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This thesis is divided into two parts dealing with the optimization problems in Markov decision processes (MDPs) and different neural network-based numerical solvers for partial differential equations (PDEs). In Part I we analyze the optimization problem arising in (partially observable) Markov decision processes using tools from algebraic statistics and information geometry, which can be viewed as neighboring fields of applied algebra and differential geometry, respectively. Here, we focus on infinite horizon problems and memoryless stochastic policies. Markov decision processes provide a mathematical framework for sequential decision-making on which most current reinforcement learning algorithms are built. They formalize the task of optimally controlling the state of a system through appropriate actions. For fully observable problems, the action can be selected knowing the current state of the system. This case has been studied extensively and optimizing the action selection is known to be equivalent to solving a linear program over the (generalized) stationary distributions of the Markov decision process, which are also referred to as state-action frequencies. In Chapter 3, we study partially observable problems where an action must be chosen based solely on an observation of the current state, which might not fully reveal the underlying state. We characterize the feasible state-action frequencies of partially observable Markov decision processes by polynomial inequalities. In particular, the optimization problem in partially observable MDPs is described as a polynomially constrained linear objective program that generalizes the (dual) linear programming formulation of fully observable problems. We use this to study the combinatorial and algebraic complexity of this optimization problem and to upper bound the number of critical points over the individual boundary components of the feasible set. Furthermore, we show that our polynomial programming formulation can be used to effectively solve partially observable MDPs using interior point methods, numerical algebraic techniques, and convex relaxations. Gradient-based methods, including variants of natural gradient methods, have gained tremendous attention in the theoretical reinforcement learning community, where they are commonly referred to as (natural) policy gradient methods. In Chapter 4, we provide a unified treatment of a variety of natural policy gradient methods for fully observable problems by studying their state-action frequencies from the standpoint of information geometry. For a variety of NPGs and reward functions, we show that the trajectories in state-action space are solutions of gradient flows with respect to Hessian geometries, based on which we obtain global convergence guarantees and convergence rates. In particular, we show linear convergence for unregularized and regularized NPG flows with the metrics proposed by Morimura and co-authors and Kakade by observing that these arise from the Hessian geometries of the entropy and conditional entropy, respectively. Further, we obtain sublinear convergence rates for Hessian geometries arising from other convex functions like log-barriers. We provide experimental evidence indicating that our predicted rates are essentially tight. Finally, we interpret the discrete-time NPG methods with regularized rewards as inexact Newton methods if the NPG is defined with respect to the Hessian geometry of the regularizer. This yields local quadratic convergence rates of these methods for step size equal to the inverse penalization strength, which recovers existing results as special cases. Part II addresses neural network-based PDE solvers that have recently experienced tremendous growth in popularity and attention in the scientific machine learning community. We focus on two approaches that represent the approximation of a solution of a PDE as the minimization over the parameters of a neural network: the deep Ritz method and physically informed neural networks. In Chapter 5, we study the theoretical properties of the boundary penalty for these methods and obtain a uniform convergence result for the deep Ritz method for a large class of potentially nonlinear problems. For linear PDEs, we estimate the error of the deep Ritz method in terms of the optimization error, the approximation capabilities of the neural network, and the strength of the penalty. This reveals a trade-off in the choice of the penalization strength, where too little penalization allows large boundary values, and too strong penalization leads to a poor solution of the PDE inside the domain. For physics-informed networks, we show that when working with neural networks that have zero boundary values also the second derivatives of the solution are approximated whereas otherwise only lower-order derivatives are approximated. In Chapter 6, we propose energy natural gradient descent, a natural gradient method with respect to second-order information in the function space, as an optimization algorithm for physics-informed neural networks and the deep Ritz method. We show that this method, which can be interpreted as a generalized Gauss-Newton method, mimics Newton’s method in function space except for an orthogonal projection onto the tangent space of the model. We show that for a variety of PDEs, natural energy gradients converge rapidly and