation that’s being done at the University of Gothenburg.

“Yes, we organisation researchers heave a sigh over this. Now we’re going to be large units. Exactly the same thing is being done at the University as in other places in the city of Gothenburg and in the church.

Big units are the trend just now. But the question is how well thought out this is. It seems sooner that they copy others instead of looking at what’s needed in the specific organisation.”

U ll a E r i k s s o n -Z e tt e rq u i st thinks that in five or perhaps ten years it will be time for small units again.

“Organisations follow trends. But we’re seeing now that it’s actually going over toward small units in some places.”

Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist and her colleagues have however not been approached in the process around the new organisation.

d

is experience at th n io at in m ri sc di of rm »The fo age.« most in the study is in fact

some fantastic material. It shows that women as a group experience a high degree of discrimination. But the form of discrimination that is experienced most in the study is in fact age. This applies to both younger and older people. Somewhere between 35 and 50 years, a person is ‘age free’. The younger ones don’t think that they’re listened to and the older ones wonder for example why they’re not promoted.”

T h e q u e sti o n n a i r e will be distributed again in the spring. 17 000 people in the military – both civil employees and officers – will be asked about discrimination.

“It’s going to be very exciting to see what developments there have been in this area.”

Another current project has to do with

“No, we haven’t. And in spite of the fact that we have Sweden’s best accounting researchers, they haven’t either been asked when the University introduced models for indirect costs. It’s hard to be a prophet in your own country. Maybe it isn’t as flashy to ask your own people.”

But not everything is negative about the new system, she thinks.

“There’s a lot that comes out in this type of change. Sometimes you have to do an overview.”

Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist talks quickly, like effectively. She often says that she’s “had advantages” during her career – a humble way to put it in someone who’s reached a high academic position.

S h e g r e w up in the small town of Ljustorp, several kilometres north of Sundsvall. Her parents had a farm with milk cows and forest. Today three of her four siblings run the farm.

“I started to help on the farm as a sixyear-old. I got to do almost everything, and I can drive a tractor and milk cows.”

But despite her being oldest among her siblings there wasn’t an expectation that she would stay at home on the farm, she says.

“If I’d been a son I probably would have experienced other expectations.”

Nowadays she just visits. The last time she was there was at New Year. And then

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Profile

»Big units are the trend just now. But the question is how well thought out this is.«

Ull a Erik ss on -Zetter

qui st

No w: Director of GRI (Gothenburg Research Institute) at the School of Eco nomic since 2012 Ag e: 45 years

there’s usually skiing. It’s something that unites the whole family.

“Skiing is a big thing in our family. My mother moved from Dalsland to Sundsvall to be able to train and compete on skis. She competed to some extent when she was young and has skied Vasaloppet 15 times.

Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist is happy that her own three children, two girls and a boy, also come along when they ski.

G ot h e n b u rg m ay n ot be the best place to live for someone who likes winter sports.

But Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist doesn’t think it’s a problem. It doesn’t take long to get to Ulricehamn, where there’s snow. And there are visits up to Norrland a few times each winter.

Literature is also something she likes to relax with.

“But when I really have free time, it’s wonderful fun to mangle, table cloths and sheets. I also work a little in the garden.

And to manage work life, you have to keep yourself in shape. I bicycle to work, go to the gym and make sure I’m active.”

Together with her colleague Kajsa Lindberg, Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist is responsible for the OAN (Organizing Action Nets) research programme.

The programme, which was started in 2001 by Professor Barbara Czarniawska, is cross disciplinary, with architects, sociologists, environmentalists – about 15 people both in and outside of GRI. They work with

themes. First it was the financial market, and then it dealt with risks.

“We published a book. It was in connection with the tsunami and bird influenza.

Now we’re looking at institutional innovations.”

About 50 people work at GRI, which she leads. It’s a cross disciplinary research institute that was started during the 1990s.

The Institute has external financing and, at the beginning, business and trade in Gothenburg gave them a start of 20 million crowns.

