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The Physical Internet (PI) offers an innovative approach to logistics networks, focussing on operational, digital, and physical interconnectivity through encapsulation, interfaces, and protocols. However, PI network can be complex to manage due to its dynamic structure and the need for routing protocols that adapt to continually evolving circumstances. This paper proposes a dynamic and reactive routing protocol for a PI sub-network, leveraging well-known Internet techniques, namely 'Route Request' and 'Route Reply'. The objective is to enable dynamic, self-starting, multi-hop routing among nodes, ensuring continuous connectivity even amidst network disruptions. Moreover, the protocol incorporates reactive assignment algorithms to address disruptions, such as product shortages and resource unavailability. Additionally, the protocol is innovative in considering each container and resource's preferences and local knowledge of the system's known state. To include preferences in decision-making, we incorporate the Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution and goal programming. Finally, we use multi-agent simulation and real order data from two major French retail chains to evaluate the protocol's performance. Results showed improved routing robustness and efficiency amidst disruptions compared to state-of-the-art methods. Various scenarios have been examined to yield promising insights for future research and practical applications in the realm of the PI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Hospital resilience has been well recognized among healthcare managers and providers as disruption of hospital services that threatens their business environment. However, the shocks identified in the recent hospital resilience concept are mainly related to disaster situations. This study aims to identify potential shocks that hospitals face during disruptions in Indonesia. Method: This qualitative study was conducted in Makassar, Indonesia in August-November 2022. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews with hospital managers and resilience experts using a semi-structured interview guide. 20 key informants were interviewed and data were analyzed by thematic analysis. Results: The study identified seven shocks to hospitals during the disruption era: policy, politics, economics, hospital management shifting paradigms, market and consumer behavior changes, disasters, and conflicts. It also identified barriers to making hospitals resilient, such as inappropriate organizational culture, weak cooperation across sectors, the traditional approach of hospital management, inadequate managerial and leadership skills, human resources inadequacies, a lack of business mindset and resistance to change. Conclusion: This study provides a comprehensive understanding of hospital shocks during disruptions. This may serve as a guide to redesigning the instruments and capabilities needed for a resilient hospital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates a risk-averse firm's investment strategy in real-time event-monitoring technologies coupled with dynamic disruption response decisions. The firm does not know how long the disruption will last, and the event-monitoring solutions provide the firm with a quicker update regarding the length of the disruption. When the firm receives an update, it has the flexibility to revise its initial response action. We model a two-stage stochastic program to study this problem where risk aversion is modeled in the form of a Service-at-Risk constraint. Our paper makes four important contributions. First, it characterizes the optimal recourse strategies given an update and identifies the conditions when the firm benefits from the recourse. Second, we characterize the optimal investment and initial response strategies where we find that the investment behavior is non-monotone. Third, our paper shows an interesting impact of risk aversion on the investment decision such that the firm may benefit from investing in event monitoring at moderate degrees of risk aversion, but not necessarily at low or high degrees of risk aversion. Fourth, we find that a firm's benefit from event monitoring is more profound when the capacity of contingency response is moderately limited. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This work explores the use of eXplainable artificial intelligence (XAI) to analyze a convolutional neural network (CNN) trained for disruption prediction in tokamak devices and fed with inputs composed of different physical quantities. Methods: This work focuses on a reduced dataset containing disruptions that follow patterns which are distinguishable based on their impact on the electron temperature profile. Our objective is to demonstrate that the CNN, without explicit training for these specific mechanisms, has implicitly learned to differentiate between these two disruption paths. With this purpose, two XAI algorithms have been implemented: occlusion and saliency maps. Results: The main outcome of this paper comes from the temperature profile analysis, which evaluates whether the CNN prioritizes the outer and inner regions. Discussion: The result of this investigation reveals a consistent shift in the CNN's output sensitivity depending on whether the inner or outer part of the temperature profile is perturbed, reflecting the underlying physical phenomena occurring in the plasma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective Data Sources Study Design Principal Findings Conclusions What is known on this