In numerical mathematics, there is a need for methods which provide a user with the solution to his problem without requiring him to understand the mathematics underlying the method of solution. Such a method involves computable tests to determine whether or not a solution exists in a given region, and whether, if it exists, such a solution may be found by using the given method. Two valuable tools for the implementation of such methods are interval mathematics and symbolic computation. In. practice all computers have memories of finite size and cannot perform exact arithmetic. Therefore, in addition to the error which is inherent in a given numerical method, namely truncation error, there is also the error due to rounding. Using interval arithmetic, computable tests which guarantee the existence of a solution to a given problem in a given region, and the convergence of a particular iterative method to this solution, become practically realizable. This is not possible using real arithmetic due to the accumulation of rounding error on a computer. The advent of packages which allow symbolic computations to be carried out on a given computer is an important advance for computational numerical mathematics. In particular, the ability to compute derivatives automatically removes the need for a user to supply them, thus eliminating a major source of error in the use of methods requiring first or higher derivatives. In this thesis some methods which use interval arithmetic and symbolic computation for the solution of systems of nonlinear algebraic equations are presented. Some algorithms based on the symmetric single-step algorithm are described. These methods however do not possess computable existence, uniqueness, and convergence tests. Algorithms which do possess such tests, based on the Krawczyk-Moore algorithm are also presented. A simple package which allows symbolic computations to be carried out is described. Several applications for such a package are given. In particular, an interval form of Brown's method is presented.

This thesis examines the capital, risk and efficiency relationship in European banking in the 1990s. The topic is particularly relevant in the European context, as the ongoing process of increased financial integration is enhancing competition and emphasising the importance of efficiency. Yet, these factors could also increase incentives for bank risk-taking. In this environment, bank capital has become a focal point of bank regulation as the primary means for limiting risk taking by banks. The empirical analysis conducted builds on the earlier US work by Kwan and Eisenbeis (1997) and Berger and De Young (1997). We developed the aforementioned approaches by including market measures of bank risk, as well as including proxies accounting for charter value, and profit efficiency in a model evaluating the determinants of European bank capital. A positive effect of inefficiency on bank risk-taking, and also of inefficiency on higher leverage were found, supporting the moral hazard hypothesis. The latter implies that inefficient banks are more likely to have more incentives towards risk taking. In addition, excessive rates of loan growth are found to have a negative effect on banking risk and efficiency. This supports the hypothesis that due to agency problems entrenched managers may pursue a growth objective, which may damage both the risk and efficiency position of the institution. The empirical model results show a positive effect of risk on capital probably indicating regulators' preference for capital, as a means of restricting risktaking activities. Finally, as in most studies analysing the determinants of bank efficiency, capital is found to affect positively the efficiency of banks. The empirical results of this research concord with earlier US work by Kwan and Eisenbeis (1997) and Berger and De Young (1997). Overall, the results presented in this thesis suggest that moral hazard incentives may be playing an important role increasing systematic risk in European banking.

No processo de integração da América Latina, a integração do CONE SUL tem importância básica. Dentro deste contexto, insere-se a proposta do presente trabalho, a integração energética através de projetos multilaterais, particularmente a interconexão elétrica entre o Brasil e a Argentina. O exemplo que deu certo foi o da Integração Energética da Europa, que teve seu início na década de 50. Consideradas as características próprias de nossa região tais como a complementaridade de regimes hidrológicos e a predominância da energia gerada via base térmica da Argentina, o trabalho elabora um levantamento cadastral da região, discute sua proposta com entidades governamentais de ambos os países, obtendo significativa receptividade. O intercâmbio de energia elétrica foi, assim, associado às relações de troca do comércio bilateral, objetivando intensificar esta atividade entre nações irmãs e sobretudo contribuir da melhor forma para a consolidação do MERCOSUL. Seu resultado concreto será a possibilidade de intercâmbio entre Argentina e Brasil, do equivalente a 1000 MW médios ou 450 milhões de dólares/ano, contribuindo de forma expressiva para o equilíbrio da balança comercial, num determinado cenário e atenuando o risco de déficit de energia elétrica. Do Brasil, quando da ocorrência de excedente hidráulico, ao invés de simples vertimento, este poderia ser exportado para a Argentina, poupando seu parque térmico para eventuais paradas de manutenção e reduzindo o consumo de óleo combustível. Da Argentina, sua energia de base térmica, aliada a excedente proporcionado por hidrologia complementar, poderia ser transferida para o Brasil. A viabilização desta integração propicia vantagens econômicas e estratégicas, como a independência energética desta região geopolítica. Assegura um desenvolvimento equilibrado e auto sustentável, permitindo aguardar a vinda de novas fontes. Contribui para o objetivo maior das nações deste continente, o desenvolvimento humano, com justiça social e preservação do meio ambiente. / In the process of integration of Latin America, Southern Cone integration is of paramount importance. Within this context, the proposal is part of this work, the energy integration through multilateral projects, particularly the electrical interconnection between Brazil and Argentina. The example that worked was the Energy Integration of Europe, which started in the 50s. Given the characteristics of our region such as the complementarity of hydrological regimes and the predominance of thermal energy generated via the base of Argentina, the work produces a cadastral survey of the region, discusses his proposal with government in both countries, obtaining significant receptivity. The exchange of power was thus associated with the exchange relations of bilateral trade, aiming to intensify this activity between sister nations and above all best contribute to the consolidation of MERCOSUR. Your results will be the possibility of exchanges between Argentina and Brazil, the equivalent of 1000 MW or 450 million dollars / year, contributing significantly to the balance of trade in a given scenario and reducing the risk of energy deficits . From Brazil, upon the occurrence of surplus hydraulic, rather than simple vertimento, this could be exported to Argentina, saving you park for possible thermal maintenance downtime and reducing consumption of fuel oil. From Argentina, its basic thermal energy, combined with additional surplus provided by hydrology, could be transferred to Brazil. The feasibility of this integration provides economic and strategic advantages, such as energy independence of this geopolitical region. Ensures a balanced and self-sustaining, allowing await the coming of new sources. Contributes to the ultimate goal of the nations of this continent, human development, social justice and environmental preservation.

