Areas cultivated with eucalyptus forests have increased in Southern Brazil, and the effects on hydrosedimentological processes are not well known particularly at the watershed scale and in watersheds where land use has been changing. The Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model has been applied in a few forested watersheds to evaluate and predict effects of commercial forest cultivation or land use change in hydrological processes, whilst erosion processes has not been the main goal. The present study aimed (i) to evaluate the effects of eucalyptus plantation on hydrosedimentological processes, and to evaluate the efficiency and limitations of the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model to simulate streamflow and sediment yield (daily and monthly) in nested eucalyptus watersheds and in two paired watersheds with eucalyptus and grassland, and (ii) to identify the contribution of the bank channel, unpaved roads and eucalyptus stands sediment-sources for two different size fractions of sediment (< 0.063 mm and 0.063-2 mm) deposited along the drainage network, and suspended sediment collected in the outlet of small watersheds. SWAT was used to evaluate hydrological and erosion processes for two nested forest watersheds (watershed-0.98 km2 and sub-watershed-0.39 km2) and two paired watersheds in Pampa Biome, one with grassland (1.10 km2) and other with eucalyptus (0.83 km2). Measured streamflow and sediment yield at the watersheds outlets was used to evaluate model sensitivity to selected model parameters, and for calibration from 2009 to 2013 for nested watersheds, and from 2009 to 2013 for paired watersheds. Time series plots and standard statistical measures were used to verify model predictions. For nested watersheds, predicted monthly streamflow was very good during calibration for the watershed and for the sub-watershed, respectively. Predicted monthly sediment yield was very good and satisfactory for the watershed, and unsatisfactory for the sub-watershed. Simulations for daily time-scale were satisfactory to predict streamflow and sediment yield for the watershed. For the sub-watershed, predicted streamflow was satisfactory , but sediment yield was unsatisfactory . For paired watersheds, predicted monthly streamflow was good during calibration for the grassland watershed and for the eucalyptus watershed. Predicted monthly sediment yield was satisfactory for the grassland watershed, and very good and satisfactory for eucalyptus watershed. Daily simulations were satisfactory to predict streamflow in both grassland and eucalyptus watersheds. The results suggest that the SWAT model is a promising tool to evaluate hydrological processes in Brazilian watersheds. However, more field work with continuous monitoring is required and empirical equations of SWAT must change to better represent the processes that predominate in each watershed and to represent the hydrological and erosion processes in sub-daily time-scale and, especially, for small watersheds where the time of concentration is less than one day. Sediment-sources was evaluated using geochemical properties, determined by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry and X-ray fluorescence analyses, and the data used to calculate proportional contributions of sediment. Source contributions were determined at points spatially-distributed along the main channel of the watershed. Source determination for in-stream sites was done using samples collected in one spot to evaluate source-contribution of area upstream of this site of interest to indicate how different sources dominate at different downstream locations. To examine whether different size-fractions shared similar origins, two size fractions of both source and suspended samples including fine (<0.063 mm) and coarse (0.063 2 mm) particles were analyzed. Fingerprinting approach indicated particle-size and location of sources within a watershed are major factors affecting the measured contribution of sources for coarse and fine sediments. The closer a sediment sampling site is to a potential source, the more likely this sediment-source will dominate the sampled material, especially for coarse particles. Based on the classification analysis, the relative contribution of each source to eroded sediments was bank channel, i.e. from the stream network. Modeling results and sediment-source identification can provide an improved understanding effect of land use or change in land use on sediment yield in watershed scale, which are useful and may be used as a management tool of natural resources. / Áreas cultivadas com florestas de eucalipto têm aumentado no Sul do Brasil e os efeitos sobre os processos hidrossedimentológicos são pouco conhecidos, especialmente em escala de