Dans cette thèse, on s'intéresse à la théorie mesurée des groupes, à l'entropie sofique et aux algèbres d'opérateurs ; plus précisément, on étudie les actions des groupes sur des espaces de probabilités, des propriétés fondamentales de leur entropie sofique (pour des groupes discrets), leurs groupes pleins (pour des groupes Polonais), et les algèbres de von Neumann et leurs sous-algèbres moyennables (pour des groupes à caractère hyperbolique et des réseaux de groupes de Lie). Cette thèse est constituée de trois parties.Dans une première partie j'étudie l'entropie sofique des actions profinies. L'entropie sofique est un invariant des actions mesurées des groupes sofiques défini par L. Bowen qui généralise la notion d'entropie introduite par Kolmogorov. La définition d'entropie sofique nécessite de fixer une approximation sofique du groupe. Nous montrons que l'entropie sofique des actions profinies est effectivement dépendante de l'approximation sofique choisie dans le cas des groupes libres et certains réseaux de groupes de Lie.La deuxième partie est un travail en collaboration avec François Le Maître. Elle est constituée d'un article prépublié dans lequel nous généralisons la notion de groupe plein aux actions préservant une mesure de probabilité des groupes polonais, et en particulier, des groupes localement compacts. On définit une topologie polonaise sur ces groupes pleins et on étudie leurs propriétés topologiques fondamentales, notamment leur rang topologique et la densité des éléments apériodiques.La troisième partie est un travail en collaboration avec Rémi Boutonnet. Elle est constituée de deux articles prépubliés dans lesquels nous considérons la question de la maximalité de la sous-algèbre de von Neumann d'un sous-groupe moyennable maximal, dans celle du groupe ambiant. Nous résolvons la question dans le cas des groupes à caractère hyperbolique en utilisant les techniques de Sorin Popa. Puis, nous introduisons un critère dynamique à la Furstenberg, permettant de résoudre la question pour des sous-groupes moyennables de réseaux des groupes de Lie en rang supérieur. / This dissertation is about measured group theory, sofic entropy and operator algebras. More precisely, we will study actions of groups on probability spaces, some fundamental properties of their sofic entropy (for countable groups), their full groups (for Polish groups) and the amenable subalgebras of von Neumann algebras associated with hyperbolic groups and lattices of Lie groups. This dissertation is composed of three parts.The first part is devoted to the study of sofic entropy of profinite actions. Sofic entropy is an invariant for actions of sofic groups defined by L. Bowen that generalize Kolmogorov's entropy. The definition of sofic entropy makes use of a fixed sofic approximation of the group. We will show that the sofic entropy of profinite actions does depend on the chosen sofic approximation for free groups and some lattices of Lie groups. The second part is based on a joint work with François Le Maître. The content of this part is based on a prepublication in which we generalize the notion of full group to probability measure preserving actions of Polish groups, and in particular, of locally compact groups. We define a Polish topology on these full groups and we study their basic topological properties, such as the topological rank and the density of aperiodic elements. The third part is based on a joint work with Rémi Boutonnet. The content of this part is based on two prepublications in which we try to understand when the von Neumann algebra of a maximal amenable subgroup of a countable group is itself maximal amenable. We solve the question for hyperbolic and relatively hyperbolic groups using techniques due to Popa. With different techniques, we will then present a dynamical criterion which allow us to answer the question for some amenable subgroups of lattices of Lie groups of higher rank.