approximations to the solution of the PDE are several orders of magnitude more accurate than gradient descent, Adam and Newton’s methods, even when these methods are given more computational time.:Chapter 1. Introduction 1 1.1 Notation and conventions 7 Part I. Geometry of Markov decision processes 11 Chapter 2. Background on Markov decision processes 12 2.1 State-action frequencies 19 2.2 The advantage function and Bellman optimality 23 2.3 Rational structure of the reward and an explicit line theorem 26 2.4 Solution methods for Markov decision processes 35 Chapter 3. State-action geometry of partially observable MDPs 44 3.1 The state-action polytope of fully observables systems 45 3.2 State-action geometry of partially observable systems 54 3.3 Number and location of critical points 69 3.4 Reward optimization in state-action space (ROSA) 83 Chapter 4. Geometry and convergence of natural policy gradient methods 94 4.1 Natural gradients 96 4.2 Natural policy gradient methods 101 4.3 Convergence of natural policy gradient flows 107 4.4 Locally quadratic convergence for regularized problems 128 4.5 Discussion and outlook 131 Part II. Neural network-based PDE solvers 133 Chapter 5. Theoretical analysis of the boundary penalty method for neural network-based PDE solvers 134 5.1 Presentation and discussion of the main results 137 5.2 Preliminaries regarding Sobolev spaces and neural networks 146 5.3 Proofs regarding uniform convergence for the deep Ritz method 150 5.4 Proofs of error estimates for the deep Ritz method 156 5.5 Proofs of implications of exact boundary values in residual minimization 167 Chapter 6. Energy natural gradients for neural network-based PDE solvers 174 6.1 Energy natural gradients 176 6.2 Experiments 183 6.3 Conclusion and outlook 192 Bibliography 193

The contribution of this thesis aims to investigate the current state of vulnerability of Italian Innerlands, crossed by continuous phenomena and by discrete or sudden phenomena, to represent the tangible and intangible space to fully understand the performativity of these territories. The methodology used lies in an intermediate space between the values process of landscape ecology, which sees as its starting point the investigation of tangible land effects, and the quantitative-qualitative approach of mapping. A scale of values is assigned using GIS-assisted multi-criteria evaluation. The proposed methodology is set and applied in the case of Val di Sole, Trentino, to spatialise the relationship between risk and resources in Italian Innerlands. Extreme Terres of Anthropocene In the world of town planning, architecture, and landscape, searching for a new phenomenology is a way of interpreting and explaining how the great environmental, social, and economic changes the entire Earth System is undergoing are manifested in borderline contexts. Therefore, most ordinary human landscapes cannot be attributed to a single person. No one can be labelled for the responsibility of creating most ordinary landscapes, and there is rarely an identifiable person we can ask about the significance of these changes (Lewis 2003). Within the literature review of this research, a new phenomenology is constructed from the need to describe how reality presents itself and manifests itself in territories subject to constant change, the Extreme Terres. For these reasons, Part 1 focuses on the social, political, ecological, and environmental conditions that remained rather unquestioned as the concept of Extreme Terres. The aim is to understand the causes and consequences of ongoing transformations, with a focus on human impact on the soil. In today’s context, where the impact of man has led to a severe crisis experience the need arises to give a new meaning to the concept of Nature, which can no longer be considered mechanical, simple and above all objectively observable (Morin 2017;p.15), but Extreme. Today the difficulty of deciphering the meaning of extreme in ordinary landscapes is more complex than interpreting other types of historical documents. Looking outside the large population centres allows us to investigate urbanisation from the perspective of its supposed ‘outsiders’, the areas commonly represented as rural, remote, wild and/or untouched by human impact. In these places, described between literature and geography, morphologically isolated from the city, man exploits their land, which is the primary resource, choosing it as the raw material for production processes (Lefebvre 1974). The raw material, that is, the resource extracted, such as a mineral or water, has been exploited for years without giving it value in the production process; or even more simply, man has never bothered to give back what he received from the “terre”. Thus, these lands, which contain precious minerals, water sources, fertile soils, forests, and many other resources on the edge of the maximum risk, are named here as Extreme Terres. To understand the Extreme Terres, it is necessary to think of the boundary between the space of maximum urban expansion and what is uninhabitable for humans: the lands of production. These lands are fragile, and highly productive because they are rich in resources and subject to great instability. Inland or isolated lands in Italy, predominantly mountainous and hilly, are characterised by recurring geographical conditions and social-ecological processes. Common trends, such as depopulation and