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Disturbing increase in the use of virgin resources to produce new products has threatened the environment. Many countries have reacted to this situation through regulations which aim to eliminate negative impact of products on the environment shaping the concept of environmentally conscious manufacturing and product recovery (ECMPRO). The first crucial and the most time-consuming step of product recovery is disassembly. The best productivity rate is achieved via a disassembly line in an automated disassembly process. In this chapter, we consider a sequence-dependent disassembly line balancing problem (SDDLBP) with multiple objectives that is concerned with the assignment of disassembly tasks to a set of ordered disassembly workstations while satisfying the disassembly precedence constraints and optimizing the effectiveness of several measures considering sequence-dependent time increments among disassembly tasks. Due to the high complexity of the SDDLBP, there is currently no known way to optimally solve even moderately sized instances of the problem. Therefore, an efficient methodology based on the simulated annealing (SA) is proposed to solve the SDDLBP. Case scenarios are considered and comparisons with ant colony optimization (ACO), particle swarm optimization (PSO), river formation dynamics (RFD), and tabu search (TS) approaches are provided to demonstrate the superior functionality of the proposed algorithm.

The purpose of this paper is to quantitatively and qualitatively analyze library marketing research output using select bibliometric indicators with the aim of identifying top-performing countries, subject subthemes, organizations, authors and journals in the area.

The present study has examined 520 publications in library marketing, as indexed in Scopus database during 2006–2017. The study has statistically assessed processed publications and citations data into tables in order to ascertain research growth rate trends, global publication output and share, citation impact and distribution of library marketing research by country of publication, international-level collaborating country share of publication, by broad subject areas and preferred media of research communication. The study also provides bibliometric profile of top research organizations and authors in terms of their publications and citation indicators.

The body of literature in library marketing research is still very small, highly scattered and has so far registered no growth during the last 12 years, i.e. 2006–2017. Library marketing research is yet to emerge as a popular research area in library and information science. The USA dominates The library marketing research in the world, whereas other top participating countries including India, China, Japan, Canada, etc., are distant cousins. Top research institutions in the area of library marketing across the world include City University of New York, Florida State University, University of Texas at Austin, USA, Loughborough University and University of Sheffield, UK. The major focus of library marketing research was on academic libraries, followed by public libraries and medical libraries. Of late, the use of social media has emerged as an alternative to traditional library marketing techniques.

The scope of study describing the status of library marketing research is limited to the period 2006–2017. The results of the study should interest researchers in finding solutions to formulating future library strategies and programs for achieving sustainable growth in this area of study.

The present study in library marketing research should be of interest to researchers in evolving, and formulating theories/best practices/and policies/programs for outreach to current and potential users for promoting library products and services.

Manufacturers and remanufacturers strive to maximize supply chain effectiveness by eliminating wastes in all their forms. This line of research extends the effectiveness during the products' working lives. Fraud in the warranty service chain (WSC) is one such source of waste that leads to revenue losses in the short term but when left unchecked leads to far worse results in the long term. Warranty frauds in the new product industry have received significant attention in recent literature. Addressing fraud issues in the remanufacturing industry have not been a high priority. Previous studies considered the primary parties in the WSC as possible sources of fraud. However, several unique opportunities exist for the secondary parties when it comes to fraud. This chapter considers fraud originating from one of the secondary parties of the WSC, namely the warranty administrator. The chapter models this fraud scenario using discrete event simulation and explores a possible fraud mitigation scenario.

This chapter studies the integration of quantitative and qualitative attributes of a particular issue in the strategic “designing” level of the reverse supply chain (RSC) process in a multicriteria decision-making environment. The study employs an analytical network process (ANP) to determine the performance indices of the collection centers derived through qualitative criteria from the remanufacturing facilities that are interested in buying used products. The evaluating criteria are comprised as a four-level hierarchy: the first level contains the objective of evaluating the collection centers, the second level involves the main evaluation criteria taken from the perspective of a remanufacturing facility, the third level contains the subcriteria under the main evaluation criteria, and the fourth level has the collection centers. ANP is presented herein as a matrix that comprises a list of all facets listed horizontally and vertically. This particular method is of value when key elements of a decision are difficult to quantify and contrast, and thus the identification of important facets and their incorporation into a linear physical programing (LPP) environment is of value. To determine the quality of end-of-life (EOL) products for transport from collection centers to remanufacturing facilities, a physical programming approach is adopted. Four criteria and their satisfaction are focused upon: (1) maximizing the total value of purchase; (2) minimizing the total cost of transportation; (3) minimizing the disposal cost; and (4) minimizing the purchase cost. A numerical example is considered in which three collection center locations are evaluated to identify the optimal collection center.

The purpose of this paper is to efficiently solve disassembly line balancing problem (DLBP) and the sequence-dependent disassembly line balancing problem (SDDLBP) which are both known to be NP-complete.

This manuscript utilizes a well-proven metaheuristics solution methodology, namely, variable neighborhood search (VNS), to address the problem.