bacia hidrográfica e para áreas em que ocorreu mudança no uso do solo. O modelo Soil and Water Assesment Tool (SWAT) tem sido utilizado em bacias hidrográficas florestais para avaliar e simular o efeito do cultivo de florestas comerciais ou mudança de uso do solo sobre os processos hidrológicos, mas os processos erosivos não têm sido avaliados. O presente estudo objetivou (i) avaliar os efeitos do plantio de eucalipto sobre os processos hidrossedimentológicos e a eficiência e as limitações do SWAT em simular o escoamento superficial e produção de sedimentos (diários e mensais) em bacias hidrográficas embutidas, ocupadas com eucalipto, e em duas bacias hidrográficas pareadas ocupadas principalmente com eucalipto e com campo natural, e (ii) identificar a contribuição das fontes margem da rede de drenagem, as estradas e os povoamentos de eucalipto na geração de duas diferentes frações de sedimentos (< 0,063 mm e 0,063-2 mm) depositados ao longo da rede de drenagem, e de sedimentos em suspensão coletados no exutório de bacias embutidas. O SWAT foi utilizado para avaliar os processos hidrológicos e de erosão em duas bacias florestais embutidas (bacia-0,94 km2 e sub-bacia-0,39 km2) e em duas bacias hidrográficas pareadas no Bioma Pampa, uma com campo natural (1,10 km2) e outra com eucalipto (0,83 km2). A vazão e a produção de sedimentos medidas nas seções de monitoramento das bacias hidrográficas foram utilizadas para avaliar a sensibilidade dos parâmetros selecionados do modelo e para calibração para as bacias embutidas (2009-2013), e para as bacias pareadas (2009-2013). As séries temporais e os parâmetros estatísticos foram utilizados para avaliar o potencial preditivo do modelo. Para as bacias embutidas, a representação da vazão mensal foi muito boa durante a calibração para a bacia e para a sub-bacia, respectivamente. A representação da produção de sedimentos mensal foi muito boa e satisfatória para a bacia, e insatisfatória para a sub-bacia. As simulações na escala diária foram satisfatórias para a representação da vazão e da produção de sedimentos para a bacia. Para a sub-bacia, a representação da vazão foi satisfatória, mas da produção de sedimentos foi insatisfatória. Para as bacias hidrográficas pareadas, a representação da vazão mensal foi boa durante a calibração para a bacia com pastagem e para a bacia com eucalipto. A representação da produção de sedimentos mensal foi satisfatória para a bacia com pastagem, e muito boa e satisfatória para a bacia com eucalipto. As simulações diárias foram satisfatórias para a vazão em ambas as bacias pareadas. Os resultados sugerem que o modelo SWAT é uma ferramenta promissora para avaliar processos hidrológicos em bacias hidrográficas brasileiras. No entanto, fazem-se necessários mais tempo de monitoramento contínuo das variáveis hidrossedimentológicas e alteração de equações empíricas do SWAT para melhor representar processos erosivos que predominam em cada bacia e para representar os processos hidrológicos e erosivos em escala sub-diária, especialmente para pequenas bacias em que o tempo de concentração é menor do que um dia. As fontes de sedimentos foram avaliadas por meio do uso de propriedades geoquímicas, determinadas por análises de espectrometria de massas com plasma e de fluorescência de raios-X. A contribuição das fontes de sedimentos foi determinada em pontos espacialmente distribuídos ao longo do canal principal da bacia. Amostras de sedimento de um ponto de coleta foram utilizadas para avaliar a contribuição das fontes da área de contribuição à montante desse local de interesse e para indicar o a diferença da contribuição dessas fontes em diferentes localizações à jusante. Para avaliar se as diferentes frações de sedimentos tem origem semelhante, duas frações de tamanho de partículas das fontes e amostras de sedimento fino (< 0,063 mm) e grosso (0,063-2 mm) foram analisadas. A técnica fingerprinting indicou que o tamanho das partículas e localização das fontes dentro da bacia hidrográfica são os principais fatores que afetam a contribuição das fontes para a produção de sedimentos finos e grossos. As fontes mais próximas do local de amostragem são as potenciais fontes de sedimentos, sendo provável que essa fonte de sedimentos será dominante na amostra de sedimentos, principalmente para as frações grossas. Com base na análise de classificação, a contribuição relativa de cada fonte indicou que a principal fonte de sedimentos foi a margem do canal da rede de drenagem. Os resultados da modelagem e identificação das fontes de sedimentos contribuem para uma melhor compreensão do efeito do uso do solo ou da alteração no uso sobre a produção de sedimentos na escala de bacia hidrográfica, que são úteis e podem ser utilizados como ferramenta de gestão dos recursos naturais.

