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Partial Least Squares (PLS) has been shown to be a versatile regression technique with an increasing number of applications in the areas of process control, process monitoring and process analysis. This Thesis considers the area of nonlinear PLS; a nonlinear projection based regression technique. The nonlinearity is introduced as a univariate nonlinear function between projections, or to be more specific, linear combinations of the predictor and the response variables. As for the linear case, the method should handle multicollinearity, underdetermined and noisy systems. Although linear PLS is accepted as an empirical regression method, none of the published nonlinear PLS algorithms have achieved widespread acceptance. This is confirmed from a literature survey where few real applications of the methodology were found. This Thesis investigates two nonlinear PLS methodologies, in particular focusing on their limitations. Based on these studies, two nonlinear PLS algorithms are proposed. In the first of the two existing approaches investigated, the projections are updated by applying an optimization method to reduce the error of the nonlinear inner mapping. This ensures that the error introduced by the nonlinear inner mapping is minimized. However, the procedure is limited as a consequence of problems with the nonlinear optimisation. A new algorithm, Nested PLS (NPLS), is developed to address these issues. In particular, a separate inner PLS is used to update the projections. The NPLS algorithm is shown to outperform existing algorithms for a wide range of regression problems and has the potential to become a more widely accepted nonlinear PLS algorithm than those currently reported in the literature. In the second of the existing approaches, the projections are identified by examining each variable independently, as opposed to minimizing the error of the nonlinear inner mapping directly. Although the approach does not necessary identify the underlying functional relationship, the problems of overfitting and other problems associated with optimization are reduced. Since the underlying functional relationship may not be established accurately, the reliability of the nonlinear inner mapping will be reduced. To address this problem a new algorithm, the Reciprocal Variance PLS (RVPLS), is proposed. Compared with established methodology, RVPLS focus more on finding the underlying structure, thus reducing the difficulty of finding an appropriate inner mapping. RVPLS is shown to perform well for a number of applications, but does not have the wide-ranging performance of Nested PLS.

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A methodology for the construction of predictive empirical models of physiological characteristics from microarray data is presented. The method, applied here to the study of the development of diabetes and insulin resistance, can be further expanded to other cases and to also include a variety of other data, such as protein expression, or metabolic flux data. The importance of several of the genes identified by the modeling methodology can be verified by comparison with results from prior literature. This implies potentially significant roles in diabetes for several of the uncharacterized genes discovered during the modeling procedure. / Singapore-MIT Alliance (SMA)

Human capital is increasingly believed to play an indispensable role in the growth process; however, adequately measuring its stock remains controversial. Because the estimated impact that human capital has on economic growth is sensitive to the measure of human capital, accurate and consistent measures are desirable. While many measures have been developed, most rely on some proxy of educational experience and are thus plagued with limitations. In this study, I adopt a lifetime earnings approach to estimate the monetary value of the human capital stock for New Zealand. I find that the country's working human capital increased by half between 1981 and 2001, mainly due to rising employment level. This stock was well over double that of physical capital. I also model human capital as a latent variable using a Partial Least Squares approach. Exploratory analyses on a number of countries show that age, gender and education combined can capture 65-97 percent of the explained variation in human capital. JEL Classifications: J24, O47.

Partial Least Squares (PLS) is an important statistical technique with multipleand diverse applications, used as an effective regression method for correlated orcollinear datasets or for datasets that are not full rank for other reasons. A shorthistory of PLS is followed by a review of the publications where the issues with theapplication PLS that have been discussed. The theoretical basis of PLS is developedfrom the single value decomposition of the covariance, so that the strong links between principal components analysis and within the various PLS algorithms appear as a natural consequence. Latent variable selection by crossvalidation, permutation and information criteriaare examined. A method for plotting crossvalidation results is proposed that makeslatent variable selection less ambiguous than conventional plots. Novel and practicalmethods are proposed to extend published methods for latent variable selection byboth permutation and information criteria from univariate PLS1 models to PLS2 multivariate cases. The numerical method proposed for information criteria is also more general than the algebraic methods for PLS1 that have been recently published as it does not assume any particular form for the PLS regression coefficients. All of these methods have been critically assessed using a number of datasets, selected specifically to represent a diverse set of dimensions and covariance structures. Methods for simulating multivariate datasets were developed that allow controlof correlation and collinearity in both regressors and responses independently. Thisdevelopment also allows control over the variate distributions. Statistical design ofexperiments was used to generate plans for the simulation that allowed the factorsthat infuence PLS model fit and latent variable selection. It was found that all thelatent variable selection methods in the simulation tend to overfit and the feature inthe simulation that causes overfitting has been identified.

This study considers whether or not optimizing process metrics and settings across a supply chain gives significantly different outcomes than consideration at a firm level. While, the importance of supply chain integration has been shown in areas such as inventory management, this study appears to be the first empirical test for optimizing process settings. A Partial Least Squares (PLS) procedure is used to determine the crucial components and indicators that make up each component in a supply chain system. PLS allows supply chain members to have a greater understanding of critical coordination components in a given supply chain. Results and implications give an indication of what performance is possible with supply chain optimization versus local optimization on simulated and manufacturing data. It was found that pursuing an integrated approach over a traditional independent approach provides an improvement of 2% to 49% in predictive power for the supply chain under study.

This study considers whether or not optimizing process metrics and settings across a supply chain gives significantly different outcomes than consideration at a firm level. While, the importance of supply chain integration has been shown in areas such as inventory management, this study appears to be the first empirical test for optimizing process settings. A Partial Least Squares (PLS) procedure is used to determine the crucial components and indicators that make up each component in a supply chain system. PLS allows supply chain members to have a greater understanding of critical coordination components in a given supply chain. Results and implications give an indication of what performance is possible with supply chain optimization versus local optimization on simulated and manufacturing data. It was found that pursuing an integrated approach over a traditional independent approach provides an improvement of 2% to 49% in predictive power for the supply chain under study.

L'expressiódels gens obtinguts de l'anàliside microarrays s'utilitza en molts casos, per classificar les cèllules. En aquestatesi, unaversióprobabilística del mètodeDiscriminant Partial Least Squares (p-DPLS)s'utilitza per classificar les mostres de les expressions delsseus gens. p-DPLS esbasa en la regla de Bayes de la probabilitat a posteriori. Aquestsclassificadorssónforaçats a classficarsempre.Per superaraquestalimitaciós'haimplementatl'opció de rebuig.Aquestaopciópermetrebutjarlesmostresamb alt riscd'errors de classificació (és a dir, mostresambigüesi outliers).Aquestaopció de rebuigcombinacriterisbasats en els residuals x, el leverage ielsvalorspredits. A més,esdesenvolupa un mètode de selecció de variables per triarels gens mésrellevants, jaque la majoriadels gens analitzatsamb un microarraysónirrellevants per al propòsit particular de classificacióI podenconfondre el classificador. Finalment, el DPLSs'estenen a la classificació multi-classemitjançant la combinació de PLS ambl'anàlisidiscriminant lineal.

This study considers whether or not optimizing process metrics and settings across a supply chain gives significantly different outcomes than consideration at a firm level. While, the importance of supply chain integration has been shown in areas such as inventory management, this study appears to be the first empirical test for optimizing process settings. A Partial Least Squares (PLS) procedure is used to determine the crucial components and indicators that make up each component in a supply chain system. PLS allows supply chain members to have a greater understanding of critical coordination components in a given supply chain. Results and implications give an indication of what performance is possible with supply chain optimization versus local optimization on simulated and manufacturing data. It was found that pursuing an integrated approach over a traditional independent approach provides an improvement of 2% to 49% in predictive power for the supply chain under study.