topic What this study adds To quantify disruptions in hospitalization and ambulatory care throughout the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) pandemic for 32 countries, and examine associations of health system characteristics and COVID‐19 response strategies on disruptions.We utilized aggregated inpatient hospitalization and surgical procedure data from the Organization for Economic Co‐operation and Development Health Database from 2010 to 2021. Covariate data were extracted from the Organization for Economic Co‐operation and Development Health Database, World Health Organization, and Oxford COVID‐19 Government Response Tracker.This is a descriptive study using time‐series analyses to quantify the annual effect of the COVID‐19 pandemic on non‐COVID‐19 hospitalizations for 20 diagnostic categories and 15 surgical procedures. We compared expected hospitalizations had the pandemic never occurred in 2020–2021, estimated using autoregressive integrated moving average modeling with data from 2010 to 2019, with observed hospitalizations. Observed‐to‐expected ratios and missed hospitalizations were computed as measures of COVID‐19 impact. Mixed linear models were employed to examine associations between hospitalization observed‐to‐expected ratios and covariates.The COVID‐19 pandemic was associated with 16,300,000 (95% uncertainty interval 14,700,000–17,900,000; 18.0% [16.5%–19.4%]) missed hospitalizations in 2020. Diseases of the respiratory (−2,030,000 [−2,300,000 to −1,780,000]), circulatory (−1,680,000 [−1,960,000 to −1,410,000]), and musculoskeletal (−1,480,000 [−1,720,000 to −1,260,000]) systems contributed most to the declines. In 2021, there were an additional 14,700,000 (95% uncertainty interval 13,100,000–16,400,000; 16.3% [14.9%–17.9%]) missed hospitalizations. Total healthcare workers per capita (β = 1.02 [95% CI 1.00, 1.04]) and insurance coverage (β = 1.05 [1.02, 1.09]) were associated with fewer missed hospitalizations. Stringency index (β = 0.98 [0.98, 0.99]) and excess all‐cause deaths (β = 0.98 [0.96, 0.99]) were associated with more missed hospitalizations.There was marked cross‐country variability in disruptions to hospitalizations and ambulatory care. Certain health system characteristics appeared to be more protective, such as insurance coverage, and number of inputs including healthcare workforce and beds. Substantial disruptions in health services associated with the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic have placed a renewed interest in health system resilience. While there is a growing body of evidence documenting disruptions in services, there are limited comparative assessments across diverse countries with different health system designs, preparedness levels, and public health responses. Learning and adapting from health system‐specific gaps and challenges highlighted by the pandemic will be critical for improving resilience. All countries experienced disruptions to hospitalizations and surgical procedures with a combined total of 30 million missed hospitalizations and 4 million missed surgical procedures in 2020–2021, but there was marked cross‐country heterogeneity in disruptions. Countries with greater baseline healthcare workers, insurance coverage, and hospital beds had disproportionately lower disruptions in care. National health planning discussions may need to balance health system resiliency and efficiency to avert preventable morbidity and mortality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Property investors operate in environments characterised by market disruptions, which necessitate their adaptation to changing market environments as they make investment decisions. Although several conceptual models have been proposed to explain property investment decision-making, little is known about how property investors make adaptive decisions amidst market disruptions. By leveraging the tenets of institutionalism to frame this study theoretically, the formal and informal rules that guide the conduct of Listed Property Trusts (LPTs) amidst market disruptions were evaluated in two stages. The first stage involved an extensive review of LPTs' annual reports for content that described how they have responded to disruptions over an extended period. Consequently, the content analysis provided the basis for in-depth interviews with decision-makers across LPTs to shed light on the disruption-driven investment decision-making strategies of their respective organisations. The research outcome reveals that the adaptive response of LPTs to disruptions involves rational and intuitive components, with decision-makers switching between rational and intuitive reasoning. This study makes original empirical and theoretical contributions to the property investment literature by not only providing insights that can enable and empower property investors to optimise their decision-making amidst disruption, but by also raising psychological issues that may occur in the process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

