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In recent years, the stability of supply chains has been undermined due to many disruptions. Although it is normal for the disruptions in supply chains to occur periodically, they have great impact on the rise of the costs and they create strong imbalances in business. For years, most world trade has been performed by maritime transport due its cost-effectiveness. The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted the global supply chain like nothing before, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine has only deepened the crisis that is affecting the global supply chain. The focus of this paper has been placed on volatile freight rates in the maritime container industry due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the consequences of these crises on the changes of the prices of consumer goods in the European Union.

This article considers the challenging problem of production lot sizing and scheduling that arises in the glass container industry. In such manufacturing environment, a furnace operates continuously feeding its attendant container forming machines with melted glass. Setups in the aforementioned machines interrupt the melted glass flow and, hence, the glass paste undergoes a heat loss. Consequently, a warm-up process is needed after each setup changeover. In addition, setups can affect the furnace output (total amount of glass extracted from the furnace) resulting in extraction variation losses. Both warm-ups and furnace extraction variations prevent the capacity of machines from being fully used and incur in additional costs. This study addresses such specificities for the first time in lot sizing and scheduling literature by introducing a novel integer programming model, which represents the problem appropriately, and a variable neighborhood search (VNS) solution method. A relevant case study conducted in an amber glass bottle plant shows that the model is able to comprise the problem requirements, and the VNS produces good-quality solutions in reasonable computational times. The reproducibility of the results is ensured by additional experiments involving artificial instances.

This article attempts to explore the notion of \"wellness\" in relation to the emerging health markets in Delhi. For this study, spa centers are going to be my major focus. How spa centers define and sell wellness? How does the notion of wellness link to the neoliberal economy and laissez-faire nature of the state? Moreover, in present societies how has it emerged as an \"ideological normativity\" which pathologies those who do not conform to the idea of wellness? Wellness is used in everyday conversation to indicate a healthy balance of mind, body, and emotions. It argues that how wellness as a quality is purportedly being sold through a range of objects and services, from a bottle of shampoo to the complex practice of power yoga. The article examines the spa center as a site and how it models the notions of health and wellness in new ways.

There is growing concern about the use of plastic in packaging for food materials, as this results in increased plastic waste materials in the environment. To counter this, alternative sources of packaging materials that are natural and based on eco-friendly materials and proteins have been widely investigated for their potential application in food packaging and other industries of the food sector. Sericin, a silk protein that is usually discarded in large quantities by the sericulture and textile industries during the degumming process of manufacturing silk from silk cocoons, can be explored for its application in food packaging and in other food sectors as a functional food and component of food items. Hence, its repurposing can result in reduced economic costs and environmental waste. Sericin extracted from silk cocoon possesses several useful amino acids, such as aspartic acid, glycine, and serine. Likewise, sericin is strongly hydrophilic, a property that confers effective biological and biocompatible characteristics, including antibacterial, antioxidant, anticancer, and anti-tyrosinase properties. When used in combination with other biomaterials, sericin has proved to be effective in the manufacture of films or coating or packaging materials. In this review, the characteristics of sericin materials and their potential application in food-sector industries are discussed in detail.

Plant-based meat analogues, edible insects, and cultured meat are promising major meat alternatives that can be used as protein sources in the future. It is also believed that the importance of meat alternatives will continue to increase because of concerns on limited sustainability of the traditional meat production system. The meat alternatives are expected to have different roles based on their different benefits and limitations. Plant-based meat analogues and edible insects can replace traditional meat as a good protein source from the perspective of nutritional value. Furthermore, plant-based meat can be made available to a wide range of consumers (e.g., as vegetarian or halal food products). However, despite ongoing technical developments, their palatability, including appearance, flavor, and texture, is still different from the consumers’ standard established from livestock-based traditional meat. Meanwhile, cultured meat is the only method to produce actual animal muscle-based meat; therefore, the final product is more meat-like compared to other meat analogues. However, technical difficulties, especially in mass production and cost, remain before it can be commercialized. Nevertheless, these meat alternatives can be a part of our future protein sources while maintaining a complementary relationship with traditional meat.

Wind tunnel tests were carried out to measure the wind pressure of a 200m high natural-draught cooling tower. An analysis of the distribution characteristics of external pressure was then conducted to determine the pressure coefficients Cp(θ , z) in a given wind profile. Finally, the effect on the response of the shell and the buckling safety of the shell, applying the simplified height-constant pressure coefficient Cp(θ ) and the realistic pressure Cp(θ , z), was determined. Taking the wind load specified in the code as an example, the influence of the distribution of external pressure on the wind-induced response was further analyzed. The results indicate that the pressure distribution varies with not only the height z but also the circumferential angle θ , and the wind load of both ends of the tower is significantly greater than that of its middle. Moreover, the wind-induced static responses of the tower under the action of the realistic pressure distribution Cp(θ , z) and the simplified approach Cp(θ ) are basically consistent, because the wind load distribution is more important than its magnitude for the wind-induced response of cooling tower, and the wind-induced response of the cooling tower is dominated by the local shell deformation.

Food loss and waste occur for many reasons, from crop processing to household leftovers. Even though some waste generation is unavoidable, a considerable amount is due to supply chain inefficiencies and damage during transport and handling. Packaging design and materials innovations represent real opportunities to reduce food waste within the supply chain. Besides, changes in people’s lifestyles have increased the demand for high-quality, fresh, minimally processed, and ready-to-eat food products with extended shelf-life, that need to meet strict and constantly renewed food safety regulations. In this regard, accurate monitoring of food quality and spoilage is necessary to diminish both health hazards and food waste. Thus, this work provides an overview of the most recent advances in the investigation and development of food packaging materials and design with the aim to improve food chain sustainability. Enhanced barrier and surface properties as well as active materials for food conservation are reviewed. Likewise, the function, importance, current availability, and future trends of intelligent and smart packaging systems are presented, especially considering biobased sensor development by 3D printing technology. In addition, driving factors affecting fully biobased packaging design and materials development and production are discussed, considering byproducts and waste minimization and revalorization, recyclability, biodegradability, and other possible ends-of-life and their impact on product/package system sustainability.

Food spoilage caused by microbial contamination remains a global challenge, driving demand for sustainable antibacterial packaging. Conventional photocatalytic materials suffer from limited spectral response, rapid charge recombination, and insufficient reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation under visible light. Here, a Z-scheme heterojunction was constructed by coupling zeolitic imidazolate framework-8 (ZIF-8) with Ag[sub.3]PO[sub.4], achieving dual-spectral absorption and spatial charge separation. The directional electron transfer from Ag[sub.3]PO[sub.4]’s conduction band to ZIF-8 effectively suppresses electron-hole recombination, prolonging carrier lifetimes and amplifying ROS production (·O[sub.2] [sup.−]/·OH). Synergy with Ag[sup.+] release further enhances bactericidal efficacy. Incorporated into a cellulose acetate matrix (CAM), the ZIF-8/Ag[sub.3]PO[sub.4]/CAM film demonstrates 99.06% antibacterial efficiency against meat surface microbiota under simulated sunlight, alongside high transparency. This study proposes a Z-scheme heterojunction strategy to maximize ROS generation efficiency and demonstrates a scalable fabrication approach for active food packaging materials, effectively targeting microbial contamination control and shelf-life prolongation.