L'objet de cette thèse est l'étude de la propriété (T) relative à l'espace (ou rigidité au sens de Popa) d'actions de groupes dénombrables sur des espaces de probabilité standards préservant une mesure de probabilité (pmp). Ces dix dernières années, la propriété (T) relative à l'espace a permis de résoudre de nombreux problèmes dans le cadre de la théorie ergodique des actions de groupes et des algèbres de von Neumann. Néanmoins, certains aspects théoriques de cette notion restent largement mystérieux. Une question encore ouverte consiste à déterminer les groupes admettant une action libre ergodique pmp ayant la propriété (T) relative à l'espace. Nous montrons dans cette thèse que les groupes de type fini non-moyennables linéaires sur un corps de caractéristique nulle admettent une action ergodique pmp possédant cette propriété. Si le groupe est à radical résoluble trivial, l'action que nous construisons est aussi libre.Pour ce faire, nous commençons par étudier la stabilité de la propriété (T) relative à l'espace vis-à-vis de différentes constructions d'actions pmp  : produit, restriction, co-induction, induction. Puis, nous donnons une caractérisation de la propriété (T) relative à l'espace dans le cas d'actions pmp sur un espace homogène G/Λ de groupe de Lie p-adique d'un sous-groupe dénombrable Γ du groupe des transformations affines de G stabilisant le réseau Λ. L'action de Γ sur G/Λ a la propriété (T) relative à l'espace si et seulement s'il n'existe pas de mesure de probabilité Γ-invariante sur l'espace projectif de l'algèbre de Lie de G. Par ailleurs, nous étudions le cas d'actions de groupes par automorphismes sur des nilvariétés définies par des graphes finis. / The purpose of this thesis is to study the Kazhdan's property (T) relative to the space (also called rigidity in the sense of Popa) of probability measure preserving actions of countable groups on standard probability measure spaces (p.m.p.).This last decade, some problems in the theory of ergodic theory and von Neumann algebras were solved using the property (T) relative to the space. However, the theoretical aspects of its study remain largely mysterious. An open question asks which groups admit a p.m.p. free and ergodic action which has the property (T) relative to the space. We show in this dissertation that every finitely-generated non-amenable linear groups over a field of characteristic zero admits a p.m.p. ergodic action which has this property. If this group has trivial solvable radical, we prove that these actions can be chosen to be free.In order to obtain these results, we start by investigating natural questions concerning the stability of the property (T) relative to the space through standard constructions : products, restriction, co-induction, induction. Then, we give a criterion for the property (T) relative to the space to hold in the case of p.m.p. actions on homogeneous space G/ Λ of a p-adic Lie group for a countable subgroup Γ of affine transformations of G stabilizing the lattice Λ. The action of Γ on G/Λ has the property (T) relative to the space if and only if the induced action of Γ on the projective space of the Lie algebra of G admits no invariant probability measure.Moreover, we study the case of actions by automorphims on nilvarietes defined by finite graphs.

Mathematical theory of partial differential equations (PDEs) is a pretty old classical area with wide range of applications to almost every branch of science and engineering. With the advanced development of functional analysis and operator theory in the last century, it became a topic of analysis. The theory of homogenization of partial differential equations is a relatively new area of research which helps to understand the multi-scale phenomena which has tremendous applications in a variety of physical and engineering models, like in composite materials, porous media, thin structures, rapidly oscillating boundaries and so on. Hence, it has emerged as one of the most interesting and useful subject to study for the last few decades both as a theoretical and applied topic. In this thesis, we study asymptotic analysis (homogenization) of second-order partial differential equations posed on an oscillating domain. We consider a two dimensional oscillating domain (comb shape type) consisting of a fixed bottom region and an oscillatory (rugose) upper region. We introduce optimal control problems for the Laplace equation. There are mainly two types of optimal control problems; namely distributed control and boundary control. For distributed control problems in the oscillating domain, one can apply control on the oscillating part or on the fixed part and similarly for boundary control problem (control on the oscillating boundary or on the fixed part the boundary). We consider all the four cases, namely distributed and boundary controls both on the oscillating part and away from the oscillating part. The present thesis consists of 8 chapters. In Chapter 1, a brief introduction to homogenization and optimal control is given with relevant references. In Chapter 2, we introduce the oscillatory domain and define the basic unfolding operators which will be used throughout the thesis. Summary of the thesis is given in Chapter 3 and future plan in Chapter 8. Our main contribution is contained in Chapters 4-7. In chapters 4 and 5, we study the asymptotic analysis of optimal control problems namely distributed and boundary controls, respectively, where the controls act away from the oscillating part of the domain. We consider both L2 cost functional as well as Dirichlet (gradient type) cost functional. We derive homogenized problem and introduce the limit optimal control problems with appropriate cost functional. Finally, we show convergence of the optimal solution, optimal state and associate adjoint solution. Also convergence of cost-functional. In Chapter 6, we consider the periodic controls on the oscillatory part together with Neumann condition on the oscillating boundary. One of the main contributions is the characterization of the optimal control using unfolding operator. This characterization is new and also will be used to study the limiting analysis of the optimality system. Chapter 7 deals with the boundary optimal control problem, where the control is applied through Neumann boundary condition on the oscillating boundary with a suitable scaling parameter. To characterize the optimal control, we introduce boundary unfolding operators which we consider as a novel approach. This characterization is used in the limiting analysis. In the limit, we obtain two limit problems according to the scaling parameters. In one of the limit optimal control problem, we observe that it contains three controls namely; a distributed control, a boundary control and an interface control.