“GRI comes out well in evaluations.

We’re known both nationally and internationally,” she says, not without pride in her voice.

“It’s fantastic to get to represent an organisation of that kind.”

R e s e a rc h e r s fro m m a n y different nations work there – Spain, Italy, Poland, Germany and last year Turkey and Brazil.

People have to apply for external grants for their research at GRI. “It isn’t the same safe thing as it is in the rest of the University. It isn’t so simple to be here, but it makes us take care of one another. And people like it here and have a good time.”

She thinks that having fun at work is important. And she herself is very satisfied with her work place.

“It’s a benefit to be able to do research and have such good colleagues as I have.”

Bo rn : In Ljustorp, nor

th of Sundsvall

Liv es: In Kungsladug

ård in Gothenburg Fam ily: Husband and three children, 11, 9 and 4 years old Ba ck gr ou nd : MBA

and PhD

Professor at GRI since 2010. Works there as a researcher and teacher. Has pub lished a large number of scientific works, alone and together with other aut hors.

Responsible for the OAN (Organizing Action Net s) research programme tog ether with one colleag ue.

Guest researcher at the university in Trento, Ital y, in 2005 and at Stanford Uni versity in the US in 201 0.

We ak ne ss: “I say yes to too much. I should say no more often but I go hap pily in to new tasks.”

Str en gt h: “Get thin gs done.”

Int er est s: Skiing, lite rature. “Probably comes from my family. We rea d a lot. My father used to pass the books on to my gra ndmother when he’d rea d them. The ones she tho ught were good she gav e to me.”

Mo st re cen tly re ad bo ok s: Often rea ds several books in parallel.

At the moment, Vasadö ttrarna (The Vasa Daughters) by Karin Tegenborg Falkdale n and 1084 by Haruki Mu rakami. “I listen to aud io books when I bicycle to work.

Right now one by Elisabe th George.”

Fav ou rit e fo od : “Shrimp, although filet of beef isn’t bad either. And roe is good. Slow cooked Ital ian food is fantastic. Yes, I’m pretty fond of food.”

News

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articles accepted in maybe lower ranked journals.”

Richard Neutze and Gergely Katona wrote the article that landed on Science’s list of the most important of the year together with a large international research team.

Photogr aphy: Johan wingborg

Gergely Katona and Richard Neutze have written one of the world’s best scientific articles, according to Science.

On the top list of science One of the world’s best scientific articles last year was written by researchers at the University of Gothenburg.

Richard Neutze and Gergely­Katona are on Science magazine’s ten best list.

What’s the subject? Intensive, ultra rapid radiation that reveals what proteins look like on the atomic level.

R e s e a rc h e r s who want to analyse proteins face two problems: it takes time to create the right kind of crystals that are big enough to be studied and to study them without destroying them.

“If you stand in front of an x-ray beam you risk getting cancer. It’s the same with proteins – if you expose them to radiation they’re destroyed,” says Richard Neutze, professor of biochemistry.

He came upon an idea 12 years ago that now is the foundation for the latest in structural bio-

logy: diffraction before destruction.

It has to do with taking pictures of proteins using inconceivably short x-ray pulses, shorter than the time it takes for light to pass over a hair.

“It means that the x-ray beam can take a picture before the protein falls into pieces.”

Research on the atomic level requires huge equipment. Work is currently going on in Lund to build the world’s strongest synchotron where electrons are accelerated in a ring so that molecular structures can be determined.

T h i s co n st ructi o n isn’t sufficient for what Richard Neutze and Gergely Katona want to do, however.

“Instead we use the world’s first x-ray free-electron laser that was built at the University of Stanford in 2009,” says Associate Professor Gergely Katona. “It’s a three kilometre long straight tube that makes it possible to

study crystals that are a million times smaller than the ones that are used in a synchotron. A similar x-ray is under construction in Hamburg.”

R e s e a rc h o n t h e structure of proteins can be used to better understand several different disease mechanisms. And that is of course important, says Richard Neutze.

