Optical disc design and design software development

Master'sMASTER OF ENGINEERIN

Estimating Credit Risk Premia

This paper investigates the nature of the credit risk premium adjust-ments in the Jarrow-Lando-Turnbull model of credit risk spreads. The adjustments relate the equivalent martingale measures to the empirical measures of unconditional transition probabilities. We provide a modified version of the risk adjustment that allows a linear partition of the credit spread into an unconditional default component, a recovery component, and the risk premium adjustment. The risk adjustments are related to conditional default risk, illiquidity risk, and other factors not related to recovery effects. The log-transform of these risk adjustments can be spec-ified as linear regressions on a set of macroeconomic variables. Some new insights are gained pertaining to these conditional risks such as a typical upward sloping term structure and sensitivity to short-term Treasury rates and increasing forward rates. The conditional risks appear to be insensitive to market returns

Battle damage assessment using inverse synthetic aperture radar (ISAR)

An imaging radar, like ISAR, offers a combatant the capability to perform long range surveillance with high quality imagery for positive target identification. Extending this attractive feature to the battle damage assessment problem (BDA) gives the operator instant viewing of the target's behavior when it is hit. As a consequence, immediate and decisive action can be quickly taken (if required). However, the conventional Fourier processing adopted by most ISAR systems does not provide adequate time resolution to capture the target's dynamic responses during the hit. As a result, the radar image becomes distorted. To improve the time resolution, time-frequency transform (TFT) methods of ISAR imaging have been proposed. Unlike traditional Fourier-based processing, TFT's allows variable time resolution of the entire event that falls within the ISAR coherent integration period to be extracted as part of the imaging process. We have shown in this thesis that the use of linear Short Time-Frequency Transforms allows the translational response of the aircraft caused by a blast force to be clearly extracted. The TFT extracted images not only tell us how the aircraft responds to a blast effect but also provides additional information about the cause of image distortion in the traditional ISAR display.http://archive.org/details/battledamagesses109451223Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited