Discrete Models of Time-Fractional Diffusion in a Potential Well

Mathematics Subject Classification: 26A33, 45K05, 60J60, 60G50, 65N06, 80-99.

A Note on Multipliers for Integrable Boehmians

2000 Mathematics Subject Classification: 44A40, 42A38, 46F05

Robust Parametric Estimation of Branching Processes with a Random Number of Ancestors

2000 Mathematics Subject Classification: 60J80.

Functional Transfer Theorems for Maxima of Stationary Processes

2000 Mathematics Subject Classification: 60G70, 60F12, 60G10.

Parametric Estimation in Branching Processes with an Increasing Random Number of Ancestors

2000 Mathematics Subject Classification: 60J80, 62M05

Dynamical Resonances and SSF Singularities for a Magnetic Schrödinger Operator

We consider the Hamiltonian H of a 3D spinless non-relativistic quantum particle subject to parallel constant magnetic and non-constant electric field. The operator H has infinitely many eigenvalues of infinite multiplicity embedded in its continuous spectrum. We perturb H by appropriate scalar potentials V and investigate the transformation of these embedded eigenvalues into resonances. First, we assume that the electric potentials are dilation-analytic with respect to the variable along the magnetic field, and obtain an asymptotic expansion of the resonances as the coupling constant ϰ of the perturbation tends to zero. Further, under the assumption that the Fermi Golden Rule holds true, we deduce estimates for the time evolution of the resonance states with and without analyticity assumptions; in the second case we obtain these results as a corollary of suitable Mourre estimates and a recent article of Cattaneo, Graf and Hunziker [11]. Next, we describe sets of perturbations V for which the Fermi Golden Rule is valid at each embedded eigenvalue of H; these sets turn out to be dense in various suitable topologies. Finally, we assume that V decays fast enough at infinity and is of definite sign, introduce the Krein spectral shift function for the operator pair (H+V, H), and study its singularities at the energies which coincide with eigenvalues of infinite multiplicity of the unperturbed operator H.

Time-varying airy pulses

Pulses in the form of the Airy function as solutions to an equation similar to the Schrodinger equation but with opposite roles of the time and space variables are derived. The pulses are generated by an Airy time varying field at a source point and propagate in vacuum preserving their shape and magnitude. The pulse motion is decelerating according to a quadratic law. Its velocity changes from infinity at the source point to zero in infinity. These one dimensional results are extended to the 3D+time case for a similar Airy-Bessel pulse with the same behaviour, the non-diffractive preservation and the deceleration. This pulse is excited by the field at a plane aperture perpendicular to the direction of the pulse propagation. © 2011 IEEE.

Decelerating Airy pulses

It is shown that an electromagnetic wave equation in time domain is reduced in paraxial approximation to an equation similar to the Schrodinger equation but in which the time and space variables play opposite roles. This equation has solutions in form of time-varying pulses with the Airy function as an envelope. The pulses are generated by a source point with an Airy time varying field and propagate in vacuum preserving their shape and magnitude. The motion is according to a quadratic law with the velocity changing from infinity at the source point to zero in infinity. These one-dimensional results are extended to the 3D+time case when a similar Airy-Bessel pulse is excited by the field at a plane aperture. The same behaviour of the pulses, the non-diffractive preservation and their deceleration, is found. © 2011 IEEE.

On the implementation of the L-Nash bargaining solution in two-person bargaining games

The “Nash program” initiated by Nash (Econometrica 21:128–140, 1953) is a research agenda aiming at representing every axiomatically determined cooperative solution to a game as a Nash outcome of a reasonable noncooperative bargaining game. The L-Nash solution first defined by Forgó (Interactive Decisions. Lecture Notes in Economics and Mathematical Systems, vol 229. Springer, Berlin, pp 1–15, 1983) is obtained as the limiting point of the Nash bargaining solution when the disagreement point goes to negative infinity in a fixed direction. In Forgó and Szidarovszky (Eur J Oper Res 147:108–116, 2003), the L-Nash solution was related to the solution of multiciteria decision making and two different axiomatizations of the L-Nash solution were also given in this context. In this paper, finite bounds are established for the penalty of disagreement in certain special two-person bargaining problems, making it possible to apply all the implementation models designed for Nash bargaining problems with a finite disagreement point to obtain the L-Nash solution as well. For another set of problems where this method does not work, a version of Rubinstein’s alternative offer game (Econometrica 50:97–109, 1982) is shown to asymptotically implement the L-Nash solution. If penalty is internalized as a decision variable of one of the players, then a modification of Howard’s game (J Econ Theory 56:142–159, 1992) also implements the L-Nash solution.

