Tick-borne encephalitis virus (strain Hypr) was serially subcultured in PS cells and tick cell line IRE/CTVM19, producing four different viral variants. Biological properties of these new variants were investigated in mouse model. Possible determinants of virulence were found by full-genome sequencing. The role of glycosylation for tick-borne encephalitis virus was evaluated.

FundaÃÃo de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Cearà / Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento CientÃfico e TecnolÃgico / Seja alfa um nÃmero algÃbrico que nÃo à raiz de um nÃmero racional. Mostraremos que o discriminante de alfa elevado a n tende a infinito com n tendendo a infinito e daremos um limite inferior para este discriminante em termos do grau de alfa, sua medida de Mahler e n. / Let alfa be an algebraic number which is not a root of a racional number. We show that the discriminant of alfa n tends to infinity with n tending to infinity and give a lower bound for this discriminant in terms of the degree of alfa, its Mahlerâs measure and n.

Many health geography studies, including the Ottawa Neighbourhood Study (ONS), have faced significant challenges uncovering local variation in patterns of community health in rural areas. This is due to the fact that sparsely populated rural areas make it difficult to define neighbourhoods that are representative of the social and resource utilization patterns of the individuals therein. Moreover, rural areas yield small samples from population-based regional health surveys and this leads to insufficient sample sizes for reliable estimation of health determinants and outcomes. In response to this issue this thesis combines geographical and statistical techniques which allow for the simulation of health variables within small areas and populations within rural Ottawa. This methodological approach combines the techniques of dasymetric mapping and statistical micro-simulation in an innovative way, which will allow health geography researchers to explore health determinants and health outcomes at small spatial scales in rural areas. Dasymetric mapping is used to generate a statistical population surface over Ottawa and then estimate socio-economic (SES) variables within small neighbourhood units within rural Ottawa. The estimated SES variables are then used as correlate variables to simulate health determinant and health outcome variables form the Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS) using statistical micro-simulation. Through this methodology, simulations of specific health determinants and outcome can be investigated at small spatial scales within rural areas. Dasymetric mapping provided neighbourhood-level population estimates that were used to re-weight as set of SES variables that were correlates with those in the Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS). These neighbourhood-level correlates allowed microsimulation and consequent spatial exploration of prevalence for smoking, binge drinking, obesity, self-rated mental health, and the presence of two or more chronic conditions. The methodology outlined in this paper, provides and innovative way of exploring health determinants and health outcomes in neighbourhoods for which population and health statistics are not traditionally collected at levels that would allow traditional statistical analyses of prevalence.

The main aim of this diploma thesis is to identify the determinants of behavior of demand for multiplexes in Prague. The main building material is the dataset of attendance and revenues evolution for individual movies distributed between years 2002 and 2011, always for the first four weeks from the premiere, provided by the Union of Film Distributors. The paper investigates consumer behavior on the movie market. The demand for movies is the dependent variable measured by the number of visitors in the corresponding weeks. The subject of analysis -- explanatory variable - is price, film rating (critics), genre, country of origin, character of time frame, frequency of screenings in a given week, format (2D/3D), length of movie, popularity of the actor/director, impact of movie series etc. The data are exposed to the regression according to which the significance of different variables is tested. The hypothesis about strong negative correlation of the price and quantity demanded is investigated based on the results, (Dewenter R., Westermann M., 2005) versus the hypothesis of weak sensitivity those two variables (Sangho Kim, 2009) against a more significant relationship of demand and other determinants. The influence of price on attendance has shown to be insignificant on the Prague movie market in the short term. A significant determinant impacting the attendance for a movie in the entire monitored period is the film rating, actor, length of movie, and number of screenings.

This work has for purpose to study the structure of capital of the companies and to verify the influence of the macroeconomics in this structure of capital. For this, she uses the theory on determinative of the structure of capital of the companies verifying if the Brazilian companies of the sample if fit in these theories. It makes, still, study on the form of financing of the Brazilian companies of the sample: internal financing, financing through emission of debts and financing for share. It presents theoretical study on the subject and shows the functioning of the National Financial System, as base for agreement on the changes in the standard of financing of the 1995/1997 companies of up to 2006. The database is composed for 820 companies customers of the Bank of Brazil of all Brazil, whose given they mention 2006 to it. They had been used changeable dummy in the study as form to simulate some necessary situations to the development of the works. It finishes with the presentation of the results of the studies. The results show the tack of the use of the determinative ones of structure of capital in the attainment of financings to the theories that serves of basement to the studies. Few are the results that do not go to the meeting of the theories. It suggests, to the end, the continuity of the research, mainly on the influence of the macroeconomics in the determination of the structure of capital of the companies. / Este trabalho tem por finalidade estudar a estrutura de capital das empresas e verificar a influência da macroeconomia nesta estrutura de capital. Para isso, utiliza a teoria sobre determinantes da estrutura de capital das empresas para verificar se as empresas brasileiras da amostra se enquadram nestas teorias. Faz, ainda, estudo sobre o a forma de financiamento das empresas brasileiras da amostra: financiamento interno, financiamento através de emissão de dívidas e financiamento por ações. Apresenta estudo teórico sobre o assunto e mostra o funcionamento do Sistema Financeiro Nacional, como base para entendimento sobre as mudanças no padrão de financiamento das empresas de 1995/1997 até 2006. A base de dados é composta por 820 empresas clientes do Banco do Brasil de todo o Brasil, cujos dados referem-se a 2006. Foram utilizadas variáveis dummy no estudo como forma de simular algumas situações necessárias ao desenvolvimento dos trabalhos. Finaliza com a apresentação dos resultados dos estudos. Os resultados mostram a aderência da utilização dos determinantes de estrutura de capital na obtenção de financiamentos às teorias que servem de embasamento aos estudos. Poucos são os resultados que não vão ao encontro das teorias. Sugere, ao final, a continuidade das pesquisas, principalmente sobre a influência da macroeconomia na determinação da estrutura de capital das empresas.