accelerated ageing of local communities, and divergent trends between abandonment or overexploitation of local resources are observed in these inner areas. In general, their relative geographic isolation makes them highly sensitive to discontinuities or disruptive events such as natural disasters (landslides, floods, flows disrupting connections) or the construction of large infrastructures (suddenly opening new flows). Where these territories are endowed with significant local resources and at the same time are extremely sensitive to discontinuities and changes, we call them ‘Extreme Terres’: where ‘great resources and great risks can evolve rapidly. In these territories, the condition of relative isolation with respect to more densely populated areas has an ambivalent or ambiguous value: the distance from urban centres and services exposes them to a greater risk of demographic decline, and the same distance limits exogenous pressures towards economic overexploitation of local resources and motivates their maintenance. Places in the extreme exist on the margins of the built world: they are found almost everywhere on the margins and in the interstices of residual and ambiguous cities (Barron and Mariani 2013). In this regard, Italy consists of a very long spine that is increasingly marginal and abandoned. People choose to live in cities and, when they choose towns, they always make sure they are comfortable and flat. Nobody wants to be in the most extreme place: the Apennines (Fig. 15-16). Part of the Italian territory of radiations and places that are in danger of being lost. In the extreme points of the territory, the Italian population has lived for millennia consuming what little was sufficient to sustain itself, and there are even areas where the landscape is still unspoilt. Moreover, the pandemic situation of recent years has influenced people’s values and priorities, allowing us to reconsider the value of lands outside urban centres. In Italy, overcoming a contrasting vision between cities and inland areas brings out a relationship of interdependence between territories, a fragile balance to be investigated and reconnected. In this context, this thesis proposes a reflection on the need to rethink the design of soil. This moves beyond the concept of urban or rural soil as opposed to nature and moves to a more inclusive definition that finds similarities with the word terre (Brenner.; Elden 2010). A fragmentation of multiple meanings around the concept of terre has appeared in the Italian landscape, by urbanism itself, as if it were “something taken for granted or having already included it in its genetic code without the need to return to it, to know well what it was” (Pileri, 2018). In order to respond to contemporary challenges, it is deemed appropriate to broaden the gaze beyond the modern city to a trans-scalar vision that includes the transformation dynamics of the marginal territories (Brenner, Schmid, 2014). Today we need to reverse the vision: no longer starting from the “centres” to the “peripheries,” but from the “margins” themselves. A new central idea is needed: that these are not places of consumption (of nature, traditions, etc.), but first and foremost territories of production, comprising new cultures, social innovations, techno-rural knowledge and practices, renewed ways of exercising welfare and interacting with the environment. The territories of the Italian inner areas, predominantly mountainous and hilly, are characterised by recurring geographical conditions and social-ecological processes. These inner areas have observed common trends, such as depopulation, accelerated ageing of local communities, and divergent trends between abandonment or overexploitation of local resources. In general, their relative geographic isolation makes them highly susceptible to discontinuities or disruptive events, such as natural disasters (landslides, floods, mudslides that disrupt connections) or the construction of large infrastructure (which suddenly opens new flows). In these territories, the condition of relative isolation from more densely populated areas has an ambivalent or ambiguous value: the distance from urban centres and services exposes them to a greater risk of demographic decline; the same distance limits exogenous pressures toward economic overexploitation of the local resources, and it motivates their maintenance. Research Question and Objective Why does man today still aspire to reach and exploit isolated lands when he is contributing to their disappearance?
This is the central question posed by the research “Extreme Terres of the Anthropocene” to understand the relationship between risk and resources in marginal lands. Specifically, in the Italian context, this contribution is supposed to understand the relationship between the risk and the resource of the territory in the Italian Innerlands and the effect that man has on these territories. Moreover, it also exists to ask what effect the flows of temporary or permanent inhabitants have onthese lands. This research hypothesizes that the existing condition of Extreme Terres has a potential value demonstrable through spatialization and design methodology. Research Aims and Objectives
The main aims of this contribution are to explain the condition of the Extreme Terres in the Anthropocene era; to explore and analyse the complexity of the Extreme Terres and to understand their value.
