THE U.S. and European M&A cycles: A Markov switching and state space approach

A Work Project, presented as part of the requirements for the Award of a Masters Degree in Finance from the NOVA – School of Business and Economics

Towards cryogenic liquid –vapor energy storage units for space applications

Dissertation to obtain the Doctoral degree in Physics Engineering

Studying urban space and literary representations using GIS: Lisbon, Portugal, 1852-2009

This article proposes a methodology to address the urban evolutionary process, demonstrating how it is reflected in literature. It focuses on “literary space,” presented as a territory defined by the period setting or as evoked by the characters, which can be georeferenced and drawn on a map. It identifies the different locations of literary space in relation to urban development and the economic, political, and social context of the city. We suggest a new approach for mapping a relatively comprehensive body of literature by combining literary criticism, urban history, and geographic information systems (GIS). The home-range concept, used in animal ecology, has been adapted to reveal the size and location of literary space. This interdisciplinary methodology is applied in a case study to nineteenth- and twentieth-century novels involving the city of Lisbon. The developing concepts of cumulative literary space and common literary space introduce size calculations in addition to location and structure, previously developed by other researchers. Sequential and overlapping analyses of literary space throughout time have the advantage of presenting comparable and repeatable results for other researchers using a different body of literary works or studying another city. Results show how city changes shaped perceptions of the urban space as it was lived and experienced. A small core area, correspondent to a part of the city center, persists as literary space in all the novels analyzed. Furthermore, the literary space does not match the urban evolution. There is a time lag for embedding new urbanized areas in the imagined literary scenario.

A system’s approach to cache hierarchy-aware decomposition of data-parallel computations

Dissertação para obtenção do Grau de Mestre em Engenharia Informática

Desenvolvimento de uma aplicação Android para pacientes sob tratamento

Nos dias de hoje, as tecnologias deixaram de ser tabus para qualquer faixa etária, tor-nando-se uma necessidade emergente. Os smartphones estão entre os dispositivos mais utilizados pela população em geral no quotidiano. Adicionando aos novos estilos de vida atuais, a medicação diária também tem vindo a crescer nos últimos tempos, sendo esta utilizada em casos de hipertensão, colesterol elevado, diabetes ou outras doenças perpétuas, como também na toma de multivitamínicos, medicação para aumento de produtividade, contracetivos ou antibióticos e anti-inflamatórios em casos de constipa-ções ou gripes. Aliado a um estilo de vida célere, a toma de medicação no momento indicado facilmente é esquecida, tornando os tratamentos ineficientes. A aplicação “Hora do comprimido”, desenvolvida para dispositivos Android, permite auxiliar os utilizadores na toma da sua medicação, contínua ou temporária, facilitando o quotidiano do utilizador, viabilizando assim um tratamento completo, sem falhas nas tomas ou feitas fora de horas.

Pedestrian Priority Zones in the Context of Urban Mobility and Valorization of Public Space

The second half of the XX century was marked by a great increase in the number of people living in cities. Urban agglomerations became poles of attraction for migration flows and these phenomena, coupled with growing car-ownership rates, resulted in the fact that modern transport systems are characterized by large number of users and traffic modes. The necessity to organize these complex systems and to provide space for different traffic modes changed the way cities look. Urban areas had to cope with traffic flows, and as a result nowadays typical street pattern consists of a road for motorized vehicles, a cycle lane (in some cases), pavement for pedestrians, parking and a range of crucial signage to facilitate navigation and make mobility more secure. However, this type of street organization may not be desirable in certain areas, more specifically, in the city centers. Downtown areas have always been places where economic, leisure, social and other types of facilities are concentrated, not surprisingly, they often attract large number of people and this frequently results in traffic jams, air and noise pollution, thus creating unpleasant environment. Besides, excessive traffic signage in central locations can harm the image and perception of a place, this relates in particular to historical centers with architectural heritage.

Is there space to build one more transshipment terminal within Portuguese territory?

NSBE - UNL

Structural transformation in the product space: Patterns and implications

Product fundamentals are essential in explaining heterogeneity in the product space. The scope for adapting and transferring capabilities into the production of different goods determines the speed and intensity of the structural transformation process and entails dissimilar development opportunities for nations. Future specialization patterns become then partly determined by the current network of products’ relatedness. Building on previous literature, this paper explicitly compares methodological concepts of product connectivity to conclude in favor of the density measure we propose combined with the Revealed Relatedness Index (RRI) approach presented by Freitas and Salvado (2011). Overall, RRI specifications displayed more consistent behavior when different time horizons are equated.

Fractional state space analysis of economic systems

This paper examines modern economic growth according to the multidimensional scaling (MDS) method and state space portrait (SSP) analysis. Electing GDP per capita as the main indicator for economic growth and prosperity, the long-run perspective from 1870 to 2010 identifies the main similarities among 34 world partners’ modern economic growth and exemplifies the historical waving mechanics of the largest world economy, the USA. MDS reveals two main clusters among the European countries and their old offshore territories, and SSP identifies the Great Depression as a mild challenge to the American global performance, when compared to the Second World War and the 2008 crisis.

Controlo remoto de um robô com recurso ao sistema Android

A interação homem-máquina é muitas vezes um processo excessivamente artificial. Para o homem constitui um desafio permanente a otimização dessa interação capaz de controlar a máquina de modo mais eficiente através de uma maior simplicidade de procedimentos. Este estudo sugere uma forma facilitadora desse controlo. Neste caso, pretende-se controlar um robô por meio de tele-operação, sem contacto visual direto. Um robô incorporando uma câmara é controlado através de um smartphone, que para tal, irá exibir na sua interface a visão do robô e um painel tátil para o controlar. No que diz respeito ao controlo, foram desenvolvidos dois modos de condução, um manual e outro com a velocidade assistida, recorrendo à lei de potência 2/3. Deste modo, deseja-se mostrar que o modo de condução de velocidade assistida facilita a condução ao homem. Com essa finalidade, foi implementado um sistema assente na construção de um robô e no desenvolvimento de uma aplicação Android para controlo do mesmo. Com recurso a este sistema, foi elaborada uma experiência, da qual foram recolhidos dados a fim de testar a hipótese que um robô que implementa leis biológicas no seu modo de funcionamento, facilita a interação homem-máquina.

The value creation radar applied to the space engineering sector

This case study illustrates the application of the Value Creation Radar (VCR) to SenSyF, an Earth Observation (EO) system which was developed by Deimos Engenharia S.A. (DME), the Portuguese affiliate of Elecnor Deimos. It describes how a team of consultants adopted the VCR in order to find new market applications for SenSyF, selected the one with the highest potential, and defined a path to guarantee a sustainable market launch. This case study highlights the main challenges of bringing a technology-driven company closer to the market in the pursuit of long-term sustainability, while not compromising its technological capabilities