The cosmopolitan echiniscid genus Hypechiniscus contains exclusively rare species. In this contribution, by combining statistical morphometry and molecular phylogeny, we present qualitative and quantitative aspects of Hypechiniscus diversity, which remained hidden under the two purportedly cosmopolitan species: H. gladiator and H. exarmatus. A neotype is designated for H. gladiator from Creag Meagaidh (Scotland), and an informal re-description is provided for H. exarmatus based on animals from Creag Meagaidh and the Isle of Skye (Inner Hebrides). Subspecies/forms of H. gladiator are suppressed due to the high developmental variability of the cirrus dorsalis. At the same time, four species of the genus are described: H. daedalus sp. nov. from Roan Mountain and the Great Smoky Mountains (Southern Appalachian Mountains, USA), H. flavus sp. nov. and H. geminus sp. nov. from the Yatsugatake Mountains (Honshu, Japan), and H. cataractus sp. nov. from the Malay Archipelago (Borneo and the Moluccas). Dorsal and ventral sculpturing, together with morphometric traits, are shown to be the key characters that allow for the phenotypic discrimination of species within the genus. Furthermore, the morphology of Hypechiniscus is discussed and compared to that of the most similar genera, Pseudechiniscus and Stellariscus. Finally, a diagnostic key to all recognized Hypechiniscus species is provided.

Triggered by the negative economic and social consequences of the 2008/09 global financial crisis, critical questions about how financial markets operate and how they benefit society have received renewed attention. In response to these questions, new investment strategies whose objectives go beyond pure financial return have emerged. Impact investing, a concept which closely co-exists with investment strategies such as socially responsible investing and responsible investing, is the latest attempt to combine financial return with a contribution to the sustainable development of society. Although still in the early days of its development, impact investing is a maturing field to the extent that it has developed into a global phenomenon with an emerging global support structure. While impact investing still occupies a tiny niche in South Africa's investment market, there is, at least compared to other developing countries on the African continent, a large community of South African impact investors who are looking to invest locally and beyond. This research investigates how far the understanding and practice of impact investing in South Africa is influenced by global efforts to build the field and to what extent context specific factors are shaping the way in which it is currently evolving. In other words, how both global convergence and local divergence mechanisms interplay to form what is the South African impact investing market. The research findings suggest that while the international movement towards the standardisation of impact investing practices has reached South Africa, context specific factors such as, among others, the social, racial and political legacy of apartheid and the existence of a sophisticated financial system are central to the way in which the field is taking shape.

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This paper considers some numerical schemes for the approximate solution of conservation laws and various wavelet methods are reviewed. This is followed by the construction of wavelet spaces based on a polynomial framework for the approximate solution of conservation laws. Construction of a representation of the approximate solution in terms of an entropy satisfying Multiresolution Analysis (MRA) is defined. Finally, a proof of convergence of the approximate solution of conservation laws using the characterization provided by the basis functions in the MRA will be given.

Thesis. 1976. Ph.D.--Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Meteorology. / Microfiche copy available in Archives and Science. / Vita. / Bibliography: leaves 320-325. / by Mark A. Cane. / Ph.D.

Sequences are sufficient to describe topological properties in metric spaces or, more generally, topological spaces having a countable base for the topology. However, filters or nets are needed in more abstract spaces. Nets are more natural extension of sequences but are generally less friendly to work with since quite often two nets have distinct directed sets for domains. Operations involving filters are set theoretic and generally certain to filters on the same set. The concept of a filter was introduced by H. Cartan in 1937 and an excellent treatment of the subject can be found in N. Bourbaki (1940).

