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© 2015 IEEE.Model-driven engineering (MDE) often features quality assurance (QA) techniques to help developers creating software that meets reliability, efficiency, and safety requirements. In this paper, we consider the question of how quality-aware MDE should support data-intensive software systems. This is a difficult challenge, since existing models and QA techniques largely ignore properties of data such as volumes, velocities, or data location. Furthermore, QA requires the ability to characterize the behavior of technologies such as Hadoop/MapReduce, NoSQL, and stream-based processing, which are poorly understood from a modeling standpoint. To foster a community response to these challenges, we present the research agenda of DICE, a quality-aware MDE methodology for data-intensive cloud applications. DICE aims at developing a quality engineering tool chain offering simulation, verification, and architectural optimization for Big Data applications. We overview some key challenges involved in developing these tools and the underpinning models.

Se presentan 12 casos de traumatismos hepáticos, sobre un total de 102 traumatismos abdominales, tratados en el Hospital Municipal de Morón, provincia de Buenos Aires, República Argentina, comprendidos en el período que va desde enero de 1989 a diciembre de 1992. Hemos utilizado la clasificación de Moore de lesiones hepáticas para su ordenamiento. Del total de los traumatismos hepáticos, 75% fueron abiertos y de éstos 80% se produjeron por arma de fuego. El mayor porcentaje de heridas se vio en el sexo masculino y el grupo etario predominante correspondió al rango que va de los 20 a 29 y de 30 a 39 años. La vía de abordaje predominante fue la mediana supra-infraumbilical y la simultaneidad de los segmentos hepáticos 11-111 fueron los más lesionados. Se explican las tácticas quirúrgicas y las lesiones asociadas. Se encontraron complicaciones, de mayor o menor importancia en 75% de los casos. La mortalidad fue de 16, 66%.

Validation of earlier predictions is a challenging but significant contribution to ecological research. The present study tests the predications made 10 years ago by Dahdouh-Guebas et al. (2000) on the evolution of mangrove forest in Galle-Unawatuna, Sri Lanka. The ground inventory carried out in five Sectors covering the entire forest (Point Centred Quarter Method - PCQM) (Cintron and Schaeffer Novelli, 1984) revealed that the adult species composition is dominated by Rhizophora apiculata, Excoecaria agallocha, Bruguiera gymnorrhiza and B. sexangula, with their total density of 216-267 stems 0.1ha-1 and basal area 1.19-1.44m2 0.1ha-1. However, both young and juvenile vegetation in the most Sectors was dominated solely by B. gymnorrhiza (128-869 stems and 356-1482 propagules 0.1ha-1). According to Dahdouh-Guebas et al. (2000), the transition of an E. agallocha forest into a B. gymnorrhiza dominated one or at least their co-dominance in the Sectors 1 and 2 is possible, whereas Sector 3 being dominated by adult and juvenile R. apiculata will persist. Overall, the possible transition to a Bruguiera dominated forest in Galle-Unawatuna area was forecasted. The recent decadal changes between 1994 and 2004 through the integration of IKONOS satellite imagery of 2004 with ground-truth information confirmed many of the predictions and showed dynamic shifts in young/adult vegetation by B. gymnorrhiza. Both E. agallocha and R. apiculata continue to be dominant in Sectors 2 and 3, although the adult turnover by B. gymnorrhiza has not yet occurred, probably due to the small time interval between the two investigations. Confirming in part with the earlier prediction on R. apiculata in Sector 3, present study also revealed the abundance of B. gymnorrhiza as young and juvenile vegetation. Viewing the present dynamic shifts and sheer dominance as young vegetation by B. gymnorrhiza with a mean height of 5.8m in most Sectors, it is still possible to anticipate the mangroves being dominated by this species, and actually now validates the predictions made 10 years ago. Because of apparent changes in the mangrove vegetation structure, it could be concluded that the ‘moving mosaic’ pattern of mangrove species distribution reported earlier for Galle-Unawatuna still persists.

Since the 1970s, there has been an exponential increase in the number of shrimp farms in tropical coastal areas. Shrimp pond construction took place on a wide scale at the expense of mangroves. Through the outbreak of diseases and a fluctuating export trade, many farms were abandoned only 5 to 10 years after construction. In this study we focus on the challenges for the abandoned shrimp farms in Chilaw Lagoon (Sri Lanka).A land-use change analysis - based on remote sensing and fieldwork - in Chilaw Lagoon showed that the mangrove area declined with 57% due to the construction of shrimp ponds. In August 2006, 75% of the shrimp farms were abandoned. There is reportedly less fish in the lagoon. Together with better management practices in the shrimp farms, re-conversion of the abandoned ponds to mangroves will encounter the mangrove loss, increase the sustainability of shrimp farming and to restore part of the lagoon fish stock because of the ecosystem functions that mangroves fulfill.Because the abandoned shrimp ponds are excluded from the brackish lagoon, terrestrial vegetation is encroaching. On the field, we saw that mangrove vegetation is not spontaneously recovering. The first management practice to make mangrove restoration possible is to breach the dykes to reintegrate ponds in the hydrology of the brackish lagoon system. As a result of our study, we could define the most suitable ponds for mangrove restoration.