AbstractShips are technologies of maritime mobility. But sometimes ships are immobile—they stop and remain stationary for short or prolonged times. A degree of stasis inside and outside ports is both usual and essential for facilitating the movement of ships in global markets. This paper makes two important points: first, echoing existing literature, frequent stationarity (or waiting) is a normal occurrence in the industry. Second, it is not just mobilities that are disrupted via moments of stasis; immobilities themselves have distinct patterns that too can be disrupted. This nuance is vital: there is a need to understand the disruptions to immobilities rather than understanding immobilities as disruptions to the general condition of mobility, both within—and beyond—the shipping example. We argue that understanding disruptions to immobilities is vital to grasping the dynamics of shipping, alongside other (im)mobilites (car, train, plane), their conditions, and the politics that shape our world on the move. Using a data-driven approach, embracing AIS methods for exploring ship stationarity around US waters during the COVID-19 pandemic, this paper upends the assumptions of ship (im)mobilities through the example of wait times, calling for scholars to give space and time to everyday immobilities and their disruptions too. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Maritime transport is vulnerable to disruptions which could threaten the resilience performance of maritime businesses. Consequently, the management of disruptions has gained significant attention from academics and the industry. The objective of this study is to review and consolidate academic research on disruption management in maritime shipping. A systematic review is performed on the search engine, Scopus. The review findings highlight (1) major categories of disruptions; (2) impacts of disruptions, which include social and economic impact and operational challenges; and (3) disruption management strategies, which cover technology, policies and regulations, service quality improvement, capacity management, collaboration with stakeholders as well as continuous training and education. The study contributes to the literature by providing a timely consolidation of the increasing focus on disruption management and maritime resilience. The results offer some implications for government authorities, policymakers, and maritime industry players to ensure the shipping industry continues to be resilient and versatile to thrive in this dynamic, fast-paced, and ever-changing environment. Recommendations for future research are also provided. • Consolidate research on maritime resilience • Organize the types of disruptions • Identify common resilience strategies • Highlight future research directions [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Background Hospital resilience has been well recognized among healthcare managers and providers as disruption of hospital services that threatens their business environment. However, the shocks identified in the recent hospital resilience concept are mainly related to disaster situations. This study aims to identify potential shocks that hospitals face during disruptions in Indonesia. Method This qualitative study was conducted in Makassar, Indonesia in August-November 2022. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews with hospital managers and resilience experts using a semi-structured interview guide. 20 key informants were interviewed and data were analyzed by thematic analysis. Results The study identified seven shocks to hospitals during the disruption era: policy, politics, economics, hospital management shifting paradigms, market and consumer behavior changes, disasters, and conflicts. It also identified barriers to making hospitals resilient, such as inappropriate organizational culture, weak cooperation across sectors, the traditional approach of hospital management, inadequate managerial and leadership skills, human resources inadequacies, a lack of business mindset and resistance to change. Conclusion This study provides a comprehensive understanding of hospital shocks during disruptions. This may serve as a guide to redesigning the instruments and capabilities needed for a resilient hospital.

Heritage language maintenance is affected by many different factors. Particularly for families in subtractive bilingual environments, it is crucial to have a well-defined family language policy (FLP). Even with an established FLP, major disruptions and changes, as well as smaller shifts in families’ lives, can significantly affect children’s multilingual development and threaten heritage language maintenance. These shifts can be sudden or gradual. This study focuses on the importance of bringing the need for a FLP into multilingual families’ awareness and explores the challenges of sustaining it. More specifically, this study uses two parents’ reflections regarding their own families’ language policies to gain a better understanding of the challenges and to make recommendations to other families. It is guided by the following questions: To what extent are parents aware of their family’s multilingual habits and policies? How can parents support their children’s heritage language development in the face of significant disruptions or even subtle life changes? Two linguists raising multilingual children in different contexts agreed to become accountability partners to gain a better understanding of their own dynamic situations and support each other to become more intentional in their family multilingual development. Data were collected over a six-month period. Findings suggest that intentionality increased due to the accountability partnership. Furthermore, this study challenged several of the researchers’ assumptions, particularly regarding the amount of heritage language spoken, how transitions affect the family, what it takes for linguistic changes to occur, and the ease of tracking one’s own family’s linguistic habits. This study suggests that having a FLP is not sufficient, but that it requires periodic updating, and changes need to be implemented to match the evolving plan.

