The high deployment and maintenance costs of last mile wireline networks (i.e., DSL and cable networks) have urged service providers to search for new cost-effective solutions to provide broadband connectivity. Broadband wireless access (BWA) networks, which offer a wide coverage area and high transmission rates in addition to their fast and low-cost deployment, have emerged as an alternative to last mile wireline networks. Therefore, BWA networks are expected to be deployed in areas with different terrain profiles (e.g., urban, suburban, rural) where wireless communication faces different channel impairments. This fact necessitates the adoption of various transmission technologies that combat the channel impairments of each profile. Implementation scenarios of BWA networks considered in this thesis are multicarrier-based direct transmission and single carrier-based cooperative transmission scenarios. The performance of these transmission technologies highly depends on how resources are allocated. In this thesis, we focus on the development of practical resource allocation schemes for the mentioned BWA networks implementation scenarios. In order to develop practical schemes, the imperfection of channel state information (CSI) and computational power limitations are among considered practical implementation issues. The design of efficient resource allocation schemes at the MAC layer heavily relies on the CSI reported from the PHY layer as a measure of the wireless channel condition. The channel estimation error and feedback delay renders the reported CSI erroneous. The inaccuracy in CSI propagates to higher layers, resulting in performance degradation. Although this effect is intuitive, a quantitative measure of this degradation is necessary for the design of practical resource allocation schemes. An approach to the evaluation of the ergodic mutual information that reflects this degradation is developed for single carrier, multicarrier, direct, and cooperative scenarios with inaccurate CSI. Given the CSI estimates and estimation error statistics, the presented evaluation of ergodic mutual information can be used in resource allocation and in assessing the severity of estimation error on performance degradation. A point-to-multipoint (PMP) network that employs orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) is considered as one of the most common implementation scenarios of BWA networks. Replacing wireline networks requires not only providing the last mile connectivity to subscribers but also supporting their diverse services with stringent quality of service (QoS) requirements. Therefore, the resource allocation problem (i.e., subcarriers, rate and power allocation) is modeled as a network utility maximization (NUM) one that captures the characteristics of this implementation scenario. A dual decomposition-based resource allocation scheme that takes into consideration the diversity of service requirements and inaccuracy of the CSI estimation is developed. Numerical evaluations and simulations are conducted to validate our theoretical claims that the scheme maximizes resource utilization, coordinates with the call admission controller to guarantee QoS, and accounts for CSI inaccuracy. Cooperation has recently received great attention from the research community and industry because of its low cost and fast deployment in addition to the performance improvement it brings to BWA networks. In cooperative scenarios, subscribers cooperate to relay each other's signals. For this implementation scenario of BWA networks, a robust and constrained Kalman filter-based power allocation scheme is proposed to minimize power consumption and guarantee bit error probability (BEP) requirements. The proposed scheme is robust to CSI inaccuracy, responsive to changes in BEP requirements, and optimal in allocating resources. In summary, research results presented in this thesis contribute to the development of practical resource allocation schemes for BWA networks.

Ce mémoire de thèse s'articule en deux parties. La premiière partie s'intéresse à la robustesse du nombre de reproduction de base R0 et du nombre de reproduction type T, qui sont des seuils pour des systèmes épidémiques. Nous montrons que ces paramètres seuils ne sont pas des jauges fiables pour évaluer la distance qui sépare le Jacobien J du système, calculé au point d'équilbre sans maladie à l'ensemble des matrices stables (S) si J est instable, ( respectivement 'a l'ensemble des matrices instables ( U) si J est stable). La deuxième partie se penche sur l'étude d'un modèle déterministe (S V E I R), o'u S représente les susceptibles, V les vaccinés, E les latents, I les infectieux et R les immuns. Dans le dit modèle, les vaccinés sont considérés comme des "susceptibles dans une moindre mesure" du fait que le vaccin ne garantit pas une immunité totale. Le nombre de reproduction de base Rvac qui assure l'existence et l'unicité de l'équilibre endémique est déterminé La globale stabilité de l'équilibre endémique est établie en utilisant les techniques de Lyapunov quand Rvac > 1. Ce réesultat améliore un résultat de Gumel et al.