“But actually it’s the method itself that we’re studying. We leave pharmacological developments to others.”

It isn’t the first time that Richard Neutze and Gergely Katona have published articles in the highest ranked scientific journals, such as Science, Nature and Nature Methods. “ D i ffe r e n t d i s c i pli n e s and different research groups think in different ways,” says Gergely Katona. “But for us it’s been more important to publish only a few articles but in the most leading journals, than to have more

“ I ’ m actua lly s u r pr i s e d that they chose that article, but of course I’m very happy,” explains Richard Neutze. “It means that the editorial staff of Science thinks that our method will become significant in the future.

And it’s incredibly important for the whole school and strengthens its trademark that researchers at the University of Gothenburg are in an internationally pioneering research programme.”

Richard Neutze and Gergely Katona have two more articles on the way, and more hopes about what an x-ray free-electron laser can be used for. Maybe a new Jurassic Park film?

“Finding dinosaur bones is fun, of course, but it’s more interesting if they can be put together to make a skeleton,” says Richard Neutze. “But it gets really exciting when you make a film that shows how the dinosaurs move, live and develop.”

That’s about the way it is with proteins, too.

“Pictures of protein structures are important,” says Gergely Katona. “But we’re actually out after understanding how the proteins move and work. So we hope our next breakthrough will be a film about how proteins react.”

Eva Lundgren

Scientific top ten li st At the end of the year, Science chose the ten best articles published in ­Science or Nature during 2012.

Number one was an article that discussed the Higgs particle. Two, three and four were articles about the Denisova­man, stem cells and the Curiosity spacecraft. The article on how it is possible to study proteins with x-ray laser came in fifth place.

Co-authors are biochemist Richard Neutze and Gergely Katona at the University of Gothenburg.

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Report

She came here for a longer life The U.S. life expectancy of individuals with cystic fibrosis is 35 years. In Sweden it’s 50.

22-year-old Lauren Meiss came from Arizona to Gothenburg to study for her life.

T h e co n t r a st b e t w e e n Arizona’s desert climate and the winter in Gothenburg couldn’t be any more obvious than on this crisp December day. The thermometer shows temperatures well below freezing and the traffic outside the Sahlgrenska Academy in Gothenburg has turned the

snow on the streets into a sparkling layer of white ice.

Having grown up in Scottsdale, Lauren Meiss is accustomed to temperatures close to 50 degrees Celsius in the shade. Now she’s slowly getting used to the apparent change of scenery. And sometimes change can be painful: As we are walking to a nearby restaurant she loses concentration for a split second, slips on a patch of ice and does a partial backflip before surrendering to gravity.

“I’m going to Kiruna next week to see what it’s like way up north. Maybe I should find some better shoes,” says Lauren as she gently pats her back end to assess the damage.

Lauren Meiss was born in 1990. When she was three months old, she was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis—a hereditary disease where a genetic defect interferes with the functioning of the pancreas, airways, and sweat glands.

The disease is characterized by abnormal

GUJOURNAL 1 | 2013

levels of mucus in the airways—and inevitably leads to death.

Seated at the restaurant and ready to enjoy the best of Swedish cuisine, Lauren says she has no problem talking about it.

“My parents didn’t know we had this gene in the family, and we don’t know of anybody else who has had it, so of course it was a shock. But for me personally, it’s just my normal everyday life. I’ve always taken medicines, always exercised to help my breathing, and always known that my life will end one day,” she says and takes another bite.

“This disease can be very difficult. But I’ve never been sad. Living with cystic fibrosis has given me a different perspective on life and has made me more outgoing.

I know that every day counts, and all the little things that bother other people my age just don’t faze me.”

A b o ut 70,0 0 0 p e r s o n s worldwide have cystic fibrosis. A lot of people, perhaps, but in a research perspective very few.

The research on the disease doesn’t attract much funding, and the scientists who do get involved often have personal reasons rather than dreams of money and fame.

