Search results for "forecasting"

Current trends in biocompatibility testing

1998

Biocompatibility remains the central theme for biomaterials applications in medicine. It is generally accepted that this term means not only absence of a cytotoxic effect but also positive effects in the sense of biofunctionality, i.e. promotion of biological processes which further the intended aim of the application of a biomaterial. The national and international standards for testing regimes represent a lowest common denominator for such applications and do not necessarily ensure that optimal function will be achieved. The authors' thesis is that biocompatibility testing has scope for extensive development with respect to biofunctionality. The present paper reviews current trends in the…

Commentary: Circulating cytokines and risk stratification of stroke incidence--will we do better in future?

2008

Macroeconomic Modelling in EMU: How Relevant is the Change in Regime?

2007

We analyse the likely effects of changes in the monetary and financial regimes of EMU countries on the dynamics of output and inflation. In particular, we evaluate the impact of the regime shift on the forecasting performance of reduced-form models. Data for both the pre-EMU and the EMU regimes are generated by a relatively standard open-economy-DSGE model with sticky prices and wages and restricted access to financial markets for some individuals. We find that the effects of the shift in the monetary regime on the processes followed by macroeconomic variables depend on the nature of the shocks hitting the economy. For plausible shocks distributions the reduction in the accuracy of VAR-base…

Modelling and forecasting mortality in Spain

2008

[EN] Experience shows that static life tables overestimate death probabilities. As a consequence of this overestimation the premiums for annuities, pensions and life insurance are not what they actually should be, with negative effects for insurance companies or policy-holders. The reason for this overestimation is that static life tables, through being computed for a specific period of time, cannot take into account the decreasing mortality trend over time. Dynamic life tables overcome this problem by incorporating the influence of the calendar when graduating mortality. Recent papers on the topic look for the development of new methods to deal with this dynamism. Most methods used in dyna…

Optimizing the level of service quality of a bike-sharing system

2016

Public bike-sharing programs have been deployed in hundreds of cities worldwide, improving mobility in a socially equitable and environmentally sustainable way. However, the quality of the service is drastically affected by imbalances in the distribution of bicycles among stations. We address this problem in two stages. First, we estimate the unsatisfied demand (lack of free lockers or lack of bicycles) at each station for a given time period in the future and for each possible number of bicycles at the beginning of the period. In a second stage, we use these estimates to guide our redistribution algorithms. Computational results using real data from the bike-sharing system in Palma de Mall…

Does the interaction between the accounting method choice and disclosure affect financial analysts’ information environment? The case of joint ventur…

2017

IAS 31 allowed firms to choose between proportionate consolidation and the equity method to record joint ventures in the consolidated accounts of the venturer. Moreover, this election implied a decision about including information in the primary financial statements or in the notes. This paper investigates if financial analysts perceive accounting information differently depending on the method chosen conditioned to the disclosure of the required information in the notes. We analysed a sample of Spanish firms during 2005–2010. We not only considered earnings forecasts, but also examined target prices and stock recommendations. Furthemore, we look at how this accounting choice affects analys…

Tension in the data environment: How organisations can meet the challenge

2022

Big Data is becoming ubiquitous - widely applied across organisations, industry sectors and society. However, the opportunities and risks it presents are not yet fully understood. In this paper we identify and explore the tensions that Big Data can create at multiple levels, focusing on the need for organisations to meet the challenges that can arise. We draw on insights from twelve papers published in the Special Issue of Technological Forecasting & Social Change entitled “Tension in the Data Environment: Can Organisations Meet the Challenge?” in order to build a ‘Multi-Layer Tensions Model’ that highlights key pressures and challenges in the BD environment. We find evidence of tensions of…

Large eddy simulation of inertial particles dispersion in a turbulent gas-particle channel flow bounded by rough walls

2020

The purpose of this paper is to understand the capability and consistency of large eddy simulation (LES) in Eulerian–Lagrangian studies aimed at predicting inertial particle dispersion in turbulent wall-bounded flows, in the absence of ad hoc closure models in the Lagrangian equations of particle motion. The degree of improvement granted by LES models is object of debate, in terms of both accurate prediction of particle accumulation and local particle segregation; therefore, we assessed the accuracy in the prediction of the particle velocity statistics by comparison against direct numerical simulation (DNS) of a finer computational mesh, under both one-way and two-way coupling regimes. We p…

Simulation of surface energy fluxes and meteorological variables using the Regional Atmospheric Modeling System (RAMS): Evaluating the impact of land…

2018

Atmospheric mesoscale numerical models are commonly used not only for research and air quality studies, but also for other related applications, such as short-term weather forecasting for atmospheric, hydrological, agricultural and ecological modelling. A key element to produce faithful simulations is the proper representation of the soil parameters used in the initialization of the corresponding mesoscale numerical model. The Regional Atmospheric Modeling System (RAMS) is used in the current study. The model code has been updated in order to permit the model to be initialized using a heterogeneous soil moisture and temperature distribution derived from land surface models. Particularly, RA…

Dynamics of the Shapovalov mid-size firm model

2020

Forecasting and analyses of the dynamics of financial and economic processes such as deviations of macroeconomic aggregates (GDP, unemployment, and inflation) from their long-term trends, asset markets volatility, etc., are challenging because of the complexity of these processes. Important related research questions include, first, how to determine the qualitative properties of the dynamics of these processes, namely, whether the process is stable, unstable, chaotic (deterministic), or stochastic; and second, how best to estimate its quantitative indicators including dimension, entropy, and correlation characteristics. These questions can be studied both empirically and theoretically. In t…