Hybrid pension plans offer employees the best features of both defined benefit and defined contribution plans. In this work, we consider the hybrid design offering a defined contribution benefit with a defined benefit guaranteed minimum underpin. This study applies the contingent claims approach to value the defined contribution benefit with a defined benefit guaranteed minimum underpin. The study shows that entry age, utility function parameters and the market price of risk each has a significant effect on the value of retirement benefits. We also consider risk management for this defined benefit underpin pension plan. Assuming fixed interest rates, and assuming that salaries can be treated as a tradable asset, contribution rates are developed for the Entry Age Normal (EAN), Projected Unit Credit(PUC), and Traditional Unit Credit (TUC) funding methods. For the EAN, the contribution rates are constant throughout the service period. However, the hedge parameters for this method are not tradable. For the accruals method, the individual contribution rates are not constant. For both the PUC and TUC, a delta hedge strategy is derived and explained. The analysis is extended to relax the tradable assumption for salaries, using the inflation as a partial hedge. Finally, methods for incorporating volatility reducingand risk management are considered.

Recently, there is growing interest in high speed circuits for broadband communication, especially in wired networks. As the data rate increases beyond 1 GB/s conventional materials used as communication channels such as PCB traces, coaxial cables, and unshielded twisted pair (UTP) cables, etc. attenuate and distort the transmitted signal causing bit errors in the receiver end. Bit errors make the communication less reliable and in many cases even impossible. The goal of this work was to analyze, and design an channel equalizer capable of restoring the received signal back to the original transmitted signal. The equalizer was designed in a standard CMOS 0.18 µm process and it is capable of compensating up to 20 dB’s of attenuation at 1.5625 GHz for 15 and 20 meters of RG-58 A/U coaxial cables. The equalizer is able to remove 0.5 UI ( 160 ps ) of peak-to-peak jitter and output a signal with 0.1 UI ( 32 ps ) for 15 meters of cable at 3.125 Gb/s. The equalizer draws 18 mA from a 1.8 V power supply which is lower than publications [1, 2] for CMOS transversal equalizers.

Diss. Nr. 3455 Wirtschaftswiss. St. Gallen. / Literaturverz.

No description available.

Bakalauro baigiamasis darbas, kurio tikslas - sukurti žiniatinklio dialogo formų generavimo sistemą, bei realizuoti žiniatinklio dialogo formos laukų susiejimą su nutolusios DB laukais. Darbui įgyvendinti buvo išanalizuotos žiniatinklio dialogo formų generavimo sistemų savybės ir jų analogai. Suformuluota darbo reikalavimų specifikacija, detalizuojama architektūros specifikacija, atliktas sukurtos sistemos testavimas ir parašytas vartotojo vadovas. / Final paper which main goal is to create web dialogs forms generation system, capable of linking web dialogs forms field with remote DB field. To achieve this goal, web dialogs forms generation systems were analyzed for their functionality. Specified requirement specification, explained architecture specification, done extensive testing of the created system and written user manual.

Sukurti MySQL duomenų bazių valdymo sistemos duomenų bazių duomenų valdymo sistemą, kuri duomenų perdavimui naudotų REST architektūros principus. REST architektūra gali būti naudojama padidinti įvairių sistemų integravimo galimybes, nes suteikia patogiai prieinamą sąsają prie sistemos funkcionalumo ir duomenų. Tad sukūrus sistemą MySQL DBVS valdymui REST architektūros pagalba, būtų galima kurti sistemas, kurios naudojasi kitų tiekėjų duomenimis. / REST architecture allows easier collaboration between two systems, as provided an easy way to call necessary functions in remote system and to get desired results. Such systems as Amazon, eBay, Twitter have their own API with support of REST architecture. However the REST architecture is not provided by default in MySQL, therefore additional tools have to be used. The purpose of this work is to design and implement a system, which could be used as a database management tool in REST architecture. Therefore in this thesis a requirement and architecture specifications are provided for such a system. The implemented system is tested and install and configuration manuals are provided.

