VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Essays on applied industrial organisation
Keywords: supermarket
collusion
demand estimation
hotel quality choice
agglomeration effects
milk market

The first chapter uses the conduct parameter approach to evaluate the sources of market power enjoyed by UK supermarkets from 1994-2006. During this period, the households rapidly shifted their purchase of fresh liquid milk from the milkmen to the supermarkets. At the same time, the supermarkets’ margin grew from negative to over 25 percent. The conduct parameter is used to investigate the sources of such market power. The analysis accounts for the change in consumers’ demand pattern, and uses direct measures of the marginal costs. My results suggest that the increase in the supermarkets’ margin was explained mainly by a significant decline in the price elasticity of demand for supermarket milk and, to a lesser extent, an increase in the market concentration. I do not find sufficient evident to support any significant improvement of collusion.
Chapter two further investigates collusion by accounting for different vertical arrangements. In 2007, the major dairy processors and retailers admitted to the UK competition commission that they were involved in anti-competitive practices, such as exchanging commercially-sensitive information. This chapter assesses the outcome of such anti-competitive behaviours. It generates a menu of outcomes under different vertical and horizontal competition scenarios. Then, it uses an encompassing test to find the scenario most consistent with the reality. The results suggest that the observed market prices are most consistent with two scenarios; 1) the perfectly competitive (Bertrand) manufacturers and noncooperative Cournot retailers under a linear vertical arrangement, and 2) the noncooperative Cournot retailers under a non-linear vertical contract with the manufacturers. Hence, I do not find sufficient evidence to support that the supermarkets achieved benefits beyond the static-noncoorporative level.
The final chapter investigates the agglomeration in quality-type among hotels in Texas. I adopt a discrete choice framework which allows for strategic interactions among firms. That is, a firm's decision could influence other firms' decisions, and vice-versa. After controlling for demand effects through area-specific variables and area-specific unobserved heterogeneity, the incentive to agglomerate in quality choice still exists. This suggests that hotels of the same quality type enjoy positive spillovers from the presence of one another.
Synthesis and characterization of inorganic nanomaterials for applications in energy storage and catalysis
Keywords: 2D MoS2 nanomaterials
organic coupling reaction
alkyne hydrogenation
Pd on support catalysis
Li-ion batteries
nanoparticles
solid acids
esterification reaction.
heterogeneous catalyst

Inorganic nanomaterials are defined as materials with one or more dimension within 1 – 100 nm range. These materials possess unique optical, electronic, thermo-physical, physicochemical and mechanical properties, and represent intensively explored, studied and sought-after commodities for a large variety of applications and manufacturing processes. Heterogeneous catalysts are vital for many industrial processes and often take advantage of the unique reactivity properties of nanomaterials, while battery electrode materials composed of nanomaterials are explored to solve current limitations with higher power densities via stable rapid ion and electron transport, and with high energy density via maximization of the charge storage capability. This thesis provides an insight into synthetic methods, detailed characterization and properties study, and exemplary applications of engineered 2D MoS2 nanomaterials in Li and Na ion batteries, palladium nanoparticles supported on 2D MoS2 nanosheets as heterogeneous catalysts in Suzuki and Heck C-C coupling and 1-pentyne hydrogenation reactions and sulphate functionalized titanium oxide nanoparticles as solid superacid catalysts in the esterification reaction of levulinic acid and pyruvaldehyde Cannizzaro reactions.
The Fourth Republic and the practicing of democracy in Brazil, 1930-1968
Keywords: Cold War
history of democracy
history
20th century
democratization
Brazil
polarization
World War II
democracy
political science
Interdisciplinary
Brasil

This thesis offers a study of the Fourth Republic (1945-64), its origins, the nature and functioning of its democratic institutions, and its demise during the Cold War within the wider context of the history of democracy in Brazil. It shows that the Fourth Republic was built upon historical legacies and a compromise of competing conceptualizations of democracy as forwarded by leading contemporary political actors. The latter are central to the developments analyzed here, as the thesis examines the extent to which the manifested beliefs and behaviors of leading political actors shaped, enhanced and undermined the process of democratization during the existence of this regime. While firmly grounded in the history discipline, it dialogues with key works from the social sciences, particularly in the identification of conceptual tools to guide the enquiry. Furthermore, the thesis places the Brazilian case in the global context, in an effort to expand the historical study of democracy into the neglected post-war period. This thesis is organized into three parts and six chronological chapters, preceded by an introduction. Part I traces the origins of the Fourth Republic starting with the 1930 Revolution until 1945. Part II looks at the creation and functioning of the Fourth Republic itself up until 1961. Finally, Part III examines the demise of the regime and the consolidation of the military dictatorship that was complete by 1968. I close the thesis with some concluding reflections.
Investigating the role of TLDc proteins in neuroprotection and disease-associated comorbidities
Keywords: anaemia
mammalian genetics
epilepsy
neuroprotection
endolysosomal pathway
neurotransmission
compound screening
molecular biology
oxidative stress
mouse genetics
neurodegeneration

