Geomorphological responses of rivers to active tectonics along the Siwalik Hills,Midwestern Nepalese Himalaya

The Nepalese Himalaya is well known for ongoing collisional tectonics, witnessed by major historical and recent earthquakes. The Siwalik Hills in Midwestern Nepalese Himalaya are bounded by eastwest trending Main Frontal Thrust(MFT) to the south and the Main Boundary Thrust(MBT) to the north. The area is dissected by numerous southwest to south-flowing bedrock rivers. This study investigates geomorphic metrics of these rivers to unravel landscape evolution and active tectonics of the Siwalik Hills. Digital Elevation Model(DEM) analysis was conducted to extract structural lineaments and longitudinal river profile and their metrics(knickpoints, Normalized Steepness Index(ksn), concavity index, and chi integral) using steam powerlaw approaches. Most of the lineaments trend eastwest like MFT. River profiles exhibit convex to double-concave shapes with upstream-propagating tectonic knickpoints that separate upstream and downstream reaches, indicating different phases of river incision. The spatial distribution of ksn shows high values along with low concavity values at the eastern part of the study area, reflecting disequilibrium conditions that are likely responding to a high uplift rate. Chi integral distribution shows a variation in drainage divide migration between the eastern and western parts of the study area. This study suggests that the rivers in the Siwalik Hills are undergoing active incision likely related to the ongoing uplift and active deformation associated with the Himalayan tectonics. The above findings can bring fresh perspectives to comprehend the neotectonic deformation and lateral variability along the Siwalik Hills landscapes within the Himalaya.     

Toward integrated smart city: a new model for implementation and design challenges

In smart city architecture, information and communication technologies are used to improve living standards and its management by citizens and government. Most researchers have divided this structure into six main components: smart people, the smart government, smart environment, smart transportation, smart economy, and smart life. Due to the connection between smart cities and the challenges resulting from their implementation and especially its integration, there exists no perfect solution for the concept of an integrated smart city so far according to our studies. Some more general concepts such as security, ICT infrastructure, and knowledge are not seen integrative in these structures. Therefore, it seems that new sub-components and general extra-components should be added to the existing models to form an integrated structure in such a way that the executive projects are located in their proper place in this structure and create and guarantee the integration of the smart city. Therefore, the requirements engineering of the smart city can also be explained more precisely. This study presents a model of an integrated graph in such a way that besides maintaining and improving the model of the smart city and existing models, it will fully cover the integration and requirements engineering and methodologies of the smart city in the future. The present paper offers an upgraded model of a six-component smart city structure as a flexible integrated dynamic graph so that beside maintaining the features of existing smart city models, it ensures its integrity, dynamism, flexibility and performance and prevents the failure of smart operations. Due to its flexibility, adaptability and localization, the proposed model presented in this paper can create an integrated solution and facilitating the life cycle of executive systems and enable governments and communities to predict and prevent sudden events such as natural disasters, pandemics like Covid-19 and the like as well as managing and leading their target community in the best way.