Um dos estudos observacionais mais difundidos e usados em epidemiologia veterinária é o estudo do tipo transversal. Sua popularidade ocorre por fatores como baixo custo e rapidez comparados com outros tipos de estudos, além de ajudar a estimar a prevalência de uma doença (desfecho) e postular fatores associados com o desfecho, que poderão ser confirmados como fatores causais em outros tipos de estudos epidemiológicos. Porém, este tipo de estudo apresenta dois importantes desafios: a dependência dos dados, muito frequente dada a típica estrutura populacional de animais dentro do mesmo rebanho ou fazenda e a escolha da medida de associação para desfechos binários, tão frequentes neste modelo de estudo. Com o objetivo de contribuir com a compreensão global da epidemiologia do aborto bovino associado à Neospora caninum tendo em conta a estrutura populacional, construiu-se um modelo misto com os dados de um estudo transversal realizado em duas regiões do Rio Grande do Sul. Usaram-se dados de 60 propriedades amostradas em duas regiões (noroeste e sudeste) e 1256 bovinos. A percentagem de aborto dentro de cada rebanho variou entre 1% e 30%. Vacas soropositivas tiveram 6,63 vezes mais chances de ter histórico de aborto (IC 95%: 4,41-13,20). As chances de uma vaca ter histórico de aborto foram 5,18 vezes maiores na região noroeste em relação à região sudeste (IC 95%: 1,83-20,80). Um coeficiente de correlação intraclasse de 16% foi estimado, indicando que 16% da variação da ocorrência de abortamentos não explicados pelos efeitos fixos foram devido as fazendas. Já na segunda parte deste trabalho, uma revisão sistemática foi realizada considerando um conjunto diverso de revistas e jornais com o objetivo de verificar os métodos estatísticos usados e a adequação das interpretações das medidas de associação estimadas em estudos transversais na área de medicina veterinária. Um total de 62 artigos foi avaliado. A revisão mostrou que, independentemente do nível de prevalência relatado no artigo, 96% deles empregou regressão logística e, portanto, estimaram razão de chances (RC). Nos artigos com prevalência superior a 10%, 23 deles fizeram uma interpretação adequada da RC como uma “razão de chances” ou simplesmente não fizeram uma interpretação direta da RC, enquanto 23 artigos interpretaram de forma inadequada a RC, considerando-a como risco ou probabilidade. Entre os artigos com prevalência inferior a 10%, apenas três interpretaram a RC como uma “razão de chances”, cinco interpretaram como risco ou probabilidade e em um, apesar de ter estimado a razão de prevalências (RP), foi interpretado de forma inadequada. Paralelamente, com o objetivo de exemplificar o uso de métodos estatísticos que estimam diretamente a razão de prevalências (RP), medida mais adequada para os estudos transversais, um conjunto de dados obtidos a partir de um estudo transversal sobre a ocorrência de anticorpos (AC) contra o vírus da diarreia viral bovina (BVDV) foi usado. Os AC foram medidos em amostras de tanque de leite de rebanhos leiteiros localizados no estado do Rio Grande do Sul, em que os possíveis fatores associados puderam ser avaliados. Entre os métodos utilizados, as maiores discrepâncias nas medidas de associação estimadas foram observadas com a regressão logística tomando-se como referência a regressão log-binomial. Finalmente, é importante que este tipo de desafio seja atendido pelos pesquisadores que realizam estudos transversais, ou seja, considerar a estrutura das populações nas análises, cuidado ao escolher o tipo de modelo estatístico empregado para desfecho binário e interpretação dos estimadores. / The commonest study design used in veterinary epidemiology is the cross-sectional study. Its popularity lies on the fact of the short time needed and low costs compared with other types of studies; moreover, this type of study estimates prevalence and associated factors, which may be elucidated as causal in another type of epidemiological studies. However, this type of study presents two major challenges: a very common dependence between data given the typical structure of the animal population, i.e., animals within herds or farms and the choice of measure of association for binary outcomes, frequently used in this type of study. In order to contribute to the understanding of the epidemiology of bovine abortion associated with Neospora caninum, a mixed model accounting for the hierarchical structure of cattle population using data from a cross-sectional study conducted in two regions (northwest and southeast) of Rio Grande do Sul was made. Data from 60 dairy herds and 1256 sampled cattle were used. The percentage of abortions in