Airlines have endured a prolonged period of intense competition with the advent of deregulation in 1978. Market innovations and price-cutting dramatically expanded the number of travelers utilizing the national air transportation network. Bankruptcies and mergers reduced the number of contestants in the industry and eventually produced four national carriers controlling 80-85 percent of the passengers and routes. This new market power of the dominant airlines is resulting in industry changes designed to reduce operational uncertainty but is also having detrimental effects on many airports, particularly the smallest airports. This study employs qualitative and quantitative methods to explore the viability of the nation’s smallest primary commercial service airports. Three journal articles are fused in examining different aspects of the viability question. In Article 1, a longitudinal comparative analysis presents historic growth patterns for various sized airports during deregulation and reveals a distinctly lower growth rate for nonhub airports than their larger rivals. Even with a burgeoning market for travelers, growth for nonhub airports was anemic and the industry experienced massive passenger migration to the 60 largest airports. Article 2 addresses the topic of consumer switching, expands on extant literature with qualitative analyses, and proposes a theoretic, conceptual framework of four primary types of traveler purchasers. Each traveler type has its own distinct switching rationale and creates leakage patterns contoured to the features of their preferred airport. Building on the migration and switching findings of the first two articles, Article 3 explores converging market conditions and factors that are threatening future airline service for dozens of the smallest airports. By extracting findings from contemporary research, a comparative analysis of airports identifies 33 airports that face the highest risk of losing air service. The explanatory model places the airports in rank order by weighting various threat criteria. Qualitative interviews of air service professionals offer insider observations generally not known to the public, confirm observations found in existing research and verify that market forces are acting to reduce the number of airports in the network. The key contribution of the three articles of the thesis is its description of how key actors (firms, customers, agencies) interact and respond to policy decisions that have unintended consequences to small airports and their regional economies. There are predictable patterns in the relational linkages of these actors that contribute to our understanding of how a particular industry evolves under various pressures and how it interacts with factors outside the industry. The preponderance of the evidence from this study reveals that current market trends are generally caustic to the continued operation of small airports. Industry experts are reticent in acknowledging that the next phase of deregulation is underway with the consolidation of the nation’s nonhub airports.

Submitted by Alexandre Otomo de Almeida (otomo.almeida@gmail.com) on 2017-03-04T15:15:48Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao_vf2.pdf: 906019 bytes, checksum: 389d53353d9269653e591405747ca68f (MD5) / Rejected by Renata de Souza Nascimento (renata.souza@fgv.br), reason: Alexandre, boa noite Para que possamos aceitar seu trabalho, por gentileza, realizar os ajustes de acordo com as normas a ABNT: Diminuir os espaços entre as frases do título. A apresentação ocorreu em 2017. Alterar São Paulo 2016, para São Paulo 2017. Na contra capa e folha de assinaturas, em campo de conhecimento deverá colocar sua área: Economia. Em seguida, submeter novamente o arquivo. att on 2017-03-07T00:11:09Z (GMT) / Submitted by Alexandre Otomo de Almeida (otomo.almeida@gmail.com) on 2017-03-07T02:06:07Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao_vf2.pdf: 905969 bytes, checksum: ddcaca60b92b7d4a93c6ae17626d4f8a (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Renata de Souza Nascimento (renata.souza@fgv.br) on 2017-03-08T23:41:02Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao_vf2.pdf: 905969 bytes, checksum: ddcaca60b92b7d4a93c6ae17626d4f8a (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-03-09T13:17:42Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao_vf2.pdf: 905969 bytes, checksum: ddcaca60b92b7d4a93c6ae17626d4f8a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2017-02-09 / This paper consists of a study over the impact of interest rates and maturities of loans for electronics and home appliances in Brazil, designed for consumers with credit constraints. Using micro data on loans of one of the