Therefore, this methodological research sets, as the main objective, mapping the condition of the Extreme Terres through a critical analysis of a selected application case in the Italian Innerlands. Methodological Approach The analytical reading of the Italian Innerlands proposed is based on the social, cultural, and natural geographical conditions of the terre. Therefore, the experimental model applied by Carlotta Olivari and Margherita Pasquali illustrated in the project “Yuxtaposiciòn Extrema” (Maggioli 2019) is taken up. Concerning the Italian inner areas’ spatialization, it becomes necessary to talk about Espace: “the attempt Extreme Terres of Anthropocene is to introduce spatial categories into social criticism.” (Olivari, Pasquali 2019; p.47). In the “Production of Space”, the architectural and urban space does not consider natural and social opacity. Within the proposed process, it is necessary to think about “the representations of space as imbued with the knowledge that is always relative and in transformation.” (Olivari, Pasquali 2019). In this contribution, geography and mapping are understood as tools for representing space and for understanding formation and development of the reference context. The effort is to include a multiscale analysis of the inner areas context through the mapping process. Methods of Investigation: Mapping as a Design Tool
Once the conceptual framework is stated, the methods of investigation need to be clarified. The goal is not to propose predefined solutions to the Italian Innerlands but rather to re-imagine fragmented and Extreme Terres via methodology to manage territorial uncertainty. The research methodology aims to respond to the endemic problems given by the conditions of risk, instability, and sudden changes to which different inner areas are subjected. Thus, the proposed methodology is structured on Italian Extreme Terres’ natural and anthropogenic conditions: the desire is to create a methodological approach to estimate the vulnerable marginal areas through a multi-scale and multi-level approach looking at fragmented territory. The aim is to underline the critical issues, potentiality, and sustainability of the Italian Innerlands space concerning the morphological conformation of the territory. Mapping is critically understood as an active and planning tool; the reading of these data can be used to highlight one or the other form, opening them up to narrative speculation. It is, therefore, a matter of critically reading geographical data and images and understanding what generates influences and composes them. Despite the attempt at mapping construction—dictated by incredible technical and logistical effort—the globe is more readable as an ongoing process of change than as an absolute, unchallenged object. By identifying the map as an active investigation tool, the cartographic inquiry is seen as a process of selection and as a potential and central tool in reading and interpreting the transformation of the land. For this reason, it is essential to work with “cognitive maps that can more effectively grasp the rapidly changing geographies of our planetary-urban existence” (Katsikis, Brenner 2013) to reach the capacity to reformulate what already exists (Corner 1999). More precisely, digital data processing is used, through the Geographic Information System (GIS) tool, the use of evaluating criteria and the classification of data and the zenith representation: the map. The Italian Innerlands, as a “geography of possibility”, are therefore semiotic and cognitive, as defined by Almo Farina, and not disconnected from the cultural context (Olivari, Pasquali, 2022) Results From the critical and theoretical reading of the context, Italian Innerlands appear a place at risk of depopulation and hydrogeological risk where tourism is used as an economic engine to exploit parts of the local landscape resources in places that were characterised by extractive processes for raw materials for production processes (energy, marble, minerals,water). Based on the parameters defined during the terre mapping methodology described at the beginning of the process, the mapping and data collection phase was characterised by in-depth research of information necessary to configure maps expressing the strong relationship between risk and resource in the Italian Innerlands. Through the mapping process, it is possible to highlight criticalities in a selected specific case, that of the Val di Sole and the smaller Val di Rabbi focus area: its existing resources and the presence of risk. The mapping process demonstrated and tested the interpretation of the potential of Extreme Terres in the marginal and alpine territory of Trentino, the one chosen as an ap- plication case. The description of the results obtained for the tangible mapping process of the Extreme Terres is the starting point for the subsequent phases of the doctoral research project that the “Extreme Terres of Anthropocene” thesis is pursuing. Discussion and Perspectives The conditions of environmental degradation and social vulnerability of the Italian Innerlands, especially the Val di Sole, are considered in this contribution as new opportunities: the slopes of the ravines become the perfect condition to recover and preserve the terre. Italian Innerlands must deal with instability, as they are situated in risky areas. As local populations live precariously and in continuous movement depending on the fickleness of nature in these areas, so the Italian Innerlands carry in them an awareness of their local knowledge as a “cultural landscape” (Farina 2000). Moreover, in these unstable conditions, “authorities managing risk could improve their strategic objectives if they could access and integrate” (Marten; Abrassart; Boano) Italian Innerlands in urban planning information. “Furthermore, a collaborative hazard governance can provide equity to multiple urban actors that are usually left out of institutional DRM, including nongovernmental organisations, academia, and community groups.” (Marten ; Abrassart ; Boano ). Thus, understanding the mixing of both nature and culture and ecology, territorial planning, and economic science allows us to create a model as a paradigm for ecological surveys and innovative management methods. Alternative models, such as cultural landscapes, should be integrated to address the contemporary overexploitation of resources and ongoing social imbalances. At the same time, a processual methodology is proposed to put these frameworks into a systemic approach that integrates economy with ecology and culture with nature. It is essential to consider the feasibility and eventual fallibility of the developed process (Olivari, Pasquali, 2022). From the point of view of the applicability of the proposed mapping methodology, we observe the necessity of understanding where the possible unbalances and richness of the territories involved come from. The capability of dialogue with the territorial planners, residents and workers using maps is essential to leave a tool to understand where and which ecological strategies should be proposed in such territories. Moreover, the proposed methodology is considered a process that cannot be replicated with actual results. Still, the conditions for establishing, each time, a new complex and endogenous thought are repeatable.