Dans cette thèse, je m'intéresse à diverses propriétés de rigidité des algèbres de von Neumann. Dans le Chapitre 1, je démontre la solidité relative des produits croisés issus d'actions Bernoulli de type quelconque. Ce résultat repose sur la théorie de la déformation/rigidité de Popa et généralise un théorème de Chifan et Ioana en type II. Comme conséquence, dès que le groupe qui agit est non-moyennable, ces produits croisés sont premiers (n'admettent pas de décomposition non triviale en produit tensoriel de deux facteurs) et la relation d'équivalence associée est solide. Le Chapitre 2 a pour thème les facteurs pleins et les phénomènes de trous spectraux. Je montre notamment que tout facteur plein de type $III$ vérifie une propriété de trou spectral similaire à celle obtenue par Connes dans le cas II_1. Le trou spectral permet d'analyser plus finement la structure de ces facteurs et de leur groupe d'automorphismes. Je généralise ainsi un théorème de Jones en donnant une condition suffisante pour qu'un produit croisé soit plein. Cette condition est de plus nécessaire dans le cas où le groupe qui agit est abélien. Ceci permet de caractériser complètement les facteurs de type III_1 dont le cœur est plein. Dans un travail en collaboration avec C. Houdayer et P. Verraedt, nous montrons aussi qu'un produit tensoriel de deux facteurs pleins est encore plein et nous calculons ses invariants de Connes. Nous obtenons aussi un théorème d'unique décomposition McDuff qui généralise un résultat de Popa dans le cas II_1.Dans le Chapitre 3, je m'intéresse aux facteurs McDuff, i.e. qui ont la propriété d'absorber tensoriellement le facteur hyperfini, ainsi qu'à leur analogue en théorie ergodique, les relations d'équivalences stables. Je donne notamment une nouvelle caractérisation de cette propriété de stabilité qui repose sur un argument de maximalité. Cette caractérisation de type "trou spectral", plus fine que celle connue jusqu'alors, permet de démontrer le résultat de rigidité suivant: un produit direct de deux relations d'équivalences est stable si et seulement si l'une des deux est stable. Le problème similaire pour les facteurs McDuff reste ouvert, mais je donne quelques résultats partiels. / In this dissertation, I study several rigidity properties of von Neumann algebras. In Chapter 1, we prove the relative solidity of Bernoulli crossed products of arbitrary type. This result is based on Popa's deformation/rigidity and generalizes a theorem of Chifan and Ioana in the tracial case. As a consequence, when the acting group is non-amenable, the crossed product is prime (cannot be decomposed nontrivially as a tensor product of two factors) and the associated equivalence relation is solid.In Chapter 2, we study full factors in relation with the spectral gap property. The main result is a spectral gap characterization of full type III factors which is similar to Connes' characterization in the tracial case. This allows us to better understand the structure of these factors and their automorphism group. We generalize a theorem of Jones by giving a sufficient condition for a crossed product to be full. This condition is necessary when the group is abelian. In particular, we obtain a complete characterization of the type III_1 whose core is full. In a joint work with C. Houdayer and P. Verraedt, we show that a tensor product of two full factors is also full and we compute its Connes invariants. We also prove a unique McDuff decomposition theorem that generalizes a result of Popa in the II_1 case. In Chapter 3, we study McDuff factors, i.e. those factors that can absorb tensorially the hyperfinite factor, as well as their counterpart in ergodic theory, the so-called stable equivalence relations. We obtain a new "spectral gap like" characterization of these properties, based on a maximality argument. With this refined characterization, we are able to prove the following rigidity result: a direct product of two stable equivalence relations is stable if and only if one of them is already stable. The analoguous problem on McDuff factors remains open, but we do give some partial results.

