A tendência atual, imposta pela competitividade do mercado, exige bovinos mais eficientes e adequados ao sistema de produção, visando atender a demanda pela qualidade de carne. Em função disso, o melhoramento genético vem sendo utilizado, de forma a incrementar a eficiência dos rebanhos, proporcionando assim, maior rentabilidade ao sistema. Assim, o presente estudo foi conduzido com o propósito de estudar a variabilidade da progênie de touros submetidos à avaliação genética, através da análise das Diferenças Esperadas na Progênie (DEP) dos filhos de 359 reprodutores. As DEP das progênies foram estimadas por procedimentos REML e as avaliações de touros por metodologias alternativas, foram realizadas com o auxílio do software SAS. Foram utilizados 45.014 dados de peso à desmama (PD), 45.014 de peso ao sobreano (PS) e 45.014 de ganho de peso da desmama ao sobreano (GP) de bovinos de corte da raça Nelore, criados em uma fazenda em região tropical do Brasil. As DEPs dos touros foram estimadas de acordo com três métodos: uso da média aritmética, média harmônica acrescida da média da característica estudada e média harmônica simples. Os resultados sugerem que o uso da média harmônica na estimação de DEPs com o objetivo de ajustar o valor genético aditivo de um touro para a dispersão dos valores genéticos de suas progênies não trouxe diferenças importantes em relação à estimativa pela média aritmética, na população estudada. No entanto, dadas as implicações e importância de novas metodologias, são necessários maiores estudos em busca de se encontrar uma metodologia que permita maior uniformidade das progênies de touros. / The strong competition in beef market imposed an actual trend of searching for quality in beef production systems, trying to attend the consumers\' demand. Due to the necessity of increasing productivity, animal breeding programs have been utilized to increase cattle efficiency, offering more profitability to the production system. The present study was carried out to contribute to knowledge about sires\' progeny variability, using Expected Progeny Difference (EPD) from calves of 359 sires. EPD\'s were estimated by REML procedures. The prediction od bull\'s EPD\'s were performed by software SAS, using 45,014 data of weaning weight (PD), 45,014 of post-weaning weight (PS) and 45,014 of weight gain post-weaning (GP) from Nellore beef cattle, raised in a tropical area of Brazil. Those data were analyzed according with three methods: application of arithmetic mean, harmonic mean of EPD added by trait mean and only harmonic mean. Results suggested that estimation of EPDs using harmonic mean on condition that adjust sire\'s additive genetic value to dispersion form its calves\' genetic values did not make difference to the prediction trough arithmetic mean in the population studied. Due to the implications and importance of alternative methods to adjust bull\'s EPDs to variability of progeny, further studies are necessary to search for better progeny\'s uniformity.

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In this paper we prove structure results for the singular sets of stationary harmonic maps and mean curvature flows local to particular singularities. The original work is contained in Chapter 5 and Chapter 8. Chapters 1-5 are concerned with energy minimising maps and stationary harmonic maps. Chapters 6-8 are concerned with mean curvature flows and Brakke flows. In the case of stationary harmonic maps we consider a singularity at which the spine dimension is maximal, and such that the weak tangent map is homotopically non-trivial, and has minimal density amongst singularities of maximal spine dimen- sion. Local to such a singularity we show the singular set is a bi-Hölder continuous homeomorphism of the unit disk of dimension equal to the maximal spine dimension. A weak tangent map is translation invariant along a subspace, and invariant under dilations, so it completely defined by its values on a sphere. Such a map is said to be homotopically non-trivial if the mapping of a sphere into some target manifold cannot be deformed by a homotopy to a constant map. For an n-dimensional mean curvature flow we consider a singularity at which we can find a shrinking cylinder as a tangent flow, that collapses on an (n−1)-dimensional plane. Local to such a singularity we show that all singularities have such a cylindrical tangent, or else have lower Gaussian density than that of the shrinking cylinder. The subset of cylindrical singularities can be shown to be contained in a finite union of parabolic (n − 1)-dimensional Lipschitz submanifolds. In the case that the mean curvature flow arises from elliptic regularisation we can show that all singularities local to a cylindrical singularity with (n − 1)-dimensional spine are either cylindrical singularities with (n − 1)-dimensional spine, or contained in a parabolic Hausdorff (n − 2)-dimensional set.