each herd ranged between 1% and 30%. Seropositive cows were 6.63 times more likely to have a history of abortion (95% CI: 4.41 to 13.20). The chances of a cow have a history of abortion were 5.18 times higher in the northwest comparing with the southeast region (95% CI: 1.83 to 20.80). An intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) of 16% was estimated which means that 16% of the variation in abortion occurrence not explained by the fixed effects is due to farms. In the second part of this work, a systematic review was conducted considering a range of journals and newspapers in order to verify the statistical methods used and the adequacy of the interpretations of the measures of association estimated in cross-sectional studies from the veterinary medicine field. A total of 62 articles were revised. The review showed that, regardless of the reported prevalence, 96% of them employed logistic regression, therefore estimating odds ratio (OR). From the articles that reported prevalence rates above 10%, 23 of them did a proper interpretation of OR as an odds ratio, or simply did not make a direct interpretation of the OR, while 23 articles interpreted improperly the OR as a risk or probability. Among the articles that reported prevalence rates lower than 10%, only three interpreted the OR as an odds ratio, five interpreted as a risk or probability and only one, despite the estimated prevalence ratio (PR), it was improperly interpreted. Meanwhile, in order to exemplify the use of statistical methods to estimate directly the PR, the more appropriate measure of association in cross-sectional studies, a data set obtained from a cross-sectional study to estimate the occurrence of antibodies (AB) against bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) in milk was used; AB were measured in bulk tank samples from dairy herds located in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, and also possible associated factors were estimated. Among the methods used, major discrepancies in the measures of association estimated were observed with the logistic regression, comparing with the log-binomial regression. Finally, it is important that such challenges are met by the researchers that undertake cross-sectional studies.

For researches in the field of the data mining and machine learning the necessary condition is an availability of various input data set. Now researchers create the databases of such sets. Examples of the following systems are: The UCI Machine Learning Repository, Data Envelopment Analysis Dataset Repository, XMLData Repository, Frequent Itemset Mining Dataset Repository. Along with above specified statistical repositories, the whole pleiad from simple filestores to specialized repositories can be used by researchers during solution of applied tasks, researches of own algorithms and scientific problems. It would seem, a single complexity for the user will be search and direct understanding of structure of so separated storages of the information. However detailed research of such repositories leads us to comprehension of deeper problems existing in usage of data. In particular a complete mismatch and rigidity of data files structure with SDMX - Statistical Data and Metadata Exchange - standard and structure used by many European organizations, impossibility of preliminary data origination to the concrete applied task, lack of data usage history for those or other scientific and applied tasks. Now there are lots of methods of data miming, as well as quantities of data stored in various repositories. In repositories there are no methods of DM (data miming) and moreover, methods are not linked to application areas. An essential problem is subject domain link (problem domain), methods of DM and datasets for an appropriate method. Therefore in this work we consider the building problem of ontological models of DM methods, interaction description of methods of data corresponding to them from repositories and intelligent agents allowing the statistical repository user to choose the appropriate method and data corresponding to the solved task. In this work the system structure is offered, the intelligent search agent on ontological model of DM methods considering the personal inquiries of the user is realized. For implementation of an intelligent data and metadata exchange repository the agent oriented approach has been selected. The model uses the service oriented architecture. Here is used the cross platform programming language Java, multi-agent platform Jadex, database server Oracle Spatial 10g, and also the development environment for ontological models - Protégé Version 3.4.