In society today the production of energy has aimed its focus towards the resources that are renewable as a result of their ability to avoid negative effects of the environment. In the future it is desired to have replaced the current market entirely with these options which generates a demand to optimize these resources and their capabilities to produce energy. The current situation of production require separate systems to generate energy from a solar system and windmills which is a clear economic disadvantage.  Therefore it is highly desired to establish a solution to combine these two systems into one where they can generate energy collectively, this would result in the possibility to avoid unnecessary costs when these are desiderated to combine. Through development and executed testing’s a prototype has been created to counter this demand which will be presented in this thesis along with the positive effects this will have on the market of energy production concerning the environment as well as financially. The prototype has been created with the possibility to integrate a windmill into a solar system. Tests have been conducted in order to ensure that the project goals have been achieved. Through the execution of this project it has been determined that integration between a solar system and a windmill is feasible without major expenses. / I dagens samhälle har energiproduktionen riktat fokus mot de energikällor som är förnybara på grund av dess förmåga att undvika negativa effekter på miljön. I framtiden hoppas energiproduktionens nuvarande marknad vara helt ersatta med dessa alternativ vilket genererar ett behov av optimering av dessa energikällor och de möjligheter dessa innehar att producera energi. Den situation som vi befinner oss i idag kräver enskilda system för att möjliggöra utvinning av energi från vindkraftverk och solcellssystem. Då detta är ekonomiskt ofördelaktigt är det önskvärt att en lösning till detta problem etableras och på så sätt kan avsevärda kostnader undvikas i situationer där dessa system önskas kombineras vid elproduktion. I detta projekt har en prototyp framtagits som kombinerar ett solcellssystem med ett vindkraftverk. Det har gjorts tester för att se hur det befintliga solcellssystemet agerar vid anslutning av vindkraftverk och hur det går att anpassa vissa delar i systemet för att uppnå önskad funktionalitet. I slutet av projektet har det blivit klart att en integration mellan ett befintligt solcellssystem och ett vindkraftverk är möjligt. Systemet består av ett vindkraftverk som samverkar med ytterligare komponenter för att utvinna energi till en låg kostnad. Prototypen har mött de mål och krav som har ställts inom projektet med en möjlighet till vidareutveckling i framtiden.

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M.Ed. / Merriam (1998) says that “learning involves a sensory experience, a mental activity and emotional dimension”. We therefore use our senses to make sense of our environment. Impaired sensory integration affects learning and development as the individual is often unable to execute and handle the normal demands of everyday life. Sensory integration difficulties manifest in the classroom as learning difficulties (Kranowitz, 2005). As educational psychologists, we intervene in learning difficulties and need to know how to assist children who present with sensory integration difficulties. The research study explored psychodrama as a possible intervention for a preschooler who presents with sensory integration difficulties. The value of drama in education has been emphasized throughout history (Way, 1967; Slade, 1995, Read, 1949) and has been called the most effective method in developing awareness of the world around us (Way, 1967). The research study explored how psychodrama allowed a preschooler the opportunity to make sense of the environment and use play, creativity, movement and spontaneity to become an active artist who established change in her life. For the purpose of this research study, a qualitative research approach was chosen as the key concern was to understand psychodrama from the participant’s perspective (Babbie & Mouton, 2001). A case study design was utilized to explore psychodrama as a therapeutic intervention for sensory integration. Data collection methods included interviewing the parents, teacher and occupational therapist of the preschooler, observations during sessions as well as documentation such as a reflective journal. In order to explore how psychodrama can be used with a preschooler with sensory integration difficulties, I chose thematic data analysis. Themes that emerged during the data analysis included that psychodrama should take place in conjunction with occupational therapy, be used as an opportunity for social skills development, and be based on the child’s unique sensory profile and consistent messages within a structured environment. The study concludes with a discussion of recommendations for future research and limitations of the study.