In this thesis, we study the overfitting problem in supervised learning of classifiers from a geometric perspective. As with many inverse problems, learning a classification function from a given set of example-label pairs is an ill-posed problem, i.e., there exist infinitely many classification functions that can correctly predict the class labels for all training examples. Among them, according to Occam's razor, simpler functions are favored since they are less overfitted to training examples and are therefore expected to perform better on unseen examples. The standard technique to enforce Occam's razor is to introduce a regularization scheme, which penalizes some type of complexity of the learned classification function. Some widely used regularization techniques are functional norm-based (Tikhonov) techniques, ensemble-based techniques, early stopping techniques, etc. However, there is important geometric information in the learned classification function that is closely related to overfitting, and has been overlooked by previous methods. In this thesis, we study the complexity of a classification function from a new geometric perspective. In particular, we investigate the differential geometric structure in the submanifold corresponding to the estimator of the class probability P(y|x), based on the observation that overfitting produces rapid local oscillations and hence large mean curvature of this submanifold. We also show that our geometric perspective of supervised learning is naturally related to an elastic model in physics, where our complexity measure is a high dimensional extension of the surface energy in physics. This study leads to a new geometric regularization approach for supervised learning of classifiers. In our approach, the learning process can be viewed as a submanifold fitting problem that is solved by a mean curvature flow method. In particular, our approach finds the submanifold by iteratively fitting the training examples in a curvature or volume decreasing manner. Our technique is unified for both binary and multiclass classification, and can be applied to regularize any classification function that satisfies two requirements: firstly, an estimator of the class probability can be obtained; secondly, first and second derivatives of the class probability estimator can be calculated. For applications, where we apply our regularization technique to standard loss functions for classification, our RBF-based implementation compares favorably to widely used regularization methods for both binary and multiclass classification. We also design a specific algorithm to incorporate our regularization technique into the standard forward-backward training of deep neural networks. For theoretical analysis, we establish Bayes consistency for a specific loss function under some mild initialization assumptions. We also discuss the extension of our approach to situations where the input space is a submanifold, rather than a Euclidean space. / 2018-11-30T00:00:00Z

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-27T17:27:06Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Maria Flavia de Araujo Russo.pdf: 641056 bytes, checksum: 7df53316600dc0202007a0c47972240e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-03-20 / The purpose of this work is to understand the meaning of mean and its importance to acquire happiness, from the viewpoint of Aristotle, in his book Nicomachean Ethics. Therefore, the meaning of areté, resulting from the Greek ideal of education and equivalent to moral excellence, will be analyzed, as well as the meaning of ethics and its relationship to virtue. Happiness, eudaimonia or the highest good, will also be analyzed in the face of its close kinship to virtue, a moral quality that leads to man s doing things well. Next, mean and its opposites will be studied, which involves excessive and deficient actions and emotions. A study will be carried out on what mean constitutes, which in reality represents the apex, that is, the beautiful and fair conduct of the virtuous man. Afterwards, it will be necessary to understand the meaning of practical wisdom, prudence or phronesis, because it will guide actions and emotions in relation to doing things well. Lastly, final comments will be made, which will help us understand the importance of acting with the intention of being good, fair and virtuous for the transformation and improvement of man and society / O presente trabalho tem por objetivo compreender o significado de mediedade e a sua importância na aquisição da felicidade, sob a ótica de Aristóteles, em seu livro Ética a Nicômaco . Para tanto, será analisado o significado de areté, decorrente do ideal grego de educação e equivalente a excelência moral e o significado de ética e a sua relação com a virtude. A felicidade, eudaimonia ou bem supremo, também será analisada, em face de sua estreita ligação com a virtude, qualidade moral que conduz ao bom agir do homem. A seguir, adentraremos o estudo da mediedade e os seus opostos, que envolvem ações e emoções excessivas ou deficientes. Estudarse- á em que consiste a mediania, que representa, em verdade, o cume, ou seja, a conduta bela e justa do homem virtuoso. A seguir, será preciso compreender o significado da sabedoria prática, prudência ou phronesis, porque será ela que ordenará as ações e emoções com vistas ao agir com acerto. Por fim, serão tecidas as considerações finais, as quais levarão à compreensão da importância do agir com intenção de ser bom, justo e virtuoso, para a transformação e aprimoramento do homem e da sociedade