This thesis focuses on the study of spectral stability of planar shock waves in 2-dimensional magnetohydrodynamics. We begin with a numerical approach, computing the Lopatinski determinant and Evans function with the goal of determining if there are parameters for which viscous waves are unstable and the corresponding inviscid waves are stable. We also begin developing a method to obtain an explicit, analytical representation of the Evans function. We demonstrate the capabilities of this method with compressible Navier-Stokes and extend our results to 2-D MHD. Finally, using compressible Navier-Stokes again, we derive an energy estimate as a first step in improving the bound on possible roots of the Evans function.

Les banques islamiques sont complètement différentes des banques conventionnelles. Elles sont pilotées par les principes de la finance islamique. Lors de la prise de décision pour accorder un crédit, les banques islamiques utilisent des outils et des méthodes spécifiques différents de ceux qui sont utilisés dans les banques conventionnelles. Le processus de décision d’octroi de crédit aux entreprises est complexe dans les deux types de banques. Cette thèse cherche à comprendre ce processus et à comparer les déterminants d’endettement dans les deux catégories de banques dans la mesure où elles n’évaluent pas l’entreprise selon les mêmes critères. Par exemple, le partage du risque, qui est une caractéristique du fonctionnement de la banque Islamique, implique la garantie d’une bonne rentabilité des projets financés. Ainsi, nous avons présenté l’état de l’art des deux types de financement pour mieux comprendre les différences de fonctionnement. Les théories qui ont été sollicitées sont la théorie de Trade Off et la théorie de Pecking Order. La régression sur données de panel confirme que les déterminants d’octroi d’un crédit aux entreprises diffèrent selon la banque. Cette différence est due aux principes spécifiques des banques islamiques. / Islamic Banks are thoroughly different from Conventional Banks. They are led by Islamic Finance principles. Indeed, during the decision-making process regarding a loan application from a company, Islamic Banks use their own tools and specific methods. Nevertheless, the two decision-making processes are highly complex. Thus, the aim of our research is to understand the different processes and compare the debt determinants for each kind of bank in so far as they don’t use the same criteria to estimate a company. For example, the risk-sharing, which is one of the features of the Islamic Bank, implies the guarantee of a good Return On Investment. In order to bring some answers relative to the two kind of financing, we exposed the state of the art. We notably mobilized two theories: The Trade Off Theory and the Pecking Order Theory. The regression in panel data confirmed that the Islamic Bank and the Conventional Bank don’t lean on the same determinants in their decision-making process. The specific principles of the Islamic Bank explain this difference.

In this thesis, we generalize a recent result of A. Eremenko and A. Gabrielov on irreducibility of the spectral discriminant for the Schroedinger equation with quartic potentials. In the first paper, we consider the eigenvalue problem with a complex-valued polynomial potential of arbitrary degree d and show that the spectral determinant of this problem is connected and irreducible. In other words, every eigenvalue can be reached from any other by analytic continuation. We also prove connectedness of the parameter spaces of the potentials that admit eigenfunctions satisfying k > 2 boundary conditions, except for the case d is even and k = d/2. In the latter case, connected components of the parameter space are distinguished by the number of zeros of the eigenfunctions. In the second paper, we only consider even polynomial potentials, and show that the spectral determinant for the eigenvalue problem consists of two irreducible components. A similar result to that of paper I is proved for k boundary conditions.

The Ethiopian Wildlife Conservation Organization has little information on the lll extent and ecological determinants of plant species composition and distribution in Omo National Park. Elsewhere, the determinants of African savanna vegetation dynamics have been the focus of numerous investigations, yet our understanding of the hierarchical nature and relative importance of any relationships remains very general. As well, our ability to derive predictions about vegetation responses is limited to extreme generalizations. African savanna landscape ecotones have received even less attention than most landscapes. In this dissertation, I test hypotheses about plant species distribution-determinant relationships in Omo National Park, a park that occurs in a landscape ecotone. Determinants investigated include rainfall and topographic-related gradients in soil moisture and edaphic conditions, and availability of soil constituents. Rainfall pattern was determined from meteorological data and multiple linear regression. Topographic attributes were measured in the field. Availability of soil constituents was determined by evaluating and using spatial interpolation models using limited soils data, and construction of surface soil maps. Hypotheses were tested using the simple and partial Mantel tests of matrix association. Results demonstrate that predictions using spatial interpolation models based on limited, coarse-scale soils data are accurate and reliable when compared with more data-intensive investigations. Results using spatial statistics indicate that the nature of the spatial pattern of perennial species associations is a monotonic spatial trend. The distribution of perennial species associations is influenced both directly or indirectly by rainfall. An indirect rainfall relationship occurs when there is variability in topography. The means of influence by the topographic-related attributes is unclear despite significant Mantel results. In the topographically invariant portion of the study area, however, exchangeable sodium and magnesium concentrations appear to indirectly influence the distribution of perennial species associations. Strength and ordering of the vegetation-determinant relationships varied depending on the type of perennial species association type being investigated. Differences in species range of tolerance and rate of change in species association, depending on association type, landforrn, and parent material differences, account for the nature of the vegetation-determinant relationships, the ordering of the determinants, and variability in responses.

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