M.A. / According to Correctional Services Act 111 of 1998, DCS has moral and legal responsibility over the parolees. Parolees are supposed to be reintegrated into the society, while still serving their sentences and ultimately become responsible citizens. Some of the parolees are unable to complete their parole sentences and end up re-offending. There are however some parolees who manage to complete their sentences successfully, despite the parole conditions and their personal circumstances. The researcher was interested in those parolees who completed their parole sentences successfully. The strengths perspective, together with other strength related theories, served as a theoretical lens that helped to identify and describe factors that enable parolees to complete their sentences successfully. A qualitative design and descriptive approach was employed. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect the data. A sample of 15 parolees who had completed their sentences successfully was identified. Data were analysed using Creswell’s approach. It was found that factors such as employment, educational qualification, job skills, personal qualities, support, relationships and networking enabled parolees to complete their sentences successfully. Recommendations are made based on the findings.

No description available.

Exchanging and integrating data that belong to worlds of different vocabularies are two prominent problems in the database literature. While data coordination deals with managing and integrating data between autonomous yet related sources with possibly distinct vocabularies, data exchange is defined as the problem of extracting data from a source and materializing it in an independent target to conform to the target schema. These two problems, however, have never been studied in a unified setting which allows both the exchange of the data as well as the coordination of different vocabularies between different sources. Our thesis shows that such a unified setting exhibits data integration capabilities that are beyond the ones provided by data exchange and data coordination separately. In this thesis, we propose a new setting – called DSE, for Data Sharing and Exchange – which allows the exchange of data between independent source and target applications that possess independent schemas, as well as independent yet related domains of constants. To facilitate this type of exchange, we extend the source-to-target dependencies used in the ordinary data exchange setting which allow the association between the source and the target at the schema level, with the mapping table construct introduced in the classical data coordination setting which defines the association between the source and the target at the instance level. A mapping table construct defines for each source element, the set of associated (or corresponding) elements in the domain of the target. The semantics of this association relationship between source and target elements change with different requirements of different applications. Ordinary DE settings can represent DSE settings; however, we show that there exist DSE settings with particular semantics of related values in mapping tables where DE is not the best exchange solution to adopt. The thesis introduces two DSE settings with such a property. We call the first DSE with unique identity semantics. The semantics of a mapping table in this DSE setting specifies that each source element should be uniquely mapped to at least one target element that is associated with it in the mapping table. ii In this setting, classical DE is one method to perform a data exchange; however, it is not the best method to adopt, since it can not represent exchange applications, that require – as DC applications – to compute both portions as well as complete sets of certain answers for conjunctive queries. In addition, we show that adopting known DE universal solutions as semantics for such DSE settings is not the best in terms of efficiency when computing certain answers for conjunctive queries. The second DSE setting that the thesis introduces with the same property is called DSE with equality semantics. This setting captures interesting meaning of related data in a mapping table. Such semantics impose that each source element in a mapping table is related to a target element only if both elements are equivalent (i.e they have the same meaning). We show in our thesis that this DSE setting differs from ordinary DE settings in the sense that additional information could be entailed under such interpretation of related data. Also, this added information needs to be augmented to both the source instance and the mapping table in order to generate target instances that correctly reflect both in a DSE scenario. In other words, we can say that in such a DSE setting, a source instance and a mapping table can be incomplete with respect to the semantics of the mapping table. We formally define the two aforementioned semantics of a DSE setting and we distinguish between two types of solutions for this setting, named,universal DSE solutions, which contain the complete set of exchanged information, and universal DSE KB-Solutions, which store a portion of the exchanged information with implicit information in the form of a set of rules over the target. DSEKB-Solutions allow applications to compute on demand both a portion and the complete set of certain answers for conjunctive queries. In addition,we define the semantics of conjunctive query answering, and we distinguish between sound and complete certain answers for conjunctive queries and we define the algorithms to compute these efficiently. Finally, we provide experimental results which compare the run times to generate DSE solutions versus DSE KB-solutions, and compare the performance of computing sound and complete certain answers for conjunctive queries using both types of solutions

Korean composer Isang Yun (1917-1995) was one of the few successful Asian avant-garde composers to blend philosophical elements from East Asia with Western techniques such as the twelve-tone method, Hauptton, Hauptklang, and Umspielung. In addition to the integration of Western and Eastern influences, a significant feature of Yun´s compositional language, found throughout his oeuvre, is the application of East Asian philosophical tenets into his works. The purpose of this dissertation is to develop a greater understanding of Isang Yun's life and music, more specifically the Quartett für Horn, Trompete, Posaune und Klavier. The dissertation is divided into five chapters. The first chapter of the dissertation presents introductory data, including the purpose and significance of the study. The second chapter provides pertinent biographical facts about Isang Yun and his works, obtained through research of authoritative books, journal articles, and interviews. The third chapter offers references to traditional Korean brass instruments in terms of their historical background, structure, and timbre. In addition, it also focuses on the processes by which Yun incorporated the compositional techniques of Hauptton, Hauptklang, and Umspielung to the work and their relation to Tao philosophy. The fourth chapter consists of an analytical and stylistic study of the Quartett; Yun's compositional language and formal structure are examined based on a stylistic assessment of selected examples from the work. The fifth and last chapter is a conclusion.