<p dir="ltr">There is a growing trend towards the development of parsimonious surrogate models for studying physical phenomena. While they typically offer less accuracy, these models bypass the computational costs of numerical methods, usually by multiple orders of magnitude, allowing statistical applications such as sensitivity analysis, stochastic treatments, parametric problems, and uncertainty quantification. Researchers have explored generalized surrogate frameworks leveraging Gaussian processes, various basis function expansions, support vector machines, and neural networks. Dynamical fields, represented through time-dependent partial differential equation, pose a particular hardship for existing frameworks due to their high dimensional representation, and possibly multi-scale solutions.</p><p dir="ltr">In this work, we present a novel architecture for solving time-dependent partial differential equations using co-ordinate neural networks and time-marching updates through hyper-networks. We show that it provides a temporally meshed and spatially mesh-free solution which are causally coherent as justified through a theoretical treatment of Lie groups. We showcase results on some benchmark problems in computational physics while discussing their performance against similar physics-informed approaches like physics-informed DeepOnets and Physics informed neural networks.</p>

[EN] The PhD thesis "INCIPIT: The search for a multidisciplinary language at the crossroads of Antiquity and Contemporaneity" focusses on the influence of the methodology of Historically Informed Performance practice on the creation of a Contemporary Music Theatre performance. The framework and creative basis for their connection is the Divina Commedia of Dante Alighieri (1265-1321). In music theatre it is not only about music as one of the scenic elements; musical thinking structures the entire theatrical process. It is a genre-between-genre, where various art disciplines interact. Historically Informed Performance practice is a characteristic musical approach of the Early Music movement. It includes study of historical documents and objects in order to obtain a more profound understanding of the music and a performance practice which is based upon this comprehension. In our thesis, Historically Informed Performance practice has been connected with Contemporary Music Theatre through a mise-en-scene of Dante's Commedia, principally based upon its sonorous non-musical and musical references. Also references of movement, gesture, colour and light were taken into account for the mise-en-scene, but always in relation to the sonorous references. In this way, the mise-en-scene is a sonorous journey through Dante's Afterworld as he might have imagined it, but also a contemporary visual and dramatical journey. This research has been done through artistic practice: the creation and performance of a contemporary music theatre work called Incipit. It is based upon thorough knowledge of the Commedia and, through its methodology of Historically Informed Performance Practice, it has mostly made used of 14th century musical sources. An audio file was created as a sonorous element for Incipit, based on previously existing sounds and recording of songs and texts.The performance was recorded in video format. The research question was: How do the work methods taken from Historically Informed Performance practice contribute to the creation of a contemporary music theatre performance in a mise-en-scene of the Divina Commedia? For this practice-based research not only historical-musical knowledge was necessary but also literary knowledge of Dante's Commedia and its underlying meanings. Theoretical knowledge thus was an important basis for the practice. However, the practice itself also provided information for the theory. For the composition of three-voice "simple polyphony" according to the rules for polyphonic improvisation around 1300, theoretical knowledge was essential, but their practice led to historical-musical insights of its performance and its rules for intervallic and rhythmic matters. The practice provided a new perspective on Dante's narrative from a sonorous point of view. Finally, the practice combined two disciplines, Early Music and Contemporary Music Theatre, which are not commonly combined, and it provides us new theoretical insights of creative processes and musical-theatrical languages. / [ES] La tesis doctoral "INCIPIT: La búsqueda de un lenguaje multidisciplinario en el punto de encuentro entre la antigüedad y contemporaneidad" trata sobre la influencia de la metodología de la práctica de interpretación históricamente informada en la creación de una puesta en escena de Teatro Musical Contemporáneo. El marco y la base creativa para su combinación es la Divina Comedia de Dante Alighieri (1265 - 1321). El teatro