A Digital Signal Processing Approach for Affective Sensing of a Computer User through Pupil Diameter Monitoring

Recent research has indicated that the pupil diameter (PD) in humans varies with their affective states. However, this signal has not been fully investigated for affective sensing purposes in human-computer interaction systems. This may be due to the dominant separate effect of the pupillary light reflex (PLR), which shrinks the pupil when light intensity increases. In this dissertation, an adaptive interference canceller (AIC) system using the H∞ time-varying (HITV) adaptive algorithm was developed to minimize the impact of the PLR on the measured pupil diameter signal. The modified pupil diameter (MPD) signal, obtained from the AIC was expected to reflect primarily the pupillary affective responses (PAR) of the subject. Additional manipulations of the AIC output resulted in a processed MPD (PMPD) signal, from which a classification feature, PMPDmean, was extracted. This feature was used to train and test a support vector machine (SVM), for the identification of stress states in the subject from whom the pupil diameter signal was recorded, achieving an accuracy rate of 77.78%. The advantages of affective recognition through the PD signal were verified by comparatively investigating the classification of stress and relaxation states through features derived from the simultaneously recorded galvanic skin response (GSR) and blood volume pulse (BVP) signals, with and without the PD feature. The discriminating potential of each individual feature extracted from GSR, BVP and PD was studied by analysis of its receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve. The ROC curve found for the PMPDmean feature encompassed the largest area (0.8546) of all the single-feature ROCs investigated. The encouraging results seen in affective sensing based on pupil diameter monitoring were obtained in spite of intermittent illumination increases purposely introduced during the experiments. Therefore, these results confirmed the benefits of using the AIC implementation with the HITV adaptive algorithm to isolate the PAR and the potential of using PD monitoring to sense the evolving affective states of a computer user.

Ser-tão de Buriti: o corpo de noturno rumor (a poética de Guimarães Rosa e o pensamento literário contemporâneo)

This thesis is to analyze the fictional texture of Buriti, novella by Guimarães Rosa, which makes part of Corpo do Baile. Gilles Deleuze‘s philosophical background as well as similar theorists such as Mircea Eliade, Derrida, Bataille, Foucault, Blanchot and Nie-tzsche constitute the main reference, as example of Guimarães Rosa‘s problematizing writing, since they present as basic element of thought the desterritorialization of con-cepts, standards and institutionalized knowledge by the dominant literary language. Along with the theoretical perspective of current alterity on these authors, Buriti is crossed by one aesthetics substantiated with a multiplicity of narrative points of view, opening gaps to other non-sacralized, nomadic voices, using polyphony as a way of breaking and destabilizing crystallized truths related to the canons of mother tongue. Interwoven by a poetic side of transgression, the narrative of Buriti finds especially marked by the signs of the backlands and of the night, which rhizomatically point to a sense of infinity, eternity, loneliness, vertigo before the abyssal, evoking the singularity of a ser-tão before the night, "the body of nocturnal rumor." The nights in the backlands in Buriti give rise to the emergence of a state of subjectivity, the ser-tão, whose nature is shown as a space of communion of the various beings that humans put on the same level of other living beings, setting up a sharing cosmic territory, enjoyment between pain and pleasure, between death and life. It is the night in the darkness, the shadows, the ser-tão is exposed, the being in his depth, facing himself with his internal rumors, which project themselves through the noise, the sound amplified by the vastness of the night at the desert backlands. "The backlands is the night." (ROSA, 1988, p.92).

