Research Trends and Outlooks in Assembly Line Balancing Problems

This paper presents the findings from the survey of articles published on the assembly line balancing problems (ALBPs) during 2014-2018. Before proceeding a comprehensive literature review, the ineffectiveness of the previous ALBP classification structures is discussed and a new classification scheme based on the layout configurations of assembly lines is subsequently proposed. The research trend in each layout of assembly lines is highlighted through the graphical presentations. The challenges in the ALBPs are also pinpointed as a technical guideline for future research works

Development of a novel integrated value engineering and risk assessment (VENRA) framework for shipyard performance measurement

The shipyard is a key facility determining the quality and performance of ships in the shipbuilding industry. A well-designed ship requires skilled shipbuilders who can deliver on parameters such as quality, timeline, budget, and environmental considerations. Evaluating shipyard performance, including shipbuilding, ship repair, and ship conversion, is crucial for strategic advancement. This thesis proposes a new performance measurement framework, the integrated Value Engineering and Risk Assessment (VENRA), to enhance shipyard performance. The framework introduces a conceptual and multi-dimensional criteria framework that considers criteria prioritisation and the evaluated shipyard conditions score. It suggests integrating five criteria groups, namely Technical, Business, External, Personnel Safety, and Environment, which include a number of criteria and sub-criteria. These criteria are intended to be used for shipyard assessment and identifying areas for improvement. In order to achieve the above framework, fuzzy Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL)-Weighting Evaluation Technique (WET) and fuzzy DEMATEL-Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) methods are employed. These methodologies assess the VENRA criteria by analysing interrelationships and assigning weight rankings to criteria and sub-criteria. An objective grading system is developed with fuzzy multi-attribute group decision-making (FMAGDM) approach to evaluate the shipyard’s condition score based on the VENRA criteria framework. By integrating criteria analysis and the shipyard score, a comprehensive analysis is conducted to determine the prioritisation of criteria, considering causal relationships, weight rankings, and the shipyard’s assessment score. The proposed framework has been applied and tested in case studies involving three different shipyards: a small shipyard specialising in aluminium ship production, a medium-sized shipyard focused on merchant ship production and a shipyard specialising in cruise ship production. The outcomes of this study include identifying the most influential criteria and sub-criteria, analysing shipyard performance measurements, prioritising enhancement tasks, and providing specific recommendations to improve shipyard performance.The shipyard is a key facility determining the quality and performance of ships in the shipbuilding industry. A well-designed ship requires skilled shipbuilders who can deliver on parameters such as quality, timeline, budget, and environmental considerations. Evaluating shipyard performance, including shipbuilding, ship repair, and ship conversion, is crucial for strategic advancement. This thesis proposes a new performance measurement framework, the integrated Value Engineering and Risk Assessment (VENRA), to enhance shipyard performance. The framework introduces a conceptual and multi-dimensional criteria framework that considers criteria prioritisation and the evaluated shipyard conditions score. It suggests integrating five criteria groups, namely Technical, Business, External, Personnel Safety, and Environment, which include a number of criteria and sub-criteria. These criteria are intended to be used for shipyard assessment and identifying areas for improvement. In order to achieve the above framework, fuzzy Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL)-Weighting Evaluation Technique (WET) and fuzzy DEMATEL-Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) methods are employed. These methodologies assess the VENRA criteria by analysing interrelationships and assigning weight rankings to criteria and sub-criteria. An objective grading system is developed with fuzzy multi-attribute group decision-making (FMAGDM) approach to evaluate the shipyard’s condition score based on the VENRA criteria framework. By integrating criteria analysis and the shipyard score, a comprehensive analysis is conducted to determine the prioritisation of criteria, considering causal relationships, weight rankings, and the shipyard’s assessment score. The proposed framework has been applied and tested in case studies involving three different shipyards: a small shipyard specialising in aluminium ship production, a medium-sized shipyard focused on merchant ship production and a shipyard specialising in cruise ship production. The outcomes of this study include identifying the most influential criteria and sub-criteria, analysing shipyard performance measurements, prioritising enhancement tasks, and providing specific recommendations to improve shipyard performance