One example is Gunnar C. Hansson at the Sahlgrenska Academy, who is heading one of the world’s leading research teams in the field, and whose son has cystic fibrosis.

In fact, Professor Hansson is the very reason Lauren Meiss came to Gothenburg in the first place.

“I decided early on to choose a career where I can help increase the knowledge about my disease, and I read anything I can get my hands on. One day at a conference in California, I heard a Swedish researcher say that in Sweden the life expectancy of people with cystic fibrosis is 50 years. In the U.S. it’s 35, so I immediately decided to go to Sweden to learn more,” she says.

Her contacts with Professor Paul Quinton—a world leading researcher on cystic fibrosis who has lived with the disease for 67 years—led her to Gunnar C. Hansson. The Swedish professor invited her to Gothenburg right away, and with the help of two national scholarships, Lauren arrived in Gothenburg about 18 months ago - literally to study for her life.

“I’ve taken some courses that I hope to apply toward a medical degree in the U.S., but right now I’m working full time in the lab with the research team. Gunnar has really taken me under his wings, and I have learned so much,” she says.

L au r e n e v e n r u n s her own research project. At the moment she’s in the process of dissecting rats to characterize their airway mucus layer. Her goal is to report her findings in a scientific article—and eventually solve the mystery of cystic fibrosis?

“Well, that may be a bit too grand of a goal. But I would love to help connect the research and the patient’s perspective. I’m envisioning myself spreading information and promoting knowledge about the disease,” she says.

13

»I know that every day counts, and all the little things that bother other people my age just don’t faze me.«

When Lauren Meiss was three months old, she was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis — a hereditary disease.

Swedes stretches far beyond backflips on icy streets. Scraping the last pieces of haddock from her plate, Lauren shares some of the things she has learned: • A Swede would never pretend to be your best friend if he isn’t.

• Swedes are reserved in the beginning but very open once you get to know them.

• Swedes are calm and never hot-tempered.

• The miserable winter is compensated by the beautiful summer, and also by the fall, which is just fantastic.

She is already making contributions.

Lauren runs two blogs and also writes and performs music about her experiences. And she would love to give lectures. At the same, it is hard to plan her life with a disease with such large effects.

For about one hour every day, Lauren has to wear a mechanical vest. It vibrates her ribcage to loosen the mucus in her airways. The symptoms of the disease tend to fluctuate. On bad days, she’s tired and has difficulties breathing, and she is always vulnerable to infections. In contrast to many others with cystic fibrosis, she has a good appetite. However, her sense of taste seems to be changing. lost her sense of smell.

“Of course I miss the smell of food and some other good stuff, but I’m not really grieving. The only real problem is that I can’t smell smoke or fire, which obviously can be a bit dangerous!”

“The most difficult part of it is that I’m forced to take it easy at an age when I’m so full of energy. I want to get involved in my disease, talk about it and spread knowledge, but I’m afraid of getting worse and not being able to do the job well.”

“But then I think of Professor Quinton.

If he can live with cystic fibrosis at his age, why couldn’t I?” Her experience with Sweden and the S h e h a s a lr e a dy

She has also noticed large differences as a patient. In Sweden, she has experienced a different type of healthcare system, where doctors listen and ask questions in a way their American counterparts generally don’t.

The vest that Lauren wears is not used at all in Sweden. Instead a physical therapist has taught her a technique to cleanse her airways by coughing in a certain way.

I n co m b i n ati o n w it h a cleaner environment and better air quality, Lauren feels that this is probably the reason why Swedes with cystic fibrosis tend to live longer, and when she returns to Arizona she’s hoping her Swedish experiences will add many years to her life.

“When I was born, the life expectancy for children with cystic fibrosis was eleven years. It has increased steadily ever since, and when I return home next winter I’ll bring new treatments and insights that I would like to share with my American doctors.”

“People often ask how I can go on living knowing that I’m going to die. But we’re all going to die, right? You may have a tragic accident tomorrow—anything can happen. My relationships with my family and friends, including my new friends in Sweden, are what keep me going.”

text: Krister svahn photography: Johan wingborg

14 New series:

World class senior researchers

Waiting for a breakthrough Arvid Carlsson doesn’t care that he recently turned 90.