L’évolution et la démocratisation des technologies ont engendré une véritable explosion de l’information et notre capacité à générer des données et le besoin de les analyser n’a jamais été aussi important. Pourtant, les problématiques soulevées par l’accumulation de données (stockage, temps de traitement, hétérogénéité, vitesse de captation/génération, etc. ) sont d’autant plus fortes que les données sont massives, complexes et variées. La représentation de l’information, de part sa capacité à synthétiser et à condenser des données, se constitue naturellement comme une approche pour les analyser mais ne résout pas pour autant ces problèmes. En effet, les techniques classiques de visualisation sont rarement adaptées pour gérer et traiter cette masse d’informations. De plus,les problèmes que soulèvent le stockage et le temps de traitement se répercutent sur le système d’analyse avec par exemple, la distanciation de plus en plus forte entre la donnée et l’utilisateur : le lieu où elle sera stockée et traitée et l’interface utilisateur servant à l’analyse. Dans cette thèse nous nous intéressons à ces problématiques et plus particulièrement à l’adaptation des techniques de visualisation d’informations pour les données massives. Pour cela, nous nous intéressons tout d’abord à l’information de relation entre éléments, comment est-elle véhiculée et comment améliorer cette transmission dans le contexte de données hiérarchisées. Ensuite, nous nous intéressons à des données multivariées,dont la complexité à un impact sur les calculs possibles. Enfin, nous présentons les approches mises en oeuvre pour rendre nos méthodes compatibles avec les données massives. / The evolution and spread of technologies have led to a real explosion of information and our capacity to generate data and our need to analyze them have never been this strong. Still, the problems raised by such accumulation (storage, computation delays, diversity, speed of gathering/generation, etc. ) is as strong as the data are big, complex and varied. Information visualization,by its ability to summarize and abridge data was naturally established as appropriate approach. However, it does not solve the problem raised by Big Data. Actually, classical visualization techniques are rarely designed to handle such mass of information. Moreover, the problems raised by data storage and computation time have repercussions on the analysis system. For example,the increasing distance between the data and the analyst : the place where the data is stored and the place where the user will perform the analyses arerarely close. In this thesis, we focused on these issues and more particularly on adapting the information visualization techniques for Big Data. First of all focus on relational data : how does the existence of a relation between entity istransmitted and how to improve this transmission for hierarchical data. Then,we focus on multi-variate data and how to handle their complexity for the required computations. Finally, we present the methods we designed to make our techniques compatible with Big Data.

Space weather is the field within the space sciences that studies how the Earths magnetosphere is influenced by the Sun. The Sun is constantly emitting dangerous radiation and plasma which in some cases can affect or damage the systems on Earth. Scientists have an interest in studying this interaction and therefore visualizations of space weather data are useful. OpenSpace is an interactive software that visualizes the entire known universe with real-time data. OpenSpace supports a range of different visualization methods and techniques, for this work, the relevant visualization tools are field lines and cut planes. GAMERA is a simulation model that simulates a wide range of situations where plasma is subjected to the influence of magnetic fields, the simulations are based on curvilinear grids. This project focuses on implementing data from GAMERA into OpenSpace. OpenSpace already supports a variety of different simulation models, although none that uses curvilinear grids for the data. The curvilinear grid can adapt to the specific shape and geometry of the data, allowing for more accurate data representation. The project aims to create a pipeline for reading data files from simulation runs and visualize it as field lines and cut planes. The files used in this project contain data suitable for volumes and field lines. The method was to first develop a reader to extract and manage desired data from HDF5 files in which the simulation data is stored. The data used to visualize field lines is rendered with an already existing component in OpenSpace. Secondly, a slice operation was developed to extract cut planes from the files containing data for volume visualization, these are then visualized with the help of a component for rendering cut planes which was developed during this work. The work led to a pipeline that reads and manages simulation data from GAMERA and the data is successfully visualized. However, there is room for improvement in color rendering, robustness and level of user interaction during runtime. / <p>Examensarbetet är utfört vid Institutionen för teknik och naturvetenskap (ITN) vid Tekniska fakulteten, Linköpings universitet</p>