Submitted by Yara de Almeida Campos Cordeiro (yarinha.a@gmail.com) on 2015-06-03T18:26:36Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Diss_Biblioteca.pdf: 649363 bytes, checksum: 3edcafbc40c828ea9dfa7b5ecbf4892b (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by BRUNA BARROS (bruna.barros@fgv.br) on 2015-06-12T14:12:17Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Diss_Biblioteca.pdf: 649363 bytes, checksum: 3edcafbc40c828ea9dfa7b5ecbf4892b (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Marcia Bacha (marcia.bacha@fgv.br) on 2015-06-12T18:08:06Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Diss_Biblioteca.pdf: 649363 bytes, checksum: 3edcafbc40c828ea9dfa7b5ecbf4892b (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2015-06-12T18:08:24Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Diss_Biblioteca.pdf: 649363 bytes, checksum: 3edcafbc40c828ea9dfa7b5ecbf4892b (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-04 / This paper investigates the expectations formation process of economic agents about inflation rate. Using the Market Expectations System of Central Bank of Brazil, we perceive that agents do not update their forecasts every period and that even agents who update disagree in their predictions. We then focus on the two most popular types of inattention models that have been discussed in the recent literature: sticky-information and noisy-information models. Estimating a hybrid model we find that, although formally fitting the Brazilian data, it happens at the cost of a much higher degree of information rigidity than observed.

Ce travail porte sur les tests d'adéquation en fiabilité, à la fois pour les systèmes non réparables et les systèmes réparables. Les tests d'adéquation sont des outils efficaces pour vérifier la pertinence d'un modèle pour un jeu de données. Pour les systèmes non réparables, la loi exponentielle et la loi de Weibull sont les lois de durée de vie les plus utilisées en fiabilité. Une comparaison exhaustive des tests d'adéquation pour la loi exponentielle est présentée pour des données complètes et censurées, suivie par des recommandations d'utilisation de ces tests. La loi de Weibull à deux paramètres permet de modéliser des taux de hasard décroissants et croissants contrairement à la loi exponentielle qui suppose un taux de hasard constant. Cependant, il existe moins de tests d'adéquation à la loi de Weibull dans la littérature. Une revue exhaustive des tests existant est effectuée et deux familles de tests exacts sont preésentées. La première famille est la famille des tests basés sur la vraisemblance et la deuxième est la famille des tests basés sur la transformée de Laplace. Des propriétés asymptotiques des nouvelles statistiques de tests sont établies. Une comparaison complète des tests d'adéquation pour la loi de Weibull est effectuée. Des recommandations sur les tests les plus puissants sont données en fonction des caractéristiques du jeu de donnés testé. Pour les systèmes réparables, de nouveaux tests d'adéquation sont développés pour des modèles de maintenance imparfaite avec à la fois des maintenances correctives et des maintenances préventives déterministes. Ces tests sont exacts et peuvent être appliqués à des petits jeux de données. Finalement, des applications à de vrais jeux de données issus de l'industrie sont effectuées pour des systèmes réparables et des systèmes non réparables. / This work deals with goodness-of-fit (GOF) tests in reliability for both non repairable and repairable systems. GOF tests are efficient techniques to check the relevance of a model for a given data set. For non repairable systems, the Exponential and Weibull distributions are the most used lifetimes distributions in reliability. A comprehensive comparison study of the GOF tests for the Exponential distribution is presented for complete and censored samples followed by recommendations about the use of the tests. The two-parameter Weibull distribution allows decreasing and increasing failure rates unlike the Exponential distribution that makes the assumption of a constant hazard rate. Yet, there exist less GOF tests in the literature for the Weibull distribution. A comprehensive review of the existing GOF tests is done and two new families of exact GOF tests are introduced. The first family is the likelihood based GOF tests and the second is the family of tests based on the Laplace transform. Theoretical asymptotic properties of some new tests statistics are established. A comprehensive comparison study of the GOF tests for the Weibull distribution is done. Recommendations about the most powerful tests are given depending on the characteristics of the tested data sets. For repairable systems, new GOF tests are developed for imperfect maintenance models when both corrective maintenance and deterministic preventive maintenance are performed. These tests are exact and can be applied to small data sets. Finally, illustrative applications to real data sets from industry are carried out for repairable and non repairable systems.