musical no se centra solamente en la música como uno de los elementos escénicos; el pensamiento musical estructura todo el proceso teatral. Es un género-entre-géneros donde interactúan varias disciplinas artísticas. La interpretación históricamente informada es una manera de abordar la música que caracterizan los intérpretes especializados en la Música Antigua. Incluye el estudio de documentos y objetos históricos con el fin de llegar a una comprensión más profunda de la música antigua y una práctica interpretativa que se basa en este entendimiento. En esta tesis, se ha relacionado la interpretación históricamente informada con el teatro musical contemporáneo a través de una puesta en escena de la Comedia de Dante basada principalmente en sus referencias sonoras, tanto musicales como no musicales. Además se tomaron en cuenta las referencias de movimiento, gesto, color y luz para la puesta en escena pero siempre en relación con las referencias sonoras. De esta forma, la puesta en escena se ha convertido en un viaje sonoro a través del Más Allá de Dante como él mismo podría haberlo imaginado, pero también siendo un viaje visualmente y dramáticamente de carácter contemporáneo. Esta investigación se ha realizado a través de la práctica artística: la creación e interpretación de una obra de teatro musical contemporáneo llamada Incipit. Se basa en un conocimiento profundo de la Comedia y, a través de la metodología de la práctica interpretativa históricamente informada, se ha hecho principalmente uso de fuentes musicales del siglo XIV. Un archivo de audio fue creado como elemento sonoro para Incipit, compuesto de sonidos previamente existentes y la grabación de cantos y textos. La actuación fue grabada en formato de vídeo. La pregunta de investigación fue: ¿Cómo contribuyen los métodos de trabajo tomados de la práctica interpretativa históricamente informada a la creación de una actuación de teatro musical contemporáneo en una puesta en escena de la Divina Comedia? Para esta investigación basada en la práctica, no sólo fue necesario el conocimiento histórico-musical, sino también el conocimiento literario de la Comedia de Dante y sus significados subyacentes. Por lo tanto el conocimiento teórico ha constituido una base importante para la práctica. Sin embargo, la práctica en sí también proporciona información para la teoría. En cuanto a la composición de "polifonía sencilla" a tres voces, de acuerdo con las reglas para la improvisación polifónica de principios del siglo XIV, ha sido esencial recurrir a un gran conocimiento teórico, pero su práctica interpretativa dio lugar a ideas histórico-musicales de su interpretación y sus normas acerca de cuestiones de intervalos y ritmos musicales. La práctica proporciona, desde un punto de vista sonoro, una nueva perspectiva de la narrativa de Dante. Por último, la interpretación junta dos disciplinas que no han sido combinadas frecuentemente: la Música Antigua y el Teatro Musical Contemporáneo, proporcionándonos nuevos conocimientos teóricos de los procesos creativos y los lenguajes musical-teatrales. / [CA] La tesi doctoral "INCIPIT: La recerca d'un llenguatge multidisciplinari en el punt de trobada entre l'antiguitat i contemporaneïtat" tracta sobre la influència de la metodologia de la pràctica d'interpretació històricament informada en la creació d'una posada en escena de Teatre Musical Contemporani. El marc i la base creativa per la seua combinació és la Divina Comèdia de Dante Alighieri (1265-1321). El teatre musical no se centra només en la música com un dels elements escènics; el pensament musical estructura tot el procés teatral. És un gènere-entre-gèneres on interactuen diverses disciplines artístiques. La interpretació històricament informada és una manera d'abordar la música que caracteritzen els intèrprets especialitzats en la Música Antiga. Inclou l'estudi de documents i objectes històrics per tal d'arribar a una comprensió més profunda de la música antiga i una pràctica interpretativa que es basa en aquest endement. En aquesta tesi, s'ha relacionat la interpretació històricament informada amb el teatre musical contemporani a través d'una posada en escena de la Comèdia de Dante basada principalment en les seues referències sonores, tant musicals com no musicals. A més es van prendre en compte les referències de moviment, gest, color i llum per a la posada en escena però sempre en relació amb les referències sonores. D'aquesta manera, la posada en escena s'ha convertit en un viatge sonor a través del Més Enllà de Dante com ell mateix podria haver-ho imaginat, però també sent un viatge visualment i dramàticament de caràcter contemporani. Aquesta investigació s'ha realitzat a través de la pràctica artística: la creació i interpretació d'una obra de teatre musical contemporani anomenada Incipit. Es basa en un coneixement profund de la Comèdia