Submitted by Filipe dos Santos (fsantos@pucsp.br) on 2016-09-13T14:21:26Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Helena Rojo Estêvão.pdf: 6577841 bytes, checksum: 2d8dafe599598866cc5a731cdee450bd (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-09-13T14:21:26Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Helena Rojo Estêvão.pdf: 6577841 bytes, checksum: 2d8dafe599598866cc5a731cdee450bd (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-03-21 / Our primary focus is the relationship among musical performances and technology. We try to highlight the importance of performer’s aesthetical position towards technologic mediation so it becomes possible to appear new audibilities, knowing that technology influences directly the artistic doing. It has allowed the creation of musical genres, new methods of musical production and, specially, of diverse sounds and artistic expressions; as well as possibilities of dissemination and public access from also new technological basis. To get there, we go through examples from analogic to digital contrasting determining proprieties of analogical musical action and reception with current musical doings – digitals – that are spread primarily on the internet. It is not about register and reproduce what is made anymore, but to construct the work in its form of dissemination. The performance is as scenic, as it is placed to the audience, as musical, regarding what concerns instruments used as performer extensions, given that the performer’s perception is altered according as other technologies and, therefore, new extensions are implanted. The same occurs to the public. This work will look at some authors such as Marshall McLuhan, Raymond Murray Schafer, Paul Zumthor, that had analyzed different moments and issues of musical doing – with special attention to MPB – since the music made in analogical times until the digital era music, leading into consideration changes in culture, determinant to the work outcome / Nosso foco principal é a relação das performances musicais com a tecnologia. Pretende-se destacar aqui a importância do posicionamento estético do performer frente à mediação tecnológica para que se torne possível o surgimento de novas audibilidades, tendo em vista que a tecnologia influencia diretamente o fazer artístico. Isso tem permitido a criação de gêneros musicais, novos modos de produção musical e, em especial, de sonoridades diversas e expressões artísticas; além de possibilidades de difusão e acesso do público a partir de bases tecnológicas igualmente novas. Para tanto, percorremos exemplos que vão do analógico ao digital contrapondo propriedades determinantes da atuação e recepção musical analógica com os fazeres musicais atuais – digitais – que se encontram difundidos, basicamente, na internet. Não se trata mais de registrar e reproduzir o que é apresentado, mas da construção de obras já na forma de sua difusão. A performance é tanto cênica, tal como se coloca frente ao público, quanto musical, no que diz respeito aos instrumentos que são utilizados como extensões do performer, tendo em vista que a percepção deste se altera na medida em que outras tecnologias e, portanto, novas extensões são implantadas. O mesmo ocorre com o público. Este trabalho busca em autores tais como Marshall McLuhan, Raymond Murray Schafer, Paul Zumthor, que analisaram diferentes momentos e questões do fazer musical – com uma atenção especial para a MPB – desde a música realizada na era analógica até a música da era digital, levando em consideração as transformações na cultura, determinantes para o resultado da obra

Neste trabalho apresentamos condições suficientes para a existência de gráficos de curvatura média constante (CMC) com bordo em dois planos paralelos. Também são feitas estimativas para a altura de superfícies CMC com vetor normal orientado para fora limitadas por um cilindro ou horocilindro. / In this work we present su cient existence conditions for constant mean curvature (CMC) graphs with boundary in two parallel planes. We also make height estimates for outwards-oriented CMC surfaces bounded by a cylinder or horocylinder.