The TLDc family of proteins is characterized by a conserved Tre2/Bub2/Cdc16 (TBC), lysin motif (LysM), domain catalytic (TLDc) domain. While the domain has been shown to protect against oxidative stress (OS), the mechanism of its protection and the distinct molecular functions of the TLDc family members are yet to be fully ascertained. In this thesis, the function and dysfunction of Tbc1d24 and Oxr1, two clinically important members of the TLDc family, are investigated.
Mutations in TBC1D24 are associated with a broad spectrum of neurological disorders, including epilepsy and the gene is implicated in synaptic transmission and neuronal development. Using knock-in mouse models, this thesis has studied the functional and physiological consequences of disruption in Tbc1d24, determining that loss-of-function mutations within Tbc1d24 result in a significant knock down of protein expression, ultimately resulting in seizures. Furthermore, a key interaction between Tbc1d24 and the V-ATPase has been confirmed, supporting a role for Tbc1d24 in the endolysosomal pathway. Unexpectedly, data from the new mouse models implicated Tbc1d24 in anaemia, revealing a novel role for the gene in the haematological system.
Oxr1 has been demonstrated to effectively protect against OS-induced cell death in neuronal cells, while overexpression of Oxr1 in vivo is able to delay neurodegeneration and neuroinflammation in mouse models of ALS. These findings support the promise of Oxr1 as a safe therapeutic target against OS-related neurodegeneration. This thesis has investigated the pharmacological induction of Oxr1 as a viable protective strategy, through generation of a stable cell line based on the highly conserved Oxr1 promoter element. Compound screening using this line has produced some early leads for exogenous upregulation of Oxr1. Furthermore, the in vivo genetic over-expression system was used to determine whether Oxr1 could functionally compensate for a loss-of-function Tbc1d24 mutation, shedding light on the lack of functional redundancy between TLDc family members.
This thesis addresses both the deleterious consequences of disruption, and the protective potential of overexpression of the TLDc family, combining new mouse genetic models with a range of molecular and cellular techniques. These studies have furthered understanding of the TLDc family and elucidated its therapeutic potential in protecting against OS and neurodegeneration.
An examination of certain counterpart accounts
Keywords: counterpart theory
modal logic

This work is closely tied to the metaphysical and formal work of David Lewis on modality. First, to Lewis’ reduction of modality in terms of his modal realism and mature counterpart machinery. Second, to Lewis’ 1968 formal account (and its subsequent developments) employing a notion of counterparthood, an account that is detachable from Lewis’ full-blooded metaphysics. This work is primarily an examination of both of these accounts, as well as five other formal accounts that, inspired by Lewis’ work, employ a notion of counterparthood.
The thesis divides into four chapters. The first chapter presents Lewis' reduction of modality in terms of his modal realism and mature counterpart machinery. It includes a presentation of an account that I take to be a straightforward regimentation of Lewis' sketch of joint possibilities in 1986.
The second chapter considers certain issues for this account. These concern existence, the combination of existence and iterated modality, and
contingent identity". The chapter ends with a discussion of alternatives to the machinery employed by the account.
The third chapter begins with a presentation and discussion of Lewis' 1968 formal account. That account employs formal machinery to deliver counterpart characterisations of natural language modal claims. First, Lewis presents a formal first-order theory, counterpart theory. Second, Lewis provides a method for translating natural language modal claims into sentences of the language of counterpart theory. This process has two steps. First, Lewis assumes a regimentation of natural language modal claims into sentences of
the language of quantified modal logic". Second, Lewis provides a translation scheme that maps sentences of this language of quantified modal logic to sentences of the language of counterpart theory.
This combination of (i) a theory and (ii) a translation scheme (that maps sentences of the language of quantified modal logic to sentences of the language of counterpart theory) generates a semantics for the language of quantified modal logic. Given this, I turn to a more foundational matter in the final part of the third chapter: comparing the usual direct model-theoretic approach and this indirect approach (presenting a theory and translation scheme) to presenting a semantics for a formal language.
The fourth chapter raises issues for five formal accounts in the literature that in some way appeal to a notion of counterparthood: Hazen's 1977 stipulational semantics; Russell's 2013 counterpart semantics; Bacon's 2014 counterpart semantics; Graff Fara's 2008 relative-sameness semantics; and Meyer's 2013 counterpart account.
Multi-resolution modelling of biomolecules
Keywords: systems biology
Langevin dynamics
molecular dynamics
Brownian motion
mathematical biology
computational biology
multi-resolution modelling