Instead he’s waiting with excitement for February 20th, the day that the codes from his latest study will be broken. h a r act e r i sti c fe atu r e s of schizophrenia are hallucinations, odd ideas, withdrawal and sometimes deteriorated thinking ability.

“But those are very different symptoms. Should they in fact be treated in the same way? Diagnoses are often just labels that can stand in the way of a deeper understanding of the disease. If we instead focus on the symptoms, it can be easier to find new paths of treatment.”

Speaking is Nobel Prize winner Arvid Carlsson. In a small preclinical laboratory at Sahlgrenska Science Park, he continues together with his research team to study the same signal substances that have interested him ever since the 1950s.

“The head of the laboratory is my daughter Maria, without whose enthusiasm today I’d be an ordinary pensioner. I’m also happy that her son, Johan-Emil, is doing part of his medical practitioner duties at the lab.”

A rv i d C a r l s s o n says that now, after over sixty years as a researcher, he has come to a couple of simple truths, via winding roads.

One is the importance of focusing on symptoms instead of on a diagnosis. Another is that medicines should stabilise the levels of different chemicals in the body, not dramatically increase or decrease them.

His greatest hope for the future in terms of research is called OSU6162.

“It’s an agent that my research group actually developed back in the 1980s and studies then showed that it had an effect on Parkinson’s disease and Huntington’s disease. What’s so exciting is that the agent acts as a stabiliser for the signal substances dopamine and serotonin. If the patient has an over-function of dopamine, for example, which is often the case in schizophrenia, OSU6162 acts to decrease that. If the patient

instead has too little, the substance gets the function to increase. If the signal substances are kept on a neutral level all the time, never too much, never too little, the body doesn’t need to produce counter reactions.

That means that many side effects are avoided, both in the short and the long run.”

T h e ag e n t h a s already been tested at several laboratories and clinics in Sweden and abroad, such as Karolinska Institute, where it was included in an investigation on rats concerning alcohol dependency. The results are better than all other preparations in the area.

And a carefully controlled study was recently done in 12 patients with mental fatigue in which seven participants clearly improved after only a few days in comparison with participants given an inactive preparation.

“Mental fatigue is something that we are especially interested in because it is a symptom that has many difference causes, from stroke and head injuries to different neurological diseases,” explains Arvid Carlsson. “If the same preparation can be used, regardless of the original cause of the difficulty, it lends strong support to the thought that it is the symptoms, not the diagnosis, that can often be the best guide.

Unfortunately, all pharmacological tests take a very long time. You must of course be thorough but at the same time I can think that the risks should be weighed against all the suffering that patients experience while waiting for the medication.”

T h e stu dy t h at Arvid Carlsson will very soon find out the results of has to do with chronic fatigue syndrome. But the substance will also be tested in patients with narcolepsy. It can perhaps also be used for

Alzheimer’s disease and depression, which are characterized by increasing weakness.

“I believe that prolonged, unnatural fatigue is often caused by poor neuroplasticity, that is a decreased ability in the brain to restructure itself when it is exposed to new stresses. This ability is decisive for maintaining alertness as a person ages and will I’m sure be a large research area in the near future.”

A rv i d C a r l s s o n i s convinced that the brain feels good when it is stimulated.

However, he is sceptical to stem cell researchers who say that the adult brain can also build new nerve cells.

“One reason for having memories from

»Research is fun, of course,­ but results often take a ­terribly long time.« an early age is that we retain the same nerve cells that we were born with. If new nerve cells could be produced, this should affect this memory function. Man is simply not a salamander.”

Arvid Carlsson turned 90 on January 25. And in March, a permanent exhibit on his research will be inaugurated at the Department of Pharmacology at Sahlgrenska Academy.

He took a trip away from Gothenburg.

He doesn’t care much for ceremonies.