No description available.

BACKGROUND: Comparative evolutionary analysis of whole genomes requires not only accurate annotation of gene space, but also proper annotation of the repetitive fraction which is often the largest component of most if not all genomes larger than 50 kb in size. RESULTS: Here we present the Rice TE database (RiTE-db) - a genus-wide collection of transposable elements and repeated sequences across 11 diploid species of the genus Oryza and the closely-related out-group Leersia perrieri. The database consists of more than 170,000 entries divided into three main types: (i) a classified and curated set of publicly-available repeated sequences, (ii) a set of consensus assemblies of highly-repetitive sequences obtained from genome sequencing surveys of 12 species; and (iii) a set of full-length TEs, identified and extracted from 12 whole genome assemblies. CONCLUSIONS: This is the first report of a repeat dataset that spans the majority of repeat variability within an entire genus, and one that includes complete elements as well as unassembled repeats. The database allows sequence browsing, downloading, and similarity searches. Because of the strategy adopted, the RiTE-db opens a new path to unprecedented direct comparative studies that span the entire nuclear repeat content of 15 million years of Oryza diversity.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 23-26, 2000 / Town & Country Hotel and Conference Center, San Diego, California / This paper presents the results of installing a distributed feedback (DFB) laser transmitter and the appropriate optical receiver in an operational site. Frequencies from 1435 to 2400 megahertz are transported intact from a remote site to a local site. From the theoretical calculations, 10 dB of dynamic range may need to be recovered by the use of an automatic gain circuit. The actual device is a delight, needing no additional circuitry to meet specifications. Predictions of performance were made from calculations. The installed system was measured for 1 dB compression point and for figure of merit.

The present thesis is an investigation into the relations between Great Britain and the Habsburg Monarchy (Austria-Hungary) in these years and how, in the words of Lord Rosebery in 1887 'the natural ally of Great Britain' became the enemy power of 1914 that had to be destroyed. Indeed, great emphasis is placed upon the key role that Britain played in the Monarchy's destruction. (one is reminded, en passant, of the poet William Cowper's admonition of 'love to hatred turned.') The first chapter will examine the general views held of the Monarchy by British travellers and commentators in the 19th and early 20th centuries, while Chapter II will focus on the views of the two greatest commentators on the Monarchy in the English-speaking world- theSlavonic scholar, Robert Seton-Watson and The Times Vienna correspondent, Henry Wickham Steed. Chapter III will deal with a general survey of Anglo-Austrian relations from the 1880's to the crisis years of 1908-9, involving the annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, which the subsequent chapter (IV) will examine in detail. Chapter V will look at the following years leading up to the First Worls War with particular reference to the Balkan Wars of 1912-13. Chapter VI (parts 1 and 2) will examine the July crisis and the actual outbreak of war and the attitude of people, press and parliament vis-à-vis the Monarchy when the two countries came to blows the following month in August, while the final Chapter VII will stress the important part that Britain subsequently played in Austria-Hungary's overthrow. In particular great significance will be attached to Sir Edward Grey's failure in the years preceding the First World War to act as an 'honest broker' between the two great rival alliance systems of France and Russia and Austria-Hungary, Germany and Italy, and the willingness to accommodate Russia at Austria's expense. This led, it will be argued, to Germany effectively waging, initially, 'a preventve war' before her only real ally either disintegrated internally or was overthrown from without, hopelessly encircled as she was. (The very scenario that Grey claimed he feared the most actually happened largely through his failure to help Austria- the weakest link in the European alliance chain. The fact that the Foregn Office Memorandum of 1916 could argue 'that the Austro-Hungarian Empire must come to an end if the causes of war in the future are to be effectively removed' was, it is argued, merely putting a gloss on an anti-Austrian British Realpolitik formulated in the years before the war broke out, even if not openly acknowledged as such.