This work investigates how multi-resolution modelling can be applied to study biomolecules as a means to improve the efficiency of simulations. In practice, we resolve aspects of a model that are of greatest biological or physical interest in high detail, while describing the remainder more coarsely. We begin by taking a multi-resolution approach to solvent in simulations, replacing the forces a simple dimer model experiences in short-range and long-range heat baths with macroscopic Langevin and generalised Langevin models. The parameters for these stochastic models are determined analytically, or inferred from molecular dynamic simulation data via force and velocity correlation statistics for comparison. Additionally, the solvent of each monomer in the dimer are also modelled with different level of resolution, with these methodologies used to investigate the effect of a shared heat bath versus two uncoupled heat baths, one for each monomer. Attention is then turned to models of a target molecule, with a multi-resolution methodology for modelling F-actin filaments presented. It provides detailed microscopic information at the level of individual monomers at a lower computational cost by replacing the monomer-based model in parts of the simulated filament by a rod-based Cosserat description. In the monomer-based description G-actin is represented by ellipsoids bound at the surface in a double helical configuration to form F-actin. The rod-based model is coarser, in which F-actin is described using a Cosserat model. The multi-resolution methodology is illustrated using case studies, designed to test the properties of F-actin under stretching, bending, shearing and twisting.
Developing Year 10 History students’ written causal arguments through a focus on their conceptual understanding and self-regulation
Keywords: MLT 2020
MLT

This project evolved from a desire to improve students’ written causal arguments, whilst also improving their metacognition and self-regulation. Baseline data, collected from student essays, a talk-through protocol, and a survey, confirmed initial hypotheses that students had a limited understanding of causation, found constructing causal arguments in History challenging, and possessed limited self-regulatory skills and techniques. An action research model was followed, with three teaching interventions interspersed with analysis of students’ work. The first phase used ‘link diagrams’ to cultivate an understanding of causation as ‘web-like’; the second used ‘circle diagrams’ to focus students’ attention on the need to reach decisions about the relative importance of different causes and provide them with a planning tool to promote self-regulation; and the third targeted the use of causation-specific language. Analysis of students’ work following each intervention and comparison with both the baseline data and the views of non-intervention class (used as a form of control group) indicated that the interventions had a positive impact, particularly on student understanding of causation. This was confirmed by a final round of data collection and analysis, using the same three sources as for the baseline. Whilst promising progress was made by most students in terms of their causal understanding and written arguments, and by some in terms of their self-regulation, further refinements to the three teaching interventions are needed in future years.
The Hadith of ʿĀʾišah’s Marital Age: a study in the evolution of early Islamic historical memory
Keywords: Isnad-Cum-Matn Analysis
Hadith
common link
Isnad
Aisha
Matn

