Portfolio optimisation has a number of constraints resulting from some practical matters and regulations. The closed-form mathematical solution of portfolio optimisation problems usually cannot include these constraints. Exhaustive search to reach the exact solution can take prohibitive amount of computational time. Portfolio optimisation models are also usually impaired by the estimation error problem caused by lack of ability to predict the future accurately. A number of Multi-Objective Genetic Algorithms are proposed to solve the problem with two objectives subject to cardinality constraints, floor constraints and round-lot constraints. Fuzzy logic is incorporated into the Vector Evaluated Genetic Algorithm (VEGA) to but solutions tend to cluster around a few points. Strength Pareto Evolutionary Algorithm 2 (SPEA2) gives solutions which are evenly distributed portfolio along the effective front while MOGA is more time efficient. An Evolutionary Artificial Neural Network (EANN) is proposed. It automatically evolves the ANN's initial values and structures hidden nodes and layers. The EANN gives a better performance in stock return forecasts in comparison with those of Ordinary Least Square Estimation and of Back Propagation and Elman Recurrent ANNs. Adaptation algorithms for selecting a pair of forecasting models, which are based on fuzzy logic-like rules, are proposed to select best models given an economic scenario. Their predictive performances are better than those of the comparing forecasting models. MOGA and SPEA2 are modified to include a third objective to handle model risk and are evaluated and tested for their performances. The result shows that they perform better than those without the third objective.

As a result of the increase in accessibility of computational resources and the increase in the power of the computers during the last two decades, designers are able to create computer models to simulate the behavior of a complex products. To address global competitiveness, companies are forced to optimize their designs and products. Optimizing the design needs several runs of computationally expensive simulation models. Therefore, using metamodels as an efficient and sufficiently accurate approximate of the simulation model is necessary. Radial basis functions (RBF) is one of the several metamodeling methods that can be found in the literature. The established approach is to add a bias to RBF in order to obtain a robust performance. The a posteriori bias is considered to be unknown at the beginning and it is defined by imposing extra orthogonality constraints. In this thesis, a new approach in constructing RBF with the bias to be set a priori by using the normal equation is proposed. The performance of the suggested approach is compared to the classic RBF with a posteriori bias. Another comprehensive comparison study by including several modeling criteria, such as problem dimension, sampling technique and size of samples is conducted. The studies demonstrate that the suggested approach with a priori bias is in general as good as the performance of RBF with a posteriori bias. Using the a priori RBF, it is clear that the global response is modeled with the bias and that the details are captured with radial basis functions. Multi-objective optimization and the approaches used in solving such problems are briefly described in this thesis. One of the methods that proved to be efficient in solving multi-objective optimization problems (MOOP) is the strength Pareto evolutionary algorithm (SPEA2). Multi-objective optimization of a disc brake system of a heavy truck by using SPEA2 and RBF with a priori bias is performed. As a result, the possibility to reduce the weight of the system without extensive compromise in other objectives is found. Multi-objective optimization of material model parameters of an adhesive layer with the aim of improving the results of a previous study is implemented. The result of the original study is improved and a clear insight into the nature of the problem is revealed.

Portfolio optimisation has a number of constraints resulting from some practical matters and regulations. The closed-form mathematical solution of portfolio optimisation problems usually cannot include these constraints. Exhaustive search to reach the exact solution can take prohibitive amount of computational time. Portfolio optimisation models are also usually impaired by the estimation error problem caused by lack of ability to predict the future accurately. A number of Multi-Objective Genetic Algorithms are proposed to solve the problem with two objectives subject to cardinality constraints, floor constraints and round-lot constraints. Fuzzy logic is incorporated into the Vector Evaluated Genetic Algorithm (VEGA) to but solutions tend to cluster around a few points. Strength Pareto Evolutionary Algorithm 2 (SPEA2) gives solutions which are evenly distributed portfolio along the effective front while MOGA is more time efficient. An Evolutionary Artificial Neural Network (EANN) is proposed. It automatically evolves the ANN¿s initial values and structures hidden nodes and layers. The EANN gives a better performance in stock return forecasts in comparison with those of Ordinary Least Square Estimation and of Back Propagation and Elman Recurrent ANNs. Adaptation algorithms for selecting a pair of forecasting models, which are based on fuzzy logic-like rules, are proposed to select best models given an economic scenario. Their predictive performances are better than those of the comparing forecasting models. MOGA and SPEA2 are modified to include a third objective to handle model risk and are evaluated and tested for their performances. The result shows that they perform better than those without the third objective.

Submitted by Sáboia Nágila (nagila.saboia01@gmail.com) on 2016-07-29T14:09:40Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Disertação-Anibrata Pal.pdf: 1139751 bytes, checksum: a29e1923e75e239365abac2dc74c7f40 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Divisão de Documentação/BC Biblioteca Central (ddbc@ufam.edu.br) on 2016-08-15T17:54:46Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Disertação-Anibrata Pal.pdf: 1139751 bytes, checksum: a29e1923e75e239365abac2dc74c7f40 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Divisão de Documentação/BC Biblioteca Central (ddbc@ufam.edu.br) on 2016-08-15T17:57:29Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Disertação-Anibrata Pal.pdf: 1139751 bytes, checksum: a29e1923e75e239365abac2dc74c7f40 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-08-15T17:57:29Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Disertação-Anibrata Pal.pdf: 1139751 bytes, checksum: a29e1923e75e239365abac2dc74c7f40 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-04-19 / CAPES - Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / The world of information retrieval revolves around web search engines. Text search engines are one of the most important source for routing information. The web search engines index huge volumes of data and handles billions of documents. The learn to rank methods have been adopted in the recent past to generate high quality answers for the search engines. The ultimate goal of these systems are to provide high quality results and, at the same time, reduce the computational time for query processing. Drawing direct correlation from the aforementioned fact; reading from smaller or compact indexes always accelerate data read or in other words, reduce computational time during query processing. In this thesis we study about using learning to rank method to not only produce high quality ranking of search results, but also to optimize another important aspect of search systems, the compression achieved in their indexes. We show that it is possible to achieve impressive gains in search engine index compression with virtually no loss in the final quality of results by using simple, yet effective, multi objective optimization techniques in the learning process. We also used basic pruning techniques to find out the impact of pruning in the compression of indexes. In our best approach, we were able to achieve more than 40% compression of the existing index, while keeping the quality of results at par with methods that disregard compression. / Máquinas de busca web para a web indexam grandes volumes de dados, lidando com coleções que muitas vezes são compostas por dezenas de bilhões de documentos. Métodos aprendizagem de máquina têm sido adotados para gerar as respostas de alta qualidade nesses sistemas e, mais recentemente, há métodos de aprendizagem de máquina propostos para a fusão de evidências durante o processo de indexação das bases de dados. Estes métodos servem então não somente para melhorar a qualidade de respostas em sistemas de busca, mas também para reduzir custos de processamento de consultas. O único método de fusão de evidências em tempo de indexação proposto na literatura tem como foco exclusivamente o aprendizado de funções de fusão de evidências que gerem bons resultados durante o processamento de consulta, buscando otimizar este único objetivo no processo de aprendizagem. O presente trabalho apresenta uma proposta onde utiliza-se o método de aprendizagem com múltiplos objetivos, visando otimizar, ao mesmo tempo, tanto a qualidade de respostas produzidas quando o grau de compressão do índice produzido pela fusão de rankings. Os resultados apresentados indicam que a adoção de um processo de aprendizagem com múltiplos objetivos permite que se obtenha melhora significativa na compressão dos índices produzidos sem que haja perda significativa na qualidade final do ranking produzido pelo sistema.