“I’ve attended two Nobel Prize festivities, the one at which I received the prize and another the following year when the Nobel

15

GUJOURNAL 1 | 2013

Arvid C arlsson NEWS: Turned 90 on January 25 CAREER: MD in 1951, employed as a researcher at Lund University 1944–1959, guest researcher at the National Institutes of Health 1955-1956, professor at the University of Gothenburg 1959–1989, received the Isreali Wolf prize in 1979, Japan prize in 1994 and the Nobel prize in 2000. His research is supported

by Sahlgrenska Academy, Sahlgrenska Science Park, the VG region, in large part via Stroke Forum and ­Gothia Forum, and a number of foundations. ­ He owns A Carlsson Research AB. RE SIDENCE: Änggården, summer house in Onsala

FAMILY: Wife Ulla-Lisa, also soon 90 years, children Bo, Lena, Hans, Maria (colleague) and Magnus.

Twelve grandchildren, one great grandchild.

Prize celebrated its 100 year anniversary.

I was seated farthest back in the so called penguin mountain with a few tall men in front of me. Each time I stood up for a new prize winner, they stood up too, so I didn’t get to see anything at all. The best way to follow the Nobel Prize ceremony is on TV.” A rv i d C a r l s s o n i n st e a d keeps on working the way he always has. He’s kept his childish curiosity. He’s also careful to keep active with daily walks together with his wife Ulla-Lisa, also soon 90 years old.

“We manage by ourselves, apart from having help with cleaning every other week.

I eat healthily. I like pea soup and other plain food. But my balance has become worse, unfortunately. I used to be able to hop from stone to stone to get out to the

water at our summer home in Onsala. I can’t do that anymore.”

The brain has a need to be in many different conditions, according to Arvid Carlsson. Sometimes, for example, you have to concentrate.

“Research is fun, of course, but results often take a terribly long time. Crypto, on the other hand, a kind of crossword puzzle where a number stands for a certain letter, gives me immediate satisfaction when I solve it successfully. The numbers for three letters are mostly given to help. But I cover them up – I want to solve it all on my own.”

But t h e b r a i n also has to be allowed to rest and just dream. Maybe the brain can then begin to see a hint of something that today’s research has yet reached.

Because, even though Arvid Carlsson isn’t religious, he’d still very much like to believe in eternity. a person dies, the brain activity is very high. Many have pondered over the reason for this. Maybe the senses have extremely many experiences then, such as wonderful pictures. Since time is demanding for the brain to keep track of, the feeling of time is probably among the first to disappear. Then it isn’t impossible that the last thing a person perceives is wonderful scenes in a timeless setting. What is that if not an experience of eternity?”

“J u st b e fo r e

text: Eva Lundgren Foto: Johan Wingborg

16

Report

Language makes us human In Africa there are hundreds of languages that still must be documented.

“An Eldorado and a challenge but also a responsibility for a language r­ esearcher,” says Laura J Downing, Professor of African Languages.

L au r a h a s a gigantic map of Africa on the wall of her work room, with the continent’s approximately 2 000 languages marked.

“It was bought at a museum outside of Brussels,” she says and sweeps her hand over the fields of colour that show the divisions into language families. In addition to Indo-European and Austronesia languages, there are also four language groups that are special to Africa.

Languages follow natural boundaries such and mountains and lakes but are affected by factors such as urbanisation and political actions.

“It is interesting to follow the language development in terms of certain countries’ economic growth, ethnic conflicts and other countries’ investments. People leave their small villages to work and live in cities, and for this reason some languages are on their way to disappearing while others are becoming more and more dominant because of political decisions,” Laura explains.

L au r a to o k up the professorship at the Department of Languages and Literatures, the only one in Sweden, last fall after the position had been unfilled for two years.

“With the earlier professor’s retirement, the University chose to take away financing, but the Department got it back and could employ me.”

She feels some worry over the interruption but also confidence.