Ser-tão de Buriti: o corpo de noturno rumor (a poética de Guimarães Rosa e o pensamento literário contemporâneo)

This thesis is to analyze the fictional texture of Buriti, novella by Guimarães Rosa, which makes part of Corpo do Baile. Gilles Deleuze‘s philosophical background as well as similar theorists such as Mircea Eliade, Derrida, Bataille, Foucault, Blanchot and Nie-tzsche constitute the main reference, as example of Guimarães Rosa‘s problematizing writing, since they present as basic element of thought the desterritorialization of con-cepts, standards and institutionalized knowledge by the dominant literary language. Along with the theoretical perspective of current alterity on these authors, Buriti is crossed by one aesthetics substantiated with a multiplicity of narrative points of view, opening gaps to other non-sacralized, nomadic voices, using polyphony as a way of breaking and destabilizing crystallized truths related to the canons of mother tongue. Interwoven by a poetic side of transgression, the narrative of Buriti finds especially marked by the signs of the backlands and of the night, which rhizomatically point to a sense of infinity, eternity, loneliness, vertigo before the abyssal, evoking the singularity of a ser-tão before the night, "the body of nocturnal rumor." The nights in the backlands in Buriti give rise to the emergence of a state of subjectivity, the ser-tão, whose nature is shown as a space of communion of the various beings that humans put on the same level of other living beings, setting up a sharing cosmic territory, enjoyment between pain and pleasure, between death and life. It is the night in the darkness, the shadows, the ser-tão is exposed, the being in his depth, facing himself with his internal rumors, which project themselves through the noise, the sound amplified by the vastness of the night at the desert backlands. "The backlands is the night." (ROSA, 1988, p.92).

Mean field evolution in an open quantum system

In this thesis, we consider N quantum particles coupled to collective thermal quantum environments. The coupling is energy conserving and scaled in the mean field way. There is no direct interaction between the particles, they only interact via the common reservoir. It is well known that an initially disentangled state of the N particles will remain disentangled at times in the limit N -> [infinity]. In this thesis, we evaluate the η-body reduced density matrix (tracing over the reservoirs and the N - η remaining particles). We identify the main disentangled part of the reduced density matrix and obtain the first order correction term in 1/N. We show that this correction term is entangled. We also estimate the speed of convergence of the reduced density matrix as N -> [infinity]. Our model is exactly solvable and it is not based on numerical approximation.

A docência na educação superior: narrativas das diferenças políticas de sujeitos surdos

Deaf teachers presence at superior education triggers a series of reactions due to cultural differences. They feel the discomfort. The cultural difference defies the established power relations. From that emerge the trading spaces with their constant shocks about problems that affect the deaf teacher participation. The thesis goes through practice, resistance, resilience and political thinking of the deaf teacher at the Superior Education. Authors like: Foucault (2004), Hall (2009), Bhabha (1998), Touraine (2009) and Veiga-Netto (2010) underlie the concept of power relations that permeate this study. Perlin (2003); Ladd (2002) subsidize with the cultural focus. The investigation came from the question: How deaf teachers make their political stands in power relations established to the construction of their narratives at Superior Education? It had the goal of identify and chart the deaf teachers narratives at Superior Education. Leaving from the interview-narrative qualitative approach it was constituted a corpus with the collected narratives. These narratives were identified in order to achieve a thematic map express in the last chapter where the constant facts of the trading spaces of Superior Education shocks unfolds. The results point to an infinity of debates. The deaf teachers do not only present initial conditions of distress, doubt and difficulty at Superior Education, but also the disposition to discuss more the everyday power chains, waged by trading spaces. The identification of the narratives was vitally important to confirm the value of cultural and linguistic recognition as strategy for new politics to the structural power relations at the university context.

Three Essays on Extremal Quantiles

Extremal quantile index is a concept that the quantile index will drift to zero (or one)

as the sample size increases. The three chapters of my dissertation consists of three

applications of this concept in three distinct econometric problems. In Chapter 2, I

use the concept of extremal quantile index to derive new asymptotic properties and

inference method for quantile treatment effect estimators when the quantile index

of interest is close to zero. In Chapter 3, I rely on the concept of extremal quantile

index to achieve identification at infinity of the sample selection models and propose

a new inference method. Last, in Chapter 4, I use the concept of extremal quantile

index to define an asymptotic trimming scheme which can be used to control the

convergence rate of the estimator of the intercept of binary response models.