largest retailers in the Brazilian market, some econometric models were built using conditional and nested logit approach, in order to estimate elasticities of loan demand with respect to the interest rate, the maturity of the loan and the terms value. Moreover, marginal substitution rates were also estimated between those attributes to evaluate consumer’s propensity to choose different combinations of loan conditions. Given the number of different product categories sold by this retailer, two of the most important were selected. The results suggest that the interest rate, the payment terms and the loan maturity are important factors on consumer decision. Loan demand is leveraged by loan’s smaller interest rates and payment terms. However, there is a material marginal substitution rate between payment terms and loan maturity or interest rate. This means that consumers are highly prone to change from loans with higher payment terms to others with lower ones, even if they face higher interest rates and longer terms to maturity. Results also suggest that consumers are not really aware of the real value paid for these products. / O trabalho tem por objetivo o estudo do impacto da taxa de juros e dos prazos de financiamento sobre a demanda de eletroeletrônicos no Brasil para os públicos com restrição de acesso a crédito. Utilizando dados de vendas por meio de crédito direto ao consumidor (CDC) de um grande varejista brasileiro, foram construídos modelos logit condicional e aninhado para dimensionamento das elasticidades da demanda às taxas de juros, aos prazos de parcelamento e ao valor das parcelas. Além disso, foram dimensionadas as subsequentes taxas marginais de substituição entre os atributos dos planos de financiamento oferecidos aos clientes, para avaliar a propensão à troca de condições de planos de financiamento pelos consumidores. Dada a extensão das categorias de produtos existentes no varejista em questão, foram selecionadas duas categorias de alta representatividade no resultado de vendas. Para as duas categorias selecionadas, foi constatado que a taxa de juros é fator importante na decisão de compra, bem como o número e valor das parcelas. A demanda se mostrou positivamente impactada por taxas de juros menores, bem como por valores de parcela menores. No entanto, os consumidores se mostraram altamente dispostos à substituição de planos com prazos de financiamento e taxas de juros menores por planos com valores menores das parcelas. Por fim, foi constatado que os consumidores têm baixa consciência do valor real pago pelos produtos comprados.

Cryptococcus neoformans (C. neoformans), um fungo que se encontra disseminado em várias partes do mundo, inclusive no Brasil, é o responsável pela criptococose infecção oportunista mais comum em pacientes com a síndrome da imunodeficiência adquirida (SIDA). O caráter sistêmico da criptococose pode levar esses pacientes a óbito. A finalidade de se obter um diagnóstico laboratorial rápido e acurado de C. neoformans, principalmente para o seguimento dos pacientes HIV nos levou a investigar \"seqüências iniciadoras\" (Si) A, B e C das regiões 18SrDNA, 5,8SrDNA e ITS do Cryptococcus spp. Pela Nested PCR com estas seqüências, sugerimos a melhor delas para o desenvolvimento de um diagnóstico molecular em relação aos métodos usuais. Para tal, foram avaliadas amostras de soro e líquor de 39 pacientes, que já haviam recebido tratamento clínico. Todos os casos foram selecionados em grupos, como segue:7 com criptococose (GIII), 14 HIV positivos (GIV), 18 HIV positivos associados com a criptococose (GV) em relação a 10 controles - indivíduos sadios (GI) e amostras de culturas referência (GII). Os resultados obtidos pela Nested PCR com as \"Sis\" A, B e C foram comparados àqueles obtidos pelos métodos de diagnóstico convencionais. As análises desse estudo mostraram que as \"Sis\" A, B e C detectam C. neoformans com especificidade variada, tanto no soro (SiA 91,66%, SiB-100%, SiC 75%), como no líquor (SiA 83,33%, SiB 100% e SiC 75%) mas não apresentaram falso positivo, quando esses resultados foram comparados aos obtidos das culturas heterólogas (GVI). A SiB, em líquor, apresentou sensibilidade, acurácia, valores preditivo positivo e negativo, e especificidade de 100% para a detecção de C. neoformans da mesma forma que no soro, porém neste o valor preditivo negativo foi 89%, acurácia 94% e a sensibilidade 88%. Em amostras de soro e líquor, os testes Tinta da China e Látex, mostraram resultados falso positivos para o GIV e falso negativos nos grupos GIII e GV. As análises comparativas entre as técnicas mostraram que a ordem de eficiência da sensibilidade para detecção de C. neoformans no soro foi SiB>SiA=Látex>SiC e no líquor foi