“I hope to be able to build up what I think might have been lost in terms of attracting students. There’s fear that they’ll try to reduce the Department’s costs again, but I’ll fight. For Sweden’s part, it’s important to have a research base for the African languages considering the immigrant population of the country. We also stand for expertise when for example Migrationsverket calls to get help with translations, identification of languages and language support.”

Laura comments on the language debate at the University of Gothenburg: “For me as a lover of languages I’m surprised that the language departments con-

stantly have to feel an overhanging financial threat, that they’re not valued. Language is what makes us human and studying them in a scientific way is a basic area of the humanities. In our time, with international trade and learning to know other cultures, subjects such as language and literature are significant.”

Her interest in languages started when she was a teenager.

“We lived at an American air force base in Germany where my father worked and I came into contact with another langu-

studying changes in pitch, emphasised and unemphasised syllables and rhythms in Chichewa and Umbuka. They differ in some basic respects; like that Tumbuka doesn’t have a pure pitch structure like Chichewa does.”

T h e Ba n tu l a n g uag e s have a common base vocabulary and basic patterns, but it can still be difficult to understand each other over language boundaries.

Over the years she’s done field work in Zimbabwe and Malawi.

“My colleagues in Malawi help to find students who are interested in participating in the research work. I ask questions, do interviews and let the people tell me something. Then I listen carefully to the

»I’m studying changes in pitch, emphasised and unemphasised syllables and rhythms in ­Chichewa and Tumbuka …« age for the first time. It was fascinating. It became African languages because it was tempting to do research on something that hadn’t been studied, but also because of enthusiastic teachers during my time as a doctoral student at the University of Illinois, which resulted in my thesis Problems in Jita Tonology.”

L a n g uag e t h eo r i st s are interested in knowing and finding out what is common for different languages and to construct theories on that basis.

“Most models are based on how European languages, sometimes also Japanese and Chinese, are built up and this often excludes languages that are spoken in Africa. We’ve worked hard to change these theories and it’s now starting to be accepted.”

In addition to doing research on languages that are related to Zulu, which is part of the language group Nguni and is spoken in South Africa and Zimbabwe, Laura also investigates two of the roughly 500 existing Bantu languages.

“Bantu, which is spoken in Malawi, for example, is a tonal language and I’m

tape recordings, make a transcript, analyse and check with my research question.”

L au r a co m e s to Gothenburg from her job as researcher and project leader at ZAS (centre for general language science) in Berlin. She says about her time until now in Gothenburg: “After having lived in a large city like Berlin for many years, I notice a genuine kindness and helpfulness in people here and I’ve already begun to form good contacts with colleagues.”

She loves music and admires the concert hall with its excellent acoustics. Film, preferably documentaries, is another big interest, and Laura is impressed by the Gothenburg International Film Festive.

“I’m fascinated by its being so large and comparable with Berlin’s. There are several films from Africa,” says Laura happily, “and The Last Fishing Boat is a film from Malawi that I absolutely have to see.”

TEXT: Helena Svensson PhotograPHy: Johan Wingborg

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GUJOURNAL 1 | 2013

Laura J Downing is Sweden’s only professor of African languages.

L aur a J Downing Title: Professor of African languages at the Department of Languages and Literatures Age: 58 years Family: Single Born: On Long Island, USA (at an air force base that no longer exists) Residence: At Kvilletorget Interests: Reading history books and novels, African music, art, documentary films Current reading: History of Mali, Dr Phiri Most recent film: Beasts of the Southern Wild, director Benh Zeitlin Favourite food: Sweet potato with butter and pepper Motto: “Quaerere Verum” (“search for the truth”), which stands on the Downing’s family crest Favourite word: “Ubuntu” is a Bantu word that means “compassion”

The approximately 500 Bantu languages are spoken by about 200 million people.

CHICHEWA: is spoken by 7 million people.

TUMBUKA: is spoken by 1 million people. l: Professor i afrikanska språk på institutionen för språk och litteraturer Ålder: 58 år Familj: Singel Född: På Long Island, USA (på en