DLBPs are analyzed using the numerical instances from the literature to show the efficiency of the proposed approach. The proposed algorithm showed superior performance compared to other techniques provided in the literature in terms of robustness to reach better solutions.

Since disassembly is the most critical step in end-of-life product treatment, every step toward improving disassembly line balancing brings us closer to cost savings and compelling practicality.

This paper is the first adaptation of VNS algorithm for solving DLBP and SDDLBP.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce sequence‐dependent disassembly line balancing problem (SDDLBP) to the literature and propose an efficient metaheuristic solution methodology to this NP‐complete problem.

This manuscript utilizes a well‐proven metaheuristics solution methodology, namely, ant colony optimization, to address the problem.

Since SDDLBP is NP‐complete, finding an optimal balance becomes computationally prohibitive due to exponential growth of the solution space with the increase in the number of parts. The proposed methodology is very fast, generates (near) optimal solutions, preserves precedence requirements and is easy to implement.

Since development of cost effective and profitable disassembly systems is an important issue in end‐of‐life product treatment, every step towards improving disassembly line balancing brings us closer to cost savings and compelling practicality.

This paper introduces a new problem (SDDLBP) and an efficient solution to the literature.

Theory of Constraints (TOC), though a well-established process improvement methodology in manufacturing, is still a novel philosophy for healthcare and an exhaustive review of literature is needed to summarize the key findings of various researchers. Such a review can provide a direction to the researchers and academicians interested in exploring the application of TOC in the healthcare sector. This paper aims to review the existing literature of TOC tools and techniques applied to the healthcare environment, and to investigate motivating factors, benefits and key gaps for identifying directions for future research in the domain of healthcare.

In this paper, different electronic repositories were searched using multiple keywords. The current study identified 36 articles published between January 1999 to mid-2021 to conceptualize and summarize the research questions used in the study. Descriptive analysis along with pictorial representations have been used for better visualization of work.

This paper presents a thorough literature review of TOC in healthcare and identifies the evolution, current trends, tools used, nature of services chosen for application and research gaps and recommends future direction for research. A variety of motivating factors and benefits of TOC in healthcare are identified. Another key finding of this study is that almost all implementations listed in literature reported positive outcomes and substantial improvements in the performance of the healthcare unit chosen for study.

This paper provides valuable insight to researchers, practitioners and policymakers on the potential of TOC to improve quality of services, flow of patients, revenues, process efficiency and cost reduction in different health care settings. A number of findings and suggestions compiled in the paper from literature study can be used for diagnosing, learning and making substantial changes in healthcare. The methodologies used by different researchers were analysed and combined to propose a generic step by step procedure to apply TOC. This methodology will guide the practising managers about the appropriate tools of TOC for their specific need.

Good health is always the first desire of all men and women around the globe. The global aim of healthcare is to quickly cure more patients and ensure healthier population both today and in future. This article will work as a foundation for future applications of TOC in healthcare and guide upcoming applications in the booming healthcare sector. The paper will help the healthcare managers in serving a greater number of patients with limited available resources.

This paper provides original collaborative work compiled by the authors. Since no comprehensive systematic review of TOC in healthcare has been reported earlier, this study would be a valuable asset for researchers in this field. A model has been presented that links various benefits with one another and clarifies the need to focus on process improvement which naturally results in these benefits. Similarly, a model has been presented to guide the users in implementation of TOC in healthcare.

Organic food market has grown rapidly on a global level and so is the interest of customers. The present paper ranks the factors and sub-criteria which are taken into consideration while making organic purchase decisions resulting in understanding the behaviour of consumers.

The present paper considered a sample of 550 respondents in the area of Punjab. Fuzzy AHP technique was applied to understand the key factors and sub-criteria which play a major role in organic food purchase decisions. The paper is empirical and descriptive in nature. The factors considered for the study include price, consumer knowledge, trust, attitude, behavioural intentions, subjective norms, perceived personal relevance and perceived consumer effectiveness.

The three major influential factors include price, trust and attitude ranked in the same order of preference which majorly affects the purchase decisions and talking about sub-criteria the three major criteria to purchase organic food include: “Price plays a significant role in purchase decisions (P2)”, “Organic food keeps me fit and healthy (A1)” and “Organic food intake makes me feel energetic (A2)”.

The present paper is limited to the area of Punjab and majorly eight factors have been taken into consideration. Further research can be explored on broader geographical and cultural areas with new dimensions in criteria and sub-criteria.

The findings of this paper will surely help the marketers to understand the behavioural intentions and preferences of the customers. Accordingly, they will strategize the policies to convert organic food market into a niche market with a high growth rate.

The existing literature explored various key factors. However, the present study comes up with ranking to the factors according to their priority in purchase decisions. This will definitely help marketers, business houses, practitioners and academicians about the key factors which affect purchase decisions, and it will surely add incredible knowledge into the existing database.