i, a través de la metodologia de la pràctica interpretativa històricament informada, s'ha fet principalment ús de fonts musicals del segle XIV. Un arxiu d'àudio va ser creat com a element sonor per a Incipit, compost de sons prèviament existents i de la gravació de cants i textos. L'actuació va ser gravada en format de vídeo. La pregunta d'investigació va ser: Com contribueixen els mètodes de treball presos de la pràctica interpretativa històricament informada a la creació d'una actuació de teatre musical contemporani en una posada en escena de la Divina Comèdia? Per a aquesta investigació basada en la pràctica, no només va ser necessari el coneixement històric-musical, sinó també el coneixement literari de la Comèdia de Dante i els seus significats subjacents. Per tant el coneixement teòric ha constituït una base important per a la pràctica. No obstant això, la pràctica en si també proporciona informació per a la teoria. Pel que fa a la composició de "polifonia senzilla" a tres veus, d'acord amb les regles per a la improvisació polifònica de principis del segle XIV, ha sigut essencial recórrer a un gran coneixement teòric, però la seua pràctica interpretativa va donar lloc a idees historicomusicals de la seua interpretació i les seues normes sobre qüestions d'intervals i ritmes musicals. La pràctica proporciona, des d'un punt de vista sonor, una nova perspectiva de la narrativa de Dante. Finalment, la interpretació junta dues disciplines que no han estat combinades freqüentment: la Música Antiga i el Teatre Musical Contemporani, proporcionant-nos nous coneixements teòrics dels processos creatius i els llenguatges musical-teatrals. / Sprenkeling, L. (2016). INCIPIT: The search for a multidisciplinary language at the crossroads of Antiquity and Contemporaneity [Tesis doctoral]. Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/Thesis/10251/62682

Para avaliar a efetividade do processo de obtenção do termo de consentimento livre e esclarecido (TCLE) no contexto da pesquisa clínica em seres humanos, foram realizadas análises sistematizadas sobre os principais elementos de sustentação do TCLE (bioética na pesquisa em seres humanos, direitos humanos do sujeito da pesquisa, história da obtenção do TCLE, e regulamentações brasileiras na pesquisa em seres humanos), assim como também análises sistematizadas sobre a efetividade dos principais processos envolvidos na obtenção do TCLE (comunicação médico-paciente, tomada de decisão pelo sujeito da pesquisa, e interpretação das expressões de probabilidade no TCLE pelo sujeito da pesquisa). Ainda que estes três processos envolvidos na obtenção do TCLE apresentem, individualmente, alguns procedimentos efetivos, verificou-se que a obtenção de um TCLE verdadeiramente autônomo é utópica e, portanto, o processo de obtenção do TCLE é considerado não-efetivo / In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the process for obtaining the informed consent (IC) within the context of clinical research in human beings, systematic-like analysis were performed on the key elements supporting the IC (bioethics within the research in human beings, human rights for the research subject, history of the obtainment for the IC, and Brazilian regulation within research in human beings), as well as systematic-like analysis on the effectiveness of the major processes involved in the obtainment for the IC (physician-patient communication, decision-making for the research subject, and interpretation of the probability expressions in the IC by the research subject). Eventhough these three processes involved in the obtainment for the IC present, individually, a few effective procedures, the obtainment of a truly autonomous IC is utopia and thus the process for obtaining the IC is considered non-effective

Using interpretive methods of social inquiry, this thesis explores the socio-political significance of body tattoos made of Chinese-like text, which have recently become popular Western phenomena. It theorizes how contemporary Western tattooing complicates bodily and social boundaries, providing context to interrogate ideas of authenticity. Coining the term "Chinesenough" (from “Chinese” and “enough”), I describe how many such tattoos do not reflect in Chinese what many wearers and viewers assume they do. I contrast how Chinesenough tattoos (re)produce whiteness to the multiple and contradictory Chinesenesses that are also (re)produced. Reading Chinesenough flash art on tattoo studio walls as objects constituting social space, I consider the social meaning of their English subtitles and manner of organization. I theorize the body’s absence from Chinesenough flash art while articulating my body’s sense experience of encountering the same. Finally, I produce and theorize five illustrations that carnivalize Chinesenough iconography to disrupt and transform the phenomenon.