This thesis consists of one stock return predictability study and two international risk exposure studies. The first study shows that the statistical significance of out-of-sample predictability of market returns given by Kelly and Pruitt (2013), using a partial least squares methodology, constructed from the valuation ratios of portfolios, is overstated for two reasons. Firstly, the analysis is conducted on gross returns rather than excess returns, and this raises the apparent predictability of the equity premium due to the inclusion of predictable movements of interest rates. Secondly, the bootstrap statistics used to assess out-of-sample significance do not account for small-sample bias in the estimated coefficients. This bias is well known to affect in-sample tests of significance and I show that it is also important for out-of-sample tests of significance. Accounting for both these effects can radically change the conclusions; for example, the recursive out-of-sample R2 values for the sample period 1965-2010 are insignificant for the prediction of one-year excess returns, and one-month returns, except in the case of the book-to-market ratios of six size- and value-sorted portfolios which are significant at the 10% level. The second study examines whether U.S. common stocks are exposed to international risks, which I define as shocks to foreign markets that are orthogonal to U.S. market returns. By sorting stocks on past exposure to this risk factor I show that it is possible to create portfolios with an ex-post spread in exposure to international risk. I examine whether the international risk is priced in the cross-section of U.S. stocks, and find that for small stocks an increase in exposure to international risk results in lower returns relative to the Fama-French three-factor model. I conduct similar analysis on a measure of the international value premium and find little evidence of this risk being priced in U.S. stocks. The third study examines whether a portfolios of U.S. stocks can mimic foreign index returns, thereby providing investors with the benefits of international diversification without the need to invest directly in assets that trade abroad. I test this proposition using index data from seven developed markets and eight emerging markets over the period 1975-2013. Portfolios of U.S. stocks are constructed out-of-sample to mimic these international indices using a step-wise procedure that selects from a variety of industry portfolios, stocks of multinational corporations, country funds and American depositary receipts. I also use a partial least squares approach to form mimicking portfolios. I show that investors are able to gain considerable exposure to emerging market indices using domestically traded stocks. However, for developed market indices it is difficult to obtain home-made exposure beyond the simple exposure of foreign indices to the U.S. market factor. Using mean-variance spanning tests I find that, with few exceptions, international indices do not improve over the investment frontier provided by the domestically constructed alternative of investing in the U.S. market index and portfolios of industries and multinational corporations.

La electrocardiografía es una herramienta básica diagnóstica en la medicina veterinaria de animales de compañía, siendo la mejor alternativa para evaluar la actividad eléctrica del corazón en forma no invasiva. Sin embargo, cambios en el posicionamiento del paciente pueden ocasionar cambios en las medidas del complejo PQRST y desencadenar diagnósticos errados. El propósito de este estudio fue detectar posibles variaciones de la dirección del eje eléctrico medio cuando el registro se hace en posición decúbito lateral izquierdo en lugar de la posición estándar en decúbito lateral derecho, para analizar la variación en los resultados de acuerdo al posicionamiento del paciente. El estudio se realizó en 100 canes aparentemente sanos de ambos sexos, mayores a 1 año de edad y de cualquier peso. Se registraron dos electrocardiogramas por cada paciente: decúbito lateral derecho e izquierdo, que luego fueron analizados uno por uno; los resultados del cálculo del eje eléctrico medio fueron comparados, llegando a la conclusión que no son similares y que la posición decúbito lateral derecho es irreemplazable para el cálculo del eje eléctrico medio cardiaco en caninos.Electrocardiography is a basic diagnostic tool in veterinary medicine pet, being the best non-invasively alternative to assess the electrical activity of the heart. However, changes in patient positioning may cause changes in measures of PQRST complex and trigger misdiagnoses. The purpose of this study was to detect possible changes in the direction of the mean electrical axis when the register is in left lateral position (LL) instead of the standard right lateral position (RL), to analyze the variation in results according to patient positioning. The study was conducted in 100 apparently healthy male and female dogs, older than 1 year of age and of any weight. Two electrocardiograms were registered for each patient: right and left lateral decubitus, which were then analyzed one by one; two electrocardiograms were performed for each patient the results of the calculation of the average electrical axis were compared, concluding that they are not similar and that the right lateral decubitus position is irreplaceable for calculating mean electrical axis of the heart in dogs.

In this work we summarize the various techniques of claims reserves evaluating which consist in estimate of the future uncertain and hardly antici- pated loss development. It appears that the methods which are based on some credibility formula bring in the mean squared error sense the most accurate results. We consider this in the text derived conclusion very relevant and con- tributing, therefore we illustrate and present it on the numerical example. The calculations are introduced in the attached charts that build the important sup- plement of the text. The topic of this work follows up the content of Nonlife Insurance and Risk Theory lectures, therefore this text can be useful also for the students of the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics to extend their knowledge. 1