Ericsson Brasil / The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) established through the International Mobile Telecommunications (IMT)-Advanced a set of requirements for high performance of 4th Generation (4G) communication systems and, with the aim of meeting such requirements, 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Long Term Evolution (LTE) is considering a set of enhancements, referred to as LTE-Advanced. In the LTE-Advanced context, Coordinated Multi-Point (CoMP) communication appears as a promising technology to boost system throughput and to allow for an efficient Radio Resource Allocation (RRA). CoMP systems promise very high performance in terms of spectral efficiency and coverage benefits when perfect Channel State Information (CSI) is available at the transmitter. However, perfect CSI is difficult to obtain in CoMP systems due to an increased number of channel parameters to be estimated at the receiver and to be fed back to the transmitter. So, the performance of such systems is compromised when the CSI is not perfectly known during CoMP processing, which is an important problem to be addressed. Space Division Multiple Access (SDMA) grouping algorithms are usually employed in order to find a suitable set of users for spatial multiplexing. The largest SDMA group is not always the best group in a given data transmission such that higher gains might be achieved by dynamically adjusting the SDMA group size. Besides, algorithms that balance the Signal to Interference-plus-Noise Ratio (SINR) among different links might ensure a certain level of link quality and so provide a more reliable communication for the scheduled users. This master thesis provides system-level analyses for RRA algorithms that exploit coordination in the downlink of CoMP systems to implement adaptive resource reuse and so improve system throughput. Herein, RRA strategies which consider dynamic SDMA grouping, joint precoding and power allocation for SINR balancing are studied in CoMP systems assuming imperfect CSI in order to obtain a better approximation with regard to the real-world implementations. It is shown through system-level analyses that quite high throughput gains are achieved through intelligent RRA. In conclusion, the results show that Sequential Removal Algorithms (SRAs) and SINR balancing provide system spectral efficiency gains. However, a critical degradation on the performance of these RRA strategies due to imperfect CSI is also shown. / A UniÃo Internacional para TelecomunicaÃÃes (ITU) estabeleceu atravÃs da iniciativa para o Sistema AvanÃado Internacional de TelecomunicaÃÃes MÃveis (IMT-Advanced), um conjunto de requisitos de alto desempenho para os sistemas de comunicaÃÃo de quarta geraÃÃo (4G) e, com o objetivo de atender tais requisitos, a EvoluÃÃo de Longo Prazo (LTE) do Projeto de Parceria para a Terceira GeraÃÃo (3GPP) està considerando um conjunto de melhorias, referidas como LTE-AvanÃado. No contexto do LTE-AvanÃado, a comunicaÃÃo multi-ponto coordenada (CoMP) aparece como uma tecnologia promissora para aumentar a vazÃo do sistema e permitir uma AlocaÃÃo de Recursos de RÃdio (RRA) eficiente. Os sistemas CoMP prometem alto desempenho em termos de eficiÃncia espectral e benefÃcios de cobertura quando a InformaÃÃo do Estado do Canal (CSI) perfeita està disponÃvel no transmissor. No entanto, CSI perfeita à difÃcil de se obter em sistemas CoMP devido a um alto nÃmero de parÃmetros de canal a serem estimados no receptor e enviados para o transmissor. Assim, o desempenho de tais sistemas à comprometido quando a CSI nÃo à perfeitamente conhecida durante o processamento CoMP tal que esse à um problema importante a ser abordado. Algoritmos de agrupamento para MÃltiplo Acesso por DivisÃo no EspaÃo (SDMA) geralmente sÃo utilizados a fim de encontrar um conjunto adequado de usuÃrios para multiplexaÃÃo espacial. O maior grupo SDMA nem sempre à o melhor grupo em uma transmissÃo de dados tal que maiores ganhos podem ser obtidos ajustando dinamicamente o tamanho do grupo SDMA. AlÃm disso, os algoritmos que balanceiam a RazÃo Sinal-InterferÃncia mais RuÃdo (SINR) entre diferentes canais podem garantir um certo nÃvel de qualidade de canal e assim proporcionar uma comunicaÃÃo mais confiÃvel para os usuÃrios agrupados. Esta dissertaÃÃo de mestrado fornece anÃlises em nÃvel sistÃmico para algoritmos de RRA que exploram a coordenaÃÃo no enlace direto de sistemas CoMP para implementar reuso adaptativo de recursos e assim melhorar o desempenho do sistema. SÃo estudadas aqui estratÃgias de RRA em sistemas CoMP que consideram agrupamento SDMA dinÃmico, precodificaÃÃo e alocaÃÃo de potÃncia conjuntas para balanceamento de SINR, sendo assumida CSI imperfeita a fim de conseguir maior aproximaÃÃo com relaÃÃo Ãs implementaÃÃs em cenÃrios reais. à mostrado atravÃs de anÃlises em nÃvel sistÃmico que ganhos de vazÃo bastante altos sÃo alcanÃados atravÃs de RRA inteligente. Em conclusÃo, os resultados mostram que Algoritmos de RemoÃÃo Sequencial (SRAs) e de balanceamento de SINR proporcionam ganhos de eficiÃncia espectral do sistema. No entanto, à tambÃm mostrada uma degradaÃÃo crÃtica no desempenho dessas estratÃgias de RRA devido à CSI imperfeita.

