The history of disaster incidents and impact in Nepal 1900-2005: ecological, geographical, and development perspectives

The people of Nepal today are exposed to perennial local disaster events and profound vulnerability to disaster. The combined efforts of government, donors, UN agencies, NGOs, and Nepalese communities are needed to avert the impacts of disaster events. Much more can be done immediately to reduce the impacts by reviewing the scope and distribution of past disaster events. This article provides an overview of Nepal’s disaster vulnerability through an analysis of the record of disaster events that occurred from 1900 to 2005. The data were generated from historical archives and divided into incidents at the district, subnational, and national levels. Statistical and Geographical Information System (GIS) analyses were carried out to generate district level disaster vulnerability maps. It is concluded that small-scale, local disasters have a greater cumulative impact in terms of casualties than large-scale, national disasters

Generic meta-modelling with concepts, templates and mixin layers

The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-16145-2_2Proceedings of 13th International Conference, MODELS 2010, Oslo, Norway, October 3-8, 2010.Meta-modelling is a key technique in Model Driven Engineering, where it is used for language engineering and domain modelling. However, mainstream approaches like the OMG’s Meta-Object Facility provide little support for abstraction, modularity, reusability and extendibility of (meta-)models, behaviours and transformations. In order to alleviate this weakness, we bring three elements of generic programming into meta-modelling: concepts, templates and mixin layers. Concepts permit an additional typing for models, enabling the definition of behaviours and transformations independently of meta-models, making specifications reusable. Templates use concepts to express requirements on their generic parameters, and are applicable to models and meta-models. Finally, we define functional layers by means of meta-model mixins which can extend other meta-models. As a proof of concept we also report on MetaDepth, a multi-level meta-modelling framework that implements these ideas.Work sponsored by the Spanish Ministry of Science, project TIN2008-02081 and mobility grants JC2009-00015 and PR2009-0019, and by the R&D programme of the Community of Madrid, project S2009/TIC-165

NARRATIVE REVIEW: EFEKTIVITAS MCKENZIE EXERCISE TERHADAP FORWARD HEAD POSTURE PADA MAHASISWA PENGGUNA GADGET

Latar belakang : Forward Head Posture adalah salah satu jenis kelainan postural paling umum terjadi pada orang-orang dengan segala rentang usia, salah satunya pada dewasa dan remaja. Penyebabnya diakibatkan oleh penggunaan gadget yang lama. Mahasiswa adalah salah satu contoh yang sering menggunakan gadget dengan waktu yang lama. Forward head posture dapat menyebabkan kelehahan, nyeri leher, keterbatasan gerak leher dan perubahan postur. Salah satu cara untuk menangani keluhan forward head posture yaitu dengan pemberian metode McKenzie Exercise. Tujuan : Untuk mengetahui efektivitas dari pemberian metode McKenzie exercise terhadap forward head posture. Metode : Penelitian ini menggunakan metode narrative review dengan framework PICO (Population, Intervention, Comparison, Outcome). Selanjutnya Mengidentifikasi artikel yang berasal dari 2 database yang relevan, yaitu Google scholar dan PubMed sesuai dengan keywords yang telah ditentukan dan mengacu pada kriteria inklusi dan ekslusi. Kriteria inklusi pada penelitian ini adalah artikel free full text tentang mckenzie exercise pada penderita forward head posture yang dipublish tahun 2011-2021. Hasil: Hasil dari 12 jurnal yang telah direview membuktikan efektifitas mckenzie exercise dalam mengurangi nyeri leher akibat ketidakseimbangan kerja otot-otot daerah cervical, meningkatkan lingkup gerak sendi,adanya perubahan postur leher serta peningkatan sudut craniovertebra pada penderita forward head posture. Kesimpulan: Pemberian mckenzie exercise pada penderita forward head posture efektif dalam mengurangi nyeri leher daerah cervical, meningkatkan lingkup gerak sendi, terjadi perubahan postur leher serta peningkatan sudut craniovertebra.. Saran: Penelitian ini dapat dijadikan evidance based fisioterapi dalam menangani keluhan pada penderita forward head posture dengan menggunakan metode mckenzie exercise

Abstracting modelling languages: A reutilization approach

The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-31095-9_9Proceedings of 24th International Conference, CAiSE 2012, Gdansk, Poland, June 25-29, 2012Model-Driven Engineering automates the development of information systems. This approach is based on the use of Domain-Specific Modelling Languages (DSMLs) for the description of the relevant aspects of the systems to be built. The increasing complexity of the target systems has raised the need for abstraction techniques able to produce simpler versions of the models, but retaining certain properties of interest. However, developing such abstractions for each DSML from scratch is a time and resource consuming activity. Our solution to this situation is a number of techniques to build reusable abstractions that are defined once and can be reused over families of modelling languages sharing certain requirements. As a proof of concept, we present a catalogue of reusable abstractions, together with an implementation in the MetaDepth multi-level meta-modelling tool.Work funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitivity (TIN2011-24139), and the R&D programme of Madrid Region (S2009/TIC-1650)

Assessing architectural evolution: A case study

This is the post-print version of the Article. The official published can be accessed from the link below - Copyright @ 2011 SpringerThis paper proposes to use a historical perspective on generic laws, principles, and guidelines, like Lehman’s software evolution laws and Martin’s design principles, in order to achieve a multi-faceted process and structural assessment of a system’s architectural evolution. We present a simple structural model with associated historical metrics and visualizations that could form part of an architect’s dashboard. We perform such an assessment for the Eclipse SDK, as a case study of a large, complex, and long-lived system for which sustained effective architectural evolution is paramount. The twofold aim of checking generic principles on a well-know system is, on the one hand, to see whether there are certain lessons that could be learned for best practice of architectural evolution, and on the other hand to get more insights about the applicability of such principles. We find that while the Eclipse SDK does follow several of the laws and principles, there are some deviations, and we discuss areas of architectural improvement and limitations of the assessment approach

A Human TREK-1/HEK Cell Line: A Highly Efficient Screening Tool for Drug Development in Neurological Diseases

TREK-1 potassium channels are involved in a number of physiopathological processes such as neuroprotection, pain and depression. Molecules able to open or to block these channels can be clinically important. Having a cell model for screening such molecules is of particular interest. Here, we describe the development of the first available cell line that constituvely expresses the TREK-1 channel. The TREK-1 channel expressed by the h-TREK-1/HEK cell line has conserved all its modulation properties. It is opened by stretch, pH, polyunsaturated fatty acids and by the neuroprotective molecule, riluzole and it is blocked by spadin or fluoxetine. We also demonstrate that the h-TREK-1/HEK cell line is protected against ischemia by using the oxygen-glucose deprivation model