In the present dissertation, we investigate two different nonparametric models; empirical Bayes model and functional deconvolution model. In the case of the nonparametric empirical Bayes estimation, we carried out a complete minimax study. In particular, we derive minimax lower bounds for the risk of the nonparametric empirical Bayes estimator for a general conditional distribution. This result has never been obtained previously. In order to attain optimal convergence rates, we use a wavelet series based empirical Bayes estimator constructed in Pensky and Alotaibi (2005). We propose an adaptive version of this estimator using Lepski’s method and show that the estimator attains optimal convergence rates. The theory is supplemented by numerous examples. Our study of the functional deconvolution model expands results of Pensky and Sapatinas (2009, 2010, 2011) to the case of estimating an (r + 1)-dimensional function or dependent errors. In both cases, we derive minimax lower bounds for the integrated square risk over a wide set of Besov balls and construct adaptive wavelet estimators that attain those optimal convergence rates. In particular, in the case of estimating a periodic (r + 1)-dimensional function, we show that by choosing Besov balls of mixed smoothness, we can avoid the ”curse of dimensionality” and, hence, obtain higher than usual convergence rates when r is large. The study of deconvolution of a multivariate function is motivated by seismic inversion which can be reduced to solution of noisy two-dimensional convolution equations that allow to draw inference on underground layer structures along the chosen profiles. The common practice in seismology is to recover layer structures separately for each profile and then to combine the derived estimates into a two-dimensional function. By studying the two-dimensional version of the model, we demonstrate that this strategy usually leads to estimators which are less accurate than the ones obtained as two-dimensional functional deconvolutions. Finally, we consider a multichannel deconvolution model with long-range dependent Gaussian errors. We do not limit our consideration to a specific type of long-range dependence, rather we assume that the eigenvalues of the covariance matrix of the errors are bounded above and below. We show that convergence rates of the estimators depend on a balance between the smoothness parameters of the response function, the iii smoothness of the blurring function, the long memory parameters of the errors, and how the total number of observations is distributed among the channels.

No / Digital content is increasingly pervasive. Communication technologies enable the creation and dissemination of content on a transnational basis. However, the relationship between communication technology and society is complex and is impacted both by the requirements of the communicator and also cultural and social norms associated with the context of the user. How does digital technology influence media communication? How far does media communication transcend technology? The boundaries between the various forms of formal communication and social communication are blurring and the user is no longer just a consumer or someone who interacts with information; they are also a creator of new information. Companies with commercial interests in these areas are seeking to exploit new forms of communication without alienating the user.

The relationship between accommodation and myopia has been under investigation for many years, and the effort to understand it is ongoing. In this thesis, an introduction to the state of myopia research is given first, with particular reference to studies of accommodation and higher-order ocular aberrations, which feature in the subsequent chapters. Following a brief introduction to the general technique of aberrometry and visual stimulus control using adaptive optics, the development of a monocular adaptive optics instrument for this purpose is described. The instrument is used to vary a dioptric stimulus and record the accommodation response in pilot studies and a detailed experiment, which has also been published elsewhere. It is found, among other things, that accommodation can respond to more than one different input level during its latency period, and that such inputs can be stored until components of the accommodation control system are free to process them. Indications of a minimum halting time for accommodation, of around 0.6 s, are presented. In later chapters, the development and testing of a new, binocular adaptive optics apparatus will be found. As well as binocular aberrometry and adaptive optics control of stimulus aberrations, this instrument displaces images to allow for and stimulate ocular convergence in binocular accommodation experiments. It is the first instrument in the world with its combined functionalities. Finally, the contribution of this thesis is summarised, and further instrumentation development and experiments are put forward for the continuation of this branch of accommodation and myopia research.

Immigration issues have dominated the political discourse of liberal democracies around the world in the 21st century. Recent elections in the United States and the Netherlands focused extensively on migrant flows, illegal immigration and migrant integration. Upcoming elections in France seem to be operating within similar parameters. These occurrences underpin a larger critique about the perceived failure of liberal democratic institutions to contend with immigration trends and successfully integrate migrants within their societies. Nowhere has this critique been more prevalent than within the public and political discourse of the European Union, the institution of focus for this paper. As the EU member states struggle to cope with their migrant issues, scholars are increasingly looking to the larger EU governmental structure to anticipate how the region will handle these challenges. Accordingly, much of the scholarly work done on subjects such as integration policy within the EU are mainly focused upon the perceived convergence of policy amongst member states. The intent of this thesis therefore, is to evaluate the validity of claims that migrant integration policy is converging amongst EU member states, and to explain why this may be the case. This was accomplished via a cross-comparison of policy outcome scores, (provided by the Migration Integration Policy Index), over time between EU-15 and EU-12 states. The convergence of policy in the EU is a topic that has been routinely addressed by scholars, but by examining the potential trends amongst the traditionally ignored EU-12 states, this thesis hopes to contribute to the academic discourse by providing a different perspective.