Essa dissertação foi desenvolvida com o objetivo de responder ao seguinte problema de pesquisa: há indícios de que notas explicativas das demonstrações financeiras que sejam menos compreensíveis, na visão de profissionais de investimento, conduzem a custos de transação maiores no estabelecimento de contratos? Por custos de transação, entendem-se aqueles referentes à coleta de informações, os custos de negociação e os de estabelecimento de contratos (COASE, 1991). Uma informação de difícil compreensibilidade, portanto, seria um catalisador de novos custos de transação, trazendo ineficiências no estabelecimento de contratos futuros. Para atingir os objetivos desejados, foram distribuídos questionários aos profissionais de investimento no 22º Congresso APIMEC que foi realizado nos dias 30 a 31 de agosto de 2012. Do total de participantes, 54 pessoas responderam o mesmo. De modo geral, verificou-se que sob a situação de tempo escasso e um grande custo de decodificação das notas explicativas, o que aumenta os custos de transação, pode-se conjecturar que algumas análises estejam sendo feitas de modo ineficiente, o que poderia conduzir a ineficiências no estabelecimento de contratos futuros. Verificou-se também que há indícios de que há excesso de informações e não falta das mesmas, o que conduziria a problemas de informação imperfeita e não de informação incompleta (LOPES, 2008). / This dissertation was developed in order to answer the following research problem: Is there evidence that the explanatory notes in the financial statements that are less understandable, by the investment professionals point of view, lead to higher transaction costs in establishing contracts? For transaction costs, we understood those that are related to information collection, the costs of negotiating and establishing contracts (COASE, 1991). A difficult understandability of information would therefore be a catalyst of new transaction costs, bringing inefficiencies in establishing future contracts. To achieve the desired goals, questionnaires were distributed to investment professionals in 22º Congresso Apimec that was held on 30 to 31 August 2012. Of all participants, 54 people responded it. In general, it was found that under the situation of limited time and a large cost to decode the notes, which increases transaction costs, it can be conjectured that some analyzes are being done inefficiently, which might lead inefficiencies in the establishment of futures contracts. It was also found that there is evidence that there is too much information and not lack of them, which would lead to problems of imperfect information and not incomplete information (LOPES, 2008).