SiB> SiA>tinta da China>Látex=SiC. No soro, a especificidade entre as técnicas foi SiB>SiA=Látex>SiC e no líquor foi SiB=tinta da China>Látex>SiA>SiC. De acordo com nossos dados, concluímos que, independente da doença associada (HIV) ou se o paciente for tratado, a SiB foi a melhor seqüência para a detecção de C. neoformans, tanto em amostras diretamente de soro, como de líquor para todos os grupos estudados. Tendo em vista os fatos, acreditamos que, a aplicação da técnica da Nested PCR com a \"SiB\", em amostras de líquor e soro, é um método viável e acurado para realizar o diagnóstico molecular do C. neoformans em pacientes HIV. O uso de amostras de soro, para o segmento dos pacientes com SIDA, durante o tratamento, pode ser a forma menos invasiva em relação ao líquor para a detecção do C. neoformans, com vantagens sobre os métodos utilizados / Cryptococcus neoformans (C. neoformans), a fungus that is widespread in many parts of the world, including Brazil, is responsible for cryptococcosis the most common opportunistic infection in patients with acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). The systemic character of cryptococcosis may be fatal. In order to obtain a rapid and accurate laboratory diagnosis to follow - up of HIV-cryptococcosis patients led us to investigate the sensibility and especificity of three primers (A, B and C) of 18SrDNA, 5,8SrDNA and ITS regions of Cryptococcus spp. Using Nested PCR with those primers we suggest the best among them to be used as a method of molecular diagnosis in relation to the usual techniques. For this purpose, the serum and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of 39 patients, who had received medical treatment, were evaluated. All cases were separated in groups, as follows: 7 with cryptococcosis (group III), 14 HIV positive (group IV), 18 HIV positive associated with cryptococcosis (group V) were compared to, 10 healthy subjects (group I) controls, as well as to reference cultures (group II) samples. The results obtained by nested PCR with primers A and B and C were compared to those obtained by conventional diagnostic methods. The analyses of primers A, B and C detected C. neoformans both in serum (SiA 91,6%, SiB-100%, SiC 75%), and in CSF (SiA 83,3%, SiB 100% e SiC 75%). Besides, they were specific for the identification of C. neoformans and showed that there were no false positives when compared with heterologous cultures (group VI) samples. The primer B in CSF showed 100% sensitivity, 100% accuracy and 100% predictive values (positive and negative), and 100% specificity for the detection of C. neoformans, the same that occurs in serum, but in this case, with 88% in sensitivity, 89% predictive value negative and 94% accuracy. In serum and CSF samples the China Ink and the Latex tests showed false positive results for group IV and false negative for III and V groups. The comparative analysis among the techniques (Nested PCR, China Ink, Latex) indicated that the efficiency order of sensitivity for the detection of C. neoformans were PrB> PrA = Latex> PrC in serum and PrB > PrA > China Ink> Latex = PrC in CSF. For the serum and CSF specificities the same techniques were used with the following results: PrB>PrA=Latex>PrC and PrB=China Ink>Latex>PrA>PrC. According to our data we conclude that, whether the patients had been under treatment or not, the Nested PCR by PrB was the best way to detect C. neoformans both in serum and in CSF for all groups. The following up of AIDS patients, throughout the course of therapy was found to be feasible, accurate and less invasive to detect C. neoformans by using serum samples (directly)

Device Management Applications are applications which are used to manage software on devices such as mobile phones. OMSI Forum provides such an application which is used to update the software on a phone. Software updates can be done at device management stations placed in stores or other service locations. Whenever a phone's software is updated, information about the update process is stored in a log. These logs can then be analyzed to generate statistics about updates such as the number of successful or failed updates or which faults that are common. This master thesis project solves the problem of manually collecting and compiling logs from several stores by making this process automatic. Rather than collecting logs manually, each device management station sends its logs to a centralized server which stores all collected logs in a database. This makes it possible to generate charts and statistics in a simple manner from a web application. This solution makes the analysis more e ective, allowing users to concentrate on analyzing data by removing the work task of collecting logs.