This research deals mainly with the changes in land cover and their impact on the environment (the soil, the infiltration and drainage of water, evapotranspiration, flora and fauna) in and around Chilaw Lagoon, a Sri Lankan mangrove site. This requires research on the space-time dynamics in soil use and land cover to estimate and predict the human influences on the ecological changes. It examines how the fishing and the shrimp farms can (co-)exist on a sustainable manner in particular. A tool getting more and more crucial in the detection, description, quantification and observance of changes in the landscape and land use, is remote sensing (e.g. Dahdouh-Guebas et al., 2005a). In combination with geographical information systems (GIS) and field work, this is an effective management tool, particularly useful in the detection of ecological degradation (Dahdouh-Guebas et al., 2005b). It is very important to detect cryptic ecological degradation to mitigate loss of ecological functions, such as the protection function of mangroves (Dahdouh-Guebas et al., 2005c; Dahdouh-Guebas and Koedam, 2006). In addition, mangroves function as a source for timber and non-timber forest products for subsistence users, and as a nursery for numerous marine species (Ewel et al., 1998). Our research implements the following activities: (1) Characterisation of the actual land cover by means of remote sensing (Ikonos images) before the field work; (2) Verification on the field of the results of the image classification: land cover, land use, habitats, vegetation assemblages, individual species; (3) Field work on the vegetation structure; (4) Evaluation of the perception of the local population concerning the actual situation of the wood and fishery resources and in particular the cultivation of shrimps; and (5) By analysis of the image processing, the ecological footprint of the shrimp farms and the fishery, a calculation will be attempted of the area of the mangrove forests that are needed for a sustainable management of the shrimp farms and of the mangrove forests. There appears to be a conflict between the shrimp farms and the mangrove forests. One cuts down mangroves to build shrimp farms. But, on the other side shrimp farms cannot survive without mangroves because the gravid females used for stocking the shrimp ponds are dependent on the mangroves. A first expected result is an extensive classification of a very high Ikonos satellite image of Chilaw-Lagoon, with an interpretation key. This will give a good view on land cover and land use in the lagoon which will be used for land management. A second expected result is to give guidelines, based on the ecological footprint of shrimp farms, for reforestation of mangroves. And by this way to give a solution for the conflicts between adjacent land use. The research is ongoing, but this presentation discusses the state-of-the-art in the light of the above objectives and the expected results.

The main objectives of this experimental study relates to the study of vegetation structure dynamics; (1) it contributes to the scientific understanding concerning the hydrochorous dispersal o fpropagules, and (2) it attempts to predict possible shifts in mangrove assemblages under different 'Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC)' scenarios of sea level rise. Collected data was implemented in a Geographical Information System (GIS) to perform all spatial analyses required for this study. The main results show the suitability maps of a small area (0.1 ha) which indicate the areas that can be colonised by different species ofpropagules. Secondly, modelling of the different IPCC scenarios (whole bay) gave the overall trend of frontal regression in the seaward zones while the landward zones expand into the terrestrial habitats. When considering the maximum scenario, +88cm by the year 2100, the landward expansion is clearly hindered by a talud which the colonizing species can not cross. In this situation the more landward assemblages dominated by Avicennia will not survive unless they adapt to the replaced inundation class. The GIS analyses take into account the available information derived from the fieldwork, but alterations related to degradation and/or sea level changes (e.g. changes in topography, erosion patterns, golf action,...) are beyond the scope of this explorative study.

In February - March 2002 fieldwork was carried out in a classic zoned mangrove forest at Gazi Bay (Kenya) and included topographical measurements and a collection of the vegetation data in the work field, but also successive propagule counting along five line transects. The main objective of the present experimental study relates to the study of vegetation structure dynamics and contributes to an overall view on where propagules can establish from the moment they detach themselves from their parental tree. The latter particularly concerns the juvenile vegetation layer of the species Rhizophora mucronata and Ceriops tagal. This part of the research framework gives the possibility to start working in a GIS environment and resolving several questions regarding the impact of degradation and sea level changes on the dispersal of propagules at the study area in question. The GIS-analyses take into account the available information derived from the fieldwork, but alternations that go hand in hand with degradation and/or sea level changes (e.g. changes in topography, erosion patterns, rates of sediment supply, golf action,…) are beyond the scope of this explorative study. The main findings that result from these analyses are that the study area at present has the potential to successfully rejuvenate and renew, although increasing anthropogenic pressures could have severe consequences on the dispersal of the propagules within this mangrove stand through the loss of aerial roots masses which were shown to provide stranding areas to propagules. Also, the hypothetical scenario that represents a minimum sea level rise of 4.8 mm.y-1 could alter the distribution pattern of the juvenile vegetation layer within a time span of 20 years, which could lead to notable floristic modifications from a regional point of view.