Smart working technologies in industry 4.0 : contributions to different manufacturing activities and workers’ skills

A Indústria 4.0 é considerada a quarta revolução industrial porque utiliza uma ampla integração de tecnologias de informação e de operação na fabricação industrial. Apesar dessa perspectiva tecnológica, diversos estudos vêm evidenciando a importância de considerar o fator humano para o desenvolvimento de um sistema de manufatura inteligente. Nesse sentido, a dimensão denominada como Smart Working precisa ser melhor investigada, uma vez que entender como as tecnologias afetam os trabalhadores e as habilidades desses são cruciais para o bom desempenho das fábricas. Em razão disso, o objetivo desta dissertação foi entender como as Smart Working Technologies (SWT) podem contribuir para as atividades e as habilidades dos trabalhadores da manufatura. Para tanto, primeiramente foi realizada uma análise abrangente da literatura para identificar as SWT e seus impactos nas capacidades dos trabalhadores em suas atividades de manufatura. Deste modo, foram analisados 80 artigos que relacionam as SWT em oito atividades de manufatura. Posteriormente, foi selecionada uma das SWT mais relevantes conforme a literatura, os robôs colaborativos, para identificar os efeitos das tecnologias nas habilidades dos trabalhadores. Deste modo, foram analisados 138 casos de aplicação reportados por uma das empresas fornecedoras líderes mundiais, bem como três entrevistas com empresas adotantes da tecnologia. Os resultados apontam que existem 15 SWT que podem ser implementadas nas atividades de manufatura e relacionadas às capacidades dos trabalhadores. Além disso, os resultados também apontam que podem existir quatro efeitos das SWT nas habilidades dos trabalhadores. Estes achados demonstram que de acordo com a estratégia da empresa uma SWT pode impactar de diferentes formas os trabalhadores.Industry 4.0 is considered the fourth industrial revolution because it uses a broad integration of information and operating technologies in industrial manufacturing. Despite this technological perspective, several studies have highlighted the importance of considering the human factor to develop a smart manufacturing system. In this sense, the Smart Working dimension needs to be further investigated since understanding how technologies affect workers and their skills are crucial for factories' good performance. Therefore, the objective of this dissertation was to understand how Smart Working Technologies (SWT) can contribute to the activities and skills of manufacturing workers. To this end, firstly a systematic literature review was carried out to identify SWTs and their impacts on workers' capabilities in their manufacturing activities. Thus, 80 articles relating to SWT in eight manufacturing activities were analyzed. Subsequently, one of the most relevant SWTs according to the literature, collaborative robots, was selected to identify the effects of technologies on workers' skills. In this way, 138 application cases reported by one of the world's leading supplier companies were analyzed, as well as three interviews with companies that adopted the technology. The results show that there are 15 SWT that can be implemented in manufacturing activities and related to workers' capabilities. In addition, the results also point out that there may be four effects of SWT on workers' skills. According to the company's strategy, these findings demonstrate that an SWT can impact workers in different ways

Aerospace Medicine and Biology: A continuing bibliography with indexes, supplement 233, June 1982

This bibliograhy lists 387 reports, articles, and other documents introduced into the NASA scientific and technical information system in May 1982

The Antinomies of Autonomy: The Social Structures of Stressors in Ireland and Denmark

