Seke Chainda

Global Swede is an initiative by the Swedish government to promote long-term relations with international students in Sweden, with the aim to create cross-border networks and future collaborations.

Seke Chainda, Master student in Biology at Karlstad University, was awarded as Global Swede 2019 together with 25 other international students studying in Sweden. The students have distinguished themselves in their areas of study and in terms of both innovation and entrepreneurship. They have therefore been deemed good representatives for both Sweden and their home countries. Seke Chainda is from Senanga, a town in western Zambia. On 21 May, Seke visited the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Utrikesdepartementet) in Stockholm to participate in the Global Swede ceremony. Seke received his diploma from Ann Linde, the Swedish Minister for Foreign Trade.

Thomas Blom (Pro-Vice-Chancellor at Karlstad University), Seke Chainda and Stina Eriksson (Vice Head of the Biology Department at Karlstad University) at the Global Swede Ceremony

Seke is enrolled in the Master programme in Ecology and Conservation Biology at Karlstad University. In his master’s thesis, he examined the function of the adipose fin for the swimming performance and drift-feeding capability of juvenile salmonids, which usually is removed from juvenile fish reared at hatcheries for stocking purposes.

Seke Chainda, Erik Petersson (Professor at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences) and Elio Bottagisio (master student) doing lab work at Karlstad University

Seke Chainda together with other master students conducting field work

Seke Chainda tagging a fish

Marius Heiß, a master student who has been working by River Ätran has finished his thesis titled “Evaluation of innovative rehabilitation measures targeting downstream migrating Atlantic salmon smolt (Salmo salar) at a hydroelectric power plant in southern Sweden” . In the abstract he writes:

“The ecological state of streams and rivers has aggravated on a global scale due to a wide range of anthropogenic influences. The disruption of migratory routes for diadromous fishes by hydroelectric power plants have led to major stock declines over the last century. As a result fishways have been built at many hydroelectric power plants in Europe to improve migration conditions at such obstacles. This measure may improve upstream migration, but typically does not solve corresponding passage problems for downstream migrating fish. Consequently large numbers of downstream migrants, e.g. Atlantic salmon smolt (Salmo salar), are forced to pass turbines on their way to the ocean. There are few rehabilitation measures specifically targeting downstream passage conditions and most of them lack scientific evaluation.

This thesis reports on a radio-telemetric-study to evaluate innovative rehabilitation measures targeting downstream migrating Atlantic salmon smolt, at a hydropower plant in southern Sweden. There had been extensive renovation works at the study site to improve passage conditions for migrating fishes. The conventional turbine rack and a modified conventional trash gate were replaced by a low sloping β-rack adjacent to a full depth bypass channel. Moreover, a nature-like fishway was built at the site.
The results show that the evaluated rehabilitation measures were able to significantly improve downstream passage conditions for Atlantic salmon smolts. Total passage success was high (94%) and bypass efficiency has increased by 68%, whereas the number of smolts passing through the turbines was reduced by 63%. Although there were some issues associated with the monitoring station in the new bypass, the results are promising and so prospective constructions of low-sloping β-racks with full-depth bypasses should lead to improved downstream passage conditions at additional hydroelectric power plants.”

Read the master thesis here.