This DPhil thesis explores the origins and development of one of the most famous traditions within the Islamic Hadith corpus: the hadith of ʿĀʾišah bt. ʾabī Bakr’s marriage to the Prophet at a young age. To this end, I surveyed all of the modern literature pertaining to the great debate over whether—or to what extent—we can date hadiths and their content, culminating in a defence of a specific—rigorous and systematic—version of the ʾisnād-cum-matn analysis. Thereafter, I collated every available version of every hadith pertaining to this topic and subjected them all to an ʾisnād-cum-matn analysis, which allowed me to reconstruct the underlying urtexts or redactions of various earlier tradents (mostly operating from the mid-to-late 8th Century CE), known as “common links”. I then subjected these common-link redactions to various form-critical, geographical, and historical-critical analyses, which produced a striking conclusion: all versions of the marital-age hadith likely derive a single archetype or ur-hadith. This ur-hadith appears to have been created and disseminated by the Madinan tradent Hišām b. ʿUrwah b. al-Zubayr (d. 146-147/763-765) after he moved to Iraq towards the end of his life, probably as a reaction to local proto-Šīʿī polemics against his great-aunt, ʿĀʾišah. Following on from this, I traced the spread and diversification of the hadith across the early Abbasid Caliphate, including the way in which some Hadith scholars reworked its content and/or replaced the original isnad with local and/or familial isnads, thereby naturalising it in their respective regions. Thereafter, I explored the reception of the hadith by the proto-Sunnī Hadith critics, who rejected or criticised some versions, but accepted others, seemingly without a thorough or systematic investigation of their provenance and transmission. Finally, I explored the broader implications of all of this, including the ways in which my findings variously confirm or disconfirm the conclusions and predictions of other scholars, concerning the authenticity of the marital-age hadith in particular and the historical development of Hadith in general. In short, this thesis tracks the provenance and development of a famous and widespread hadith, from its genesis in the sectarian milieu of mid-8th-Century Iraq, to its spread and diversification across the early Abbasid Caliphate, to its canonisation at the hands of the proto-Sunnī Hadith critics.
The economics of industrial cyberespionage
Keywords: inventions
strategic network formation
panel data
conflict
firm strategy
innovation
network defence
cyber crime
cyber secuirty

Industrial cyberespionage is a widespread phenomenon that costs the global economy up to $6 trillion annually. It influences how we invest in innovation, store data, and create laws, and ultimately the welfare of society. Yet, it has received limited attention from the economics community. This thesis contributes to the emerging interdisciplinary field of economics of information security, bringing an economic perspective to the matter and considering industrial cyberespionage from three different angles.
The first chapter examines a dynamic R&D race in which competitors can conduct cyberespionage against each other. We develop a framework that analyses the influence of cyberespionage on innovative incentives, companies' payoffs and the quality of the end product. We demonstrate that industrial espionage has an ambiguous influence on the overall investments exerted in the race and companies' expected payoffs and might even be beneficial for the quality of innovative end-products under certain circumstances.
The second chapter provides new empirical evidence that research-intensive industries are particularly susceptible to information leakage attacks. Based on Eurostat aggregated data on enterprises' innovative and digital activity, we construct a tailored data set that allows us to achieve robust statistical inference and study the relationship between information leakage attack rate, research-intensity, and companies' data reliance. The study uses multivariate fractional regression analysis to distinguish two industry-specific associations: high-tech manufacturing industries are prone to experience targeted attacks, while knowledge-intensive service companies are more likely to fall victim to opportunistic attacks.
The third chapter aims to understand efficient network formation and optimal defensive resource distribution in the presence of an intelligent attacker. We present a two-player dynamic framework in which the Defender and the Attacker compete in a network formation and defence game with heterogeneous vertices' values. Such a model allows for studying the trade-off between network efficiency and security. Contrary to the literature, we find that a centrally protected star network does not yield the maximum payoff for the defending side in most circumstances, even being the most secure network formation. Additionally, it reveals a new type of network that often arises in an equilibrium of the games with limited defensive resources---a maxi-core network.
Neural networks as data
Keywords: implicit neural representations
generative models
neural compression
neural networks

In machine learning, neural networks are typically treated as models to be used for various tasks such as classification, regression or generative modeling. In this thesis, we take a different perspective and treat neural networks as data instead of models.
Indeed, in deep learning, data is often represented by arrays, such as a 2D grid of pixels for images. However, the underlying signal represented by these arrays is often continuous, such as the scene depicted in an image. A powerful continuous alternative to discrete arrays is then to represent such signals with an implicit neural representation (INR), a neural network trained to output the appropriate signal value for any input spatial location. An image for example, can be parameterized by a neural network mapping pixel locations to RGB values. In this thesis, we investigate the consequences and compelling properties of using such neural networks as data. We motivate and explore this approach through two main applications: compression, where we store data as neural networks, and generative modeling, where we train generative models directly on datasets of neural networks.
For data compression, we propose to store the quantized weights of an INR as a compressed code for a given signal (such as an image), instead of directly compressing the discretized signal. We show how this allows us to build a single neural codec that is seamlessly applicable to multiple data modalities, from images and audio to medical and climate data. For generative modeling, we propose to learn distributions of INRs, either implicitly by training on array data or explicitly by directly training models on datasets of INRs. We demonstrate how such an approach leads to compelling algorithms for a range of machine learning tasks, including 3D shape inference and generative modeling of neural radiance fields.