Autonomy is a core aspect of the labour process, working conditions, and the relationship between working conditions and well-being. Developments in techno-economic capacities, networked production, occupational structures, and organisational flexibility, have altered the dynamics of autonomy. High levels of work autonomy can now present counter-intuitive demands and contradictions which challenge the experience of self-regulation, discretion, and freedom at work - the Antinomies of Autonomy. In negotiating the decisive and interlinked post-industrial work bargains of effort, boundaries, and employment, different antinomies emerge which can present unique forms of stressors. The interrelated dynamics of the autonomy and antinomies within these post-industrial work bargains present difficulties for models linking working conditions and well-being outcomes (Bakker and Demerouti 2007, Karasek 1979, Siegrist 1996). The key mechanisms shaping the impact of work on psychological well-being go beyond the individual and a work 'place'. The thesis thus presents a sociological framework centred on a stressor (Wheaton 1999) - capability (Sen 1999, Hobson 2014) pathway. Employing a comparative case study method, the research draws from in-depth semi-structured interviews with IT workers in Ireland (n=17) and Denmark (n=14) to explore the antinomies, strategies and stressors of autonomous working lives and how they are shaped by different institutional contexts. The interviews involved psychosocial work environment and job related feelings surveys, alongside more detailed discussions of work and employment conditions in IT. The survey data shows an association between high autonomy and high demands for the Irish interviewees but not the Danish, and a surprising lack of feelings of excitement, enthusiasm, and calmness at work. The qualitative analysis identifies three mutually reinforcing antinomies of autonomy - interdependence, boundarylessness, and fusion - occurring within the labour process, working conditions, and the employment relationship respectively. The strategies and stressors emerging from these conditions are based on the 'capability sets' available within each institutional context. The analysis shows how Danish interviewees drew on more collective and institutional resources and norms in developing working life strategies. The Irish interviewees described strategies sourced and sustained mainly at the individual level. The thesis illustrates the complex interplay of post-industrial work bargains, the antinomies of autonomy, institutional capabilities, and the social structure of stressors of working life

Considerations in designing a cybernetic simple 'learning' model; and an overview of the problem of modelling learning

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.Learning is viewed as a central feature of living systems and must be manifested in any artifact that claims to exhibit general intelligence. The central aims of the thesis are twofold: (1) - To review and critically assess the empirical and theoretical aspects of learning as have been addressed in a multitude of disciplines, with the aim of extracting fundamental features and elements. (2) - To develop a more systematic approach to the cybernetic modelling of learning than has been achieved hitherto. In pursuit of aim (1) above the following discussions are included: Historical and Philosophical backgrounds; Natural learning, both physiological and psychological aspects; Hierarchies of learning identified in the evolutionary, functional and developmental senses; An extensive section on the general problem of modelling of learning and the formal tools, is included as a link between aims (1) and (2). Following this a systematic and historically oriented study of cybernetic and other related approaches to the problem of modelling of learning is presented. This then leads to the development of a state-of-the-art general purpose experimental cybernetic learning model. The programming and use of this model is also fully described, including an elaborate scheme for the manifestation of simple learning