In this work, we study two problems in information-theoretic security. Firstly, we study a wireless network where two nodes want to securely exchange messages via an honest-but-curious bidirectional relay. There is no direct link between the user nodes, and all communication must take place through the relay. The relay behaves like a passive eavesdropper, but otherwise follows the protocol it is assigned. Our objective is to design a scheme where the user nodes can reliably exchange messages such that the relay gets no information about the individual messages. We first describe a perfectly secure scheme using nested lattices, and show that our scheme achieves secrecy regardless of the distribution of the additive noise, and even if this distribution is unknown to the user nodes. Our scheme is explicit, in the sense that for any pair of nested lattices, we give the distribution used for randomization at the encoders to guarantee security. We then give a strongly secure lattice coding scheme, and we characterize the performance of both these schemes in the presence of Gaussian noise. We then extend our perfectly-secure and strongly-secure schemes to obtain a protocol that guarantees end-to-end secrecy in a multichip line network. We also briefly study the robustness of our bidirectional relaying schemes to channel imperfections. In the second problem, we consider the scenario where multiple terminals have access to private correlated Gaussian sources and a public noiseless communication channel. The objective is to generate a group secret key using their sources and public communication in a way that an eavesdropper having access to the public communication can obtain no information about the key. We give a nested lattice-based protocol for generating strongly secure secret keys from independent and identically distributed copies of the correlated random variables. Under certain assumptions on the joint distribution of the sources, we derive achievable secret key rates. The tools used in designing protocols for both these problems are nested lattice codes, which have been widely used in several problems of communication and security. In this thesis, we also study lattice constructions that permit polynomial-time encoding and decoding. In this regard, we first look at a class of lattices obtained from low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes, called Low-density Construction-A (LDA) lattices. We show that high-dimensional LDA lattices have several “goodness” properties that are desirable in many problems of communication and security. We also present a new class of low-complexity lattice coding schemes that achieve the capacity of the AWGN channel. Codes in this class are obtained by concatenating an inner Construction-A lattice code with an outer Reed-Solomon code or an expander code. We show that this class of codes can achieve the capacity of the AWGN channel with polynomial encoding and decoding complexities. Furthermore, the probability of error decays exponentially in the block length for a fixed transmission rate R that is strictly less than the capacity. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first capacity-achieving coding scheme for the AWGN channel which has an exponentially decaying probability of error and polynomial encoding/decoding complexities.