In this report, we present some of the results achieved by investigating two-dimensional monomial cellular automata modulo m, where m is a non-zero positive integer. Throughout the experiments, we work with the von Neumann neighbourhood and apply the same local rule based on modular multiplication. The purpose of the study is to examine the behaviour of these cellular automata in three different environments, (i.e. the infinite plane, the finite plane and the torus), by means of elementary number theory. We notice how the distance between each pair of cells with state 0 influences the evolution of the automaton and the convergence of its configurations. Similar impact is perceived when the cells attain the values of Euler's-<img src="http://www.diva-portal.org/cgi-bin/mimetex.cgi?%5Cphi" />function or of integers with common divisors with m, when m &gt; 2. Alongside with the states of the cells, the evolution of the automaton, as well as the convergence of its configurations, are also decided by the values attributed to m, whether it is a prime, a prime power or a multiple of primes and/or prime powers.

In this essay I employ memory theories to examine Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner. How are the memories depicted and how do they function in the novel? What are the characters 'allowed' to remember? Scholars that have written about William Faulkners usage of memories and narrative time in his novels, often claim that they together represent and create a sense of determinism and/or fatalism. Even though I agreed with that opinion, regarding time and memory in a lot of Faulkners novels, I wondered if these features in the text might not represent/mean something more, beyond that. One scholar have expressed the view that William Faulkners characters resemble blind marionettes of Destiny. I instead claim that the characters themselves, via their individual memories and temporal relations, create an internal determinism, connected with cultural memory, norms and traditions. I try to examine both the individual memories, as depicted in the novel, and the novel in its entirety, using different memory theories and narratology.

This thesis describes methods for transforming applicative programs with the aim of improving their efficiency. The general justification for these techniques is presented via the concept of abstract interpretation. The work can be seen as providing mechanisms to optimise applicative programs for sequential von Neumann machines. The chapters address the following subjects. Chapter 1 gives an overview and gentle introduction to the following technical chapters. Chapter 2 gives an introduction to and motivation for the concept of abstract interpretation necessary for the detailed understanding of the rest of the work. It includes certain theoretical developments, of which I believe the most important is the incorporation of the concept of partial functions into our notion of abstract interpretation. This is done by associating non-standard denotations with functions just as denotational semantics gives the standard denotations. Chapter 3 gives an example of the ease with which we can talk about function objects within abstract interpretive schemes. It uses this to show how a simple language using call-by-need semantics can be augmented with a system that annotates places in a program at which call-by-value can be used without violating the call-by-need semantics. Chapter 4 extends the work of chapter 3 by showing that under some sequentiality restriction, the incorporation of call-by-value for call-by-need can be made complete in the sense that the resulting program will only possess strict functions except for the conditional. Chapter 5 is an attempt to apply the concepts of abstract interpretation to a completely different problem, that of incorporating destructive operators into an applicative program. We do this in order to increase the efficiency of implementation without violating the applicative semantics by introducing destructive operators into our language. Finally, chapter 6 contains a discussion of the implications of such techniques for real languages, and in particular presents arguments whereby applicative languages should be seen as whole systems and not merely the applicative subset of some larger language.

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

A numerical implementation of the direct Boundary-Domain Integral Equation (BDIE)/ Boundary-Domain Integro-Differential Equations (BDIDEs) and Localized Boundary-Domain Integral Equation (LBDIE)/Localized Boundary-Domain Integro-Differential Equations (LBDIDEs) related to the Neumann and Dirichlet boundary value problem for a scalar elliptic PDE with variable coefficient is discussed in this thesis. The BDIE and LBDIE related to Neumann problem are reduced to a uniquely solvable one by adding an appropriate perturbation operator. The mesh-based discretisation of the BDIE/BDIDEs and LBDIE/LBDIDEs with quadrilateral domain elements leads to systems of linear algebraic equations (discretised BDIE/BDIDEs/LBDIE/BDIDEs). Then the systems obtained from BDIE/BDIDE (discretised BDIE/BDIDE) are solved by the LU decomposition method and Neumann iterations. Convergence of the iterative method is analyzed in relation with the eigen-values of the corresponding discrete BDIE/BDIDE operators obtained numerically. The systems obtained from LBDIE/LBDIDE (discretised LBDIE/LBDIDE) are solved by the LU decomposition method as the Neumann iteration method diverges.

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.