Power and competence in professional education: A study of youth workers

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University, 22/10/1998.This thesis explores shifting ideas of youth work, and the changing notions of professional competence that have shaped it since its emergence at the end of the last century. It begins by discussing Foucault's distinctive conception of power. This analysis is applied later in the thesis to youth work itself and to its forms of professional education and training. It is argued that modem professional practices illustrate the changing nature of disciplinary techniques in modem societies. These techniques are employed to discipline both professions themselves (by 'normalising' professional practices), and their client groups, and are also part of the contemporary problem of 'government'. Indeed, it is argued that models of professional education reflect the historically changing rationales on which British society has been organised and managed. The thesis identifies three phases of this: 'emergent welfarism', social government' or 'welfarism' and 'neo-liberalism. Drawing on a range of historical sources, a number of changing assumptions about young people in the context of youth work are identified, such as their characterisation as an inherently and naturally problematic social category. The 'discourse of adolescence' which draws on a range of knowledges about young people (from scientific to moral) is seen as providing a powerful justification for the expansion of youth work over the last hundred years or so. The youth worker's modem role in managing groups, offering counselling and acting as a 'broker' of social and moral knowledge is discussed. The progressive development of the professional education and training of youth workers since the 1930s is examined together with its curriculum content and the techniques and practices through which youth workers have been socialised into their occupational roles. After the initial tendency towards leadership training through apprenticeship, the professional model became organised on 'technical-rational' principles, with various 'techniques of the self' by which youth workers became disciplined into their professional identities (for example by 'surveillance' and 'confession'). Focus is given to the paradigmatic development and deployment of such techniques at the National College for the Training of Youth Leaders in the 1960s. The thesis concludes with an analysis of the intense criticism to which professional education and training in youth work has been subjected in the last decade, including the separation of theory and practice, unclear curricula, academic and professional elitism, and the marginalisation of learners' experience. The 'discourse of competency' is identified as being important in shaping current approaches to professional education and training in youth work. Finally, it is suggested that the emergent model of professional education is, ironically, characterised by an increasingly intense and invasive application of the techniques of disciplinary power identified earlier in the thesis. Competency practices we suggest facilitate the attempt to govern, professionals ahd professional practice. The thesis is broadly structured in four parts, and in the following way: Chapter 1 provides a broad introduction and context for the thesis. In Part One, Chapter 2 discusses Foucault's concept of power which informs the thesis. In Part Two, Chapter 3 discusses the managerial and disciplinary functions of the human service professions, providing a context for the subsequent analysis of youth work. Chapter 4 goes on to identify models of professional education in their political and social contexts and concludes with a discussion of the 'competency model'. In Part Three, Chapters 5 and 6 explore the distinctive contribution which youth work has made to the regulation and disciplining of young people. In these chapters links are made between broad political objectives and the evolving knowledge and practices of youth workers. In Part Four, Chapter 7 identifies the earliest attempts to identify and enhance competence through the training and education of youth workers. Chapter 8 explores youth work training in the 1960s and 1970s, identifying the essentially humanistic discourse which subsequently dominated youth work and the training of youth workers. In the context of political shifts beginning in the 1970s, Chapter 9 analyses the emergence of a 'discourse of competency' in youth work, and its challenge to the prevailing humanistic orthodoxy which characterised the professional education and training of youth workers. Finally, Chapter 11 draws general and particular conclusions to the thesis

Production Engineering and Management

It is our pleasure to introduce the 8th edition of the International Conference on Production Engineering and anagement (PEM), an event that is the result of the joint effort of the OWL University of Applied Sciences and the University of Trieste. The conference has been established as an annual meeting under the Double Degree Master Program “Production Engineering and Management” by the two partner universities. This year the conference is hosted at the university campus in Lemgo, Germany. The main goal of the conference is to offer students, researchers and professionals in Germany, Italy and abroad, an opportunity to meet and exchange information, discuss experiences, specific practices and technical solutions for planning, design, and management of manufacturing and service systems and processes. As always, the conference is a platform aimed at presenting research projects, introducing young academics to the tradition of symposiums and promoting the exchange of ideas between the industry and the academy. This year’s special focus is on Supply Chain Design and Management in the context of Industry 4.0, which are currently major topics of discussion among experts and professionals. In fact, the features and problems of Industry 4.0 have been widely discussed in the last editions of the PEM conference, in which sustainability and efficiency also emerged as key factors. With the further study and development of Direct Digital Manufacturing technologies in connection with new Management Practices and Supply Chain Designs, the 8th edition of the PEM conference aims to offer new and interesting scientific contributions. The conference program includes 25 speeches organized in seven sessions. Two are specifically dedicated to “Direct Digital Manufacturing in the context of Industry 4.0”. The other sessions are covering areas of great interest and importance to the participants of the conference, which are related to the main focus: “Supply Chai n Design and Management”, “Industrial Engineering and Lean Management”, “Wood Processing Technologies and Furniture Production”, and “Management Practices and Methodologies”. The proceedings of the conference include the articles submitted and accepted after a careful double-blind refereeing process