The purpose of this study was to gain an understanding of the potential effect of sudden loss on the personality structures of bereaved individuals. For this purpose, I focused on the individual personality structures of five nuclear family members during the first year following the sudden loss of their daughter/sister. I followed a concurrent nested mixed model research approach and relied upon both the post-positivist and interpretivist paradigms, allowing me to integrate the complementary strengths of quantitative and qualitative data collection by means of triangulation. I utilised a within group interrupted time series design, comparing the family’s MBTI® profiles prior to and following the sudden loss they had experienced. In addition, I incorporated the results of 16PF profiles of the participants administered post-sudden loss. I further substantiated my findings in terms of recurring themes on individual metaphors concerning the sudden loss experience, constructed by the participants. The findings of the study indicated that distinct changes in personality structures occurred in terms of the personality structures of the participants. Pertaining to the four polarities of the MBTI®, I found that the participants displayed a greater preference for the Introversion attitude, as well as both the Sensing and Feeling functions, after they had experienced sudden loss. All participants displayed an inclination towards personal growth by moving closer to the Judging/Perceiving axis post-sudden loss. In addition, two general tendencies were evident amongst the participants, namely a greater dependence on the inferior functions; and secondly the tendency to rely on type exaggeration when dealing with sudden loss. / Dissertation (MEd)--University of Pretoria, 2008. / Educational Psychology / unrestricted

The performance of commercial Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tags is primarily limited by present techniques used for tag antenna design. Currently, industry techniques rely on identifying the RFID tag application (books, clothing, etc.) and then building antenna prototypes of different configurations in order to satisfy minimum read range requirements. However, these techniques inherently lack an electromagnetic basis and are unable to provide a low cost solution to the tag antenna design process. RFID tag performance characteristics (read-range, chip-antenna impedance matching, surrounding environment) can be very complex, and a thorough understanding of the RFID tag antenna design may be gained through an electromagnetic approach in order to reduce the tag antenna size and the overall cost of the RFID system. The research presented in this thesis addresses RFID tag antenna design process for passive RFID tags. With the growing number of applications (inventory, supply-chain, pharmaceuticals, etc), the proposed RFID antenna design process demonstrates procedures to design tag antennas for such applications. Electrical/geometrical properties of the antennas designed were investigated with the help of computer electromagnetic simulations in order to achieve optimal tag performance criteria such as read range, chip-impedance matching, antenna efficiency, etc. Experimental results were performed on the proposed antenna designs to compliment computer simulations and analytical modelling.

En 2008, à l’issue du « Grenelle de l’Environnement » la France prend l’engagement de réduire de 50% les usages en pesticides des agriculteurs à niveaux de production inchangés. Comment y parvenir ? Un tel objectif est-il réalisable ? Cette thèse apporte des éléments de réponses grâce à l’étude de la demande en pesticides des agriculteurs et à son interaction avec l’offre de produits des firmes. L’exploitation de données individuelles permet d’analyser les déterminants des usages des agriculteurs liés aux caractéristiques des produits phytosanitaires. Le premier chapitre estime un système de demande en supposant que les produits sont homogènes au sein des grandes catégories de traitements. Il montre que la demande est peu sensible aux prix des produits à un niveau global. Il met en évidence que seule une taxe ad valorem très élevée permettrait d’atteindre l’objectif du "Grenelle de l’Environnement" , ce qui amputerait significativement les revenus des agriculteurs. Afin d’envisager une solution alternative, la suite de la thèse étudie une action simultanée sur l’offre et sur la demande. Il est préalablement nécessaire de construire un indice des prix qui intègre les spécificités techniques et réglementaires de ces produits. Cela fait l’ objet du second chapitre. Le prix ajusté est utilisé dans le troisième chapitre qui s’intéresse à l’équilibre du marché . La prise en compte de la structure de la concurrence rend possible l’identification des différentes sources de marges des firmes. L’analyse des changements de marges avant et après la modification de la procédure d’homologation des produits souligne une augmentation des marges des firmes après renforcement des exigences environnementales des caractéristiques des produits. / Following the “Grenelle de l’Environnement” the French government takes the commitment to reduce by 50% pesticide use while maintaining current production levels. How can we reach this objective? Is this target sustainable ? This thesis analyzes the demand of farmers and its interaction with firms supply. A desagregated dataset is constructed to analyze the determinants of farmers’ practices related to the characteristics of products and firms that market them. The first chapter estimates a demand system assuming homogeneous products within categories of pesticides. It confirms that the demand is not sensitive to the prices at an aggregated level. It shows that only a very high ad valorem tax would achieve the objective of the ”Grenelle de l’Environnement”. However, this measure would significantly reduce farmers' income. Alternatively, the thesis retains simultaneous action on both the supply and the demand. First, a price index is constructed in the second chapter. It introduces the technical and regulatory specificities of these products by exploiting the panel structure of the price series. Second, the adjusted price computed indexis used in the third chapter which retains structural econometrics framework to analyze the market equilibrium. Taking into account the structure of competition we compute the margins of firms which are generated by different competition conduct. These results are used to evaluate the effect of the modification of the homologation process on margins. We find that important source of margin was generated by this regulation which sustain innovation.

No description available.