En mécanique des matériaux et des structures, l’interface entre deux composants matériels ou deux éléments structuraux est traditionnellement et le plus souvent supposé parfaite. Au sens mécanique, une interface parfaite est une surface à travers laquelle le vecteur de déplacement et le vecteur de contrainte sont tous les deux continus. L’hypothèse des interfaces parfaites est inappropriée dans de nombreuses situations en mécanique. En effet, l’interface entre deux corps ou deux parties d’un corps est un endroit propice aux réactions physico-chimiques complexes et favorable à l’endommagement mécanique. L’intérêt pour les interfaces imparfaites devient depuis quelques années grandissant avec le développement des matériaux et structures nanométriques dans lesquels les interfaces et surfaces jouent un rôle prépondérant. A partir de la configuration de base où une interphase de faible épaisseur sépare deux phases, ce travail établit trois modèles d’interface imparfaite généraux qui permettent de remplacer l’interphase par une interface imparfaite dans les cas de la conduction thermique, de l’élasticité linéaire et de la piézoélectricité sans perturber les champs en questions à une erreur fixée près. La dérivation de ces modèles est basée sur le développement de Taylor et sur une approche originale de géométrie différentielle indépendante de tout système de coordonnées. Les trois modèles généraux permettent non seulement de mieux appréhender certains modèles phénoménologiques d’interface imparfaite mais aussi de décrire les effets d’interface que les modèles existants ne sont pas en mesure de prendre en compte. Les modèles d’interface imparfaite établis sont appliqués dans la détermination des propriétés effectives thermiques, élastiques et piézoélectriques d’un matériau composite constitué d’une matrice renforcée par des particules ou fibres enrobées d’une interphase. La méthode utilisée pour rendre compte des effets des interfaces imparfaites sur les propriétés effectives repose sur une condition d’équivalence énergétique qui ramène un matériau hétérogène avec interfaces imparfaites à un matériau hétérogène avec interfaces parfaites / In mechanics of materials and structures, the interface between two material components or two structural elements is traditionally and the most often assumed to be perfect. In mechanics, a perfect interface is a surface through which the displacement and stress vectors are continuous. The assumption of the perfect interfaces is inappropriate in many situations in mechanics. Indeed, the interface between two bodies or two parts of a body is a place propitious to complex physicochemical reactions and vulnerable to mechanical damage. The interest in imperfect interfaces has become for a few years growing with the development of nanometric materials and structures in which the interfaces and surfaces play a preponderant role. Starting from the basic configuration where an interphase of thin thickness separates two phases, this work establishes three general models of imperfect interface which make it possible to replace the interphase by an imperfect interface in the cases of thermal conduction, linear elasticity and piezoelectricity without disturbing the fields in questions to within a fixed error. The derivation of these models is based on the development of Taylor and an original coordinate-free approach of differential geometry. The three general models make it possible not only to get a better understanding of certain phenomenological models of imperfect interface but also to describe the effects of interface which the existing models are not able to take into account. The established models of imperfect interface are applied to determining the thermal, elastic and piezoelectric effective properties of composite materials consisting of a matrix reinforced by particles or fibers coated with an interphase. The method used to account for the effects of imperfect interfaces on the effective properties rests on an energy equivalency which brings back a heterogeneous material with imperfect interfaces to a heterogeneous material with perfect interfaces

The aim of this essay is to identify the factors that exert an influence on university students' use of the imperfect indicative and the preterite in Spanish. The present study is based on an empirical study consisting of questionnaries carried out with 102 university students who study Spanish as a foreign language at four different universities in Sweden. The hypothesis of this essay is that not only internal factors and external factors but also individual factors and learner strategies used by the students have an influence on the students' correct and incorrect use of the imperfect indicative and the preterite. In the theoretical background of this essay, the internal, external and individual factors related to the acquisition of Spanish as a foreign language are presented. In the next part of the essay, the results of the empirical study are presented and analized. In order to determine if there are any correlations between the variables in question, a series of statistical tests are carried out and analized. Taking in consideration the factors of the aim of this study, the independent variables, i.e. the internal, external and individual factors, are confronted with the dependent variable, i.e. the amount of correct and incorrect answers, in order to identify which of these independent variables favour and prevent the correct use of the imperfect indicative and the preterite. The statistical analyses carried out verify the initial hypothesis: internal and external factors as well as individual factors exert an influence on the students' correct and incorrect use of the imperfect indicative and the preterite.

The aim of this thesis is to introduce modotemporal functions of paradigm hablaba in Spanish. In the theoretical part, we define basic concepts related to this theme and the basic functions of paradigm hablaba. Then we describe functions that are less typical for the given paradigm. We designate these functions as modal meanings and we pay most attention to them. We describe them mainly from the semantic point of view and we also introduce different kinds of theories, which try to explain these meanings. In the practical part, using parallel corpus InterCorp, we analyze the meanings of the paradigm hablaba in the selected occurrences and we introduce the examples of some sentences proving the statements from the theoretical part of the thesis. Key words: verbal paradigm, imperfect tense, modal meanings, Spanish, corpus, InterCorp

Signaling games are part of games with imperfect information. The games with imperfect information mean that the player doesn't know all moves of players, which played before him. The signaling game as such are interesting because some players have more information than the others. The better informed group of players can indicate to uninformed players what they know and wait how the opponents react. Generally the move which uninformed party takes influence all players. In my papers I want to describe main rules for signaling games, show possible ways how to solve this kinds of problems and use this new knowledge in aplication on problem which can be usable in practices.