This research aims to empirically examine how Lean Supply Chains (LSC) have coped with the disruptive effects of the COVID-19 pandemic from the normal accidents theory (NAT) perspective. Initially, a literature review was conducted to identify the main dimensions of LSC. Then, four experts were interviewed, offering insight into how each of the LSC dimensions copes with disruptions in general. Finally, three case studies of manufacturing shed light on the LSC implications for the pandemic context in particular. From the NAT viewpoint, the effects of the pandemic are analyzed according to two dimensions of the interactions that make up an LSC: linear to non-linear, and loosely to tightly-coupled. The more non-linear and tightly-coupled the interactions the more vulnerable the LSC is to disruptions. Results indicated that LSC might effectively and quickly adapt to keep interactions as linear as possible through transparent information flows and collaborative work while at the same time temporarily reducing tight-couplings through inventory increases. Some of the countermeasures to cope with the disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic conflict with LSC principles, such as inventory reduction, developing a solid customer-supplier relationship, and long-term orientation. This points out the contingent nature of some lean principles as well as the meta principle that guided companies' behaviours in the case studies, namely adding value to internal and external customers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a three-phase robust approach to the problem of designing a supply chain in an e-tailing environment considering the resilience strategies such as fortification, backup suppliers, and transshipment. First, the scores of potential suppliers are obtained using several resilience criteria. Then, a scenario-based stochastic network design model is proposed which considers operational (demand and transfer cost) and disruption (a natural disaster) risks. Finally, an order transfer problem is solved. The results prove the effectiveness of the framework for a case study. A preferred Pareto optimal solution of the robust optimization model is selected such that its cost is only 0.15% worse than its neighbour while its score of suppliers is 2.46% greater than the mentioned point. In addition, the results of the sensitivity analysis show that although the suppliers with higher scores costs more, they have a smaller cost range. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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A soft spaces lens enables a nuanced perspective on regional resilience governance to disruptions. Focusing on COVID-19, this article illuminates comparative insights into resilience governance in England and how the regional soft spaces of local resilience forums differentially experienced this momentous disruptive event. The pandemic has exposed the limited ability of these regional soft spaces to enhance resilience to disruptions and thus narrow the resilience implementation gap. This article contributes to theory and practice on the tensions and opportunities to progress resilience governance through regional soft spaces amid an evolving policy landscape post-pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Industry 5.0 (I5.0) is the next industrial revolution that will leverage human intervention in collaboration with intelligent, logical, and smart machines to attain even more user-preferred and resource-efficient manufacturing and supply chain solutions. The main aim of this article is to study I5.0 technologies in supply chains when these are affected by disruptive phenomena such as those created by wars, climate change or pandemics. A systematic literature review methodology was conducted to understand the present knowledge connected with this theme. This study summarises 194 research articles from the period 2009 to 2022 to understand the present knowledge connected with this theme. The research findings show a significant gap related to the adoption of I5.0 technologies to prevent or overcome supply chain disruptions. 194 articles, including journal and review articles, were identified in the literature. The study provides a novel and insightful concept related to I5.0 within the context of supply chain disruptions. The potential applications of I5.0 and Industry 4.0 are elaborately discussed in three areas, namely: (1) disruptions in supply chains due to pandemics; (2) disruptions in supply chains due to war; and (3) disruptions in supply chains due to climate change. Finally, this study highlights research implications and proposes future research avenues that will contribute to further exploring the adoption of I5.0 technologies to prevent, manage and overcome disruptions in supply chains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: We conducted a systematic review to explore the potential for the application of blockchain technologies for supply chain resilience in a small-scale agri-food business context. Design/methodology/approach: As part of the research methodology, scientific databases such as Web of Science, Google Scholar and Scopus were used to find relevant articles for this review. Findings: The systematic review of articles (n = 57) found that the use of blockchain technology in the small-scale agri-food business sector can reduce the risk of food fraud by assuring the provenance of food products. Research limitations/implications: Only a few papers were directly from a small-scale agribusiness context. Key challenges that limit the implementation of blockchain and other distributed ledger technologies include concerns over the disclosure of proprietary information and trade secrets, incomplete or inaccurate information, economic and technical difficulties, low levels of trust in the technology, risk of human error and poor governance of process-related issues. Originality/value: The application of blockchain technology ensures that the risks and costs associated with non-compliance, product recalls and product loss are reduced. Improved communication and information sharing can increase resilience and better support provenance claims and traceability. Better customer relationships can be built, increasing supply chain efficiency and resilience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic in late 2019 led to a global crisis of unprecedented scale and complexity that disrupted almost every aspect of human life. The pandemic has taken people, institutions and governments by surprise, so the impact of the virus has been profound and far-reaching. The rapid and relentless spread of the pandemic has challenged global health systems, strained economies, altered daily routines in educational settings and at work, and tested the resilience of communities worldwide. Different studies have identified vulnerabilities in the world's ability to respond to health emergencies at the individual and societal levels. This study presents a systematic literature review and theoretical analysis of the disruptions caused by COVID-19 to help formulate strategies that encourage flexibility and resilience in the face of such complex and interconnected disruptions. The article analyzes the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic through the prism of two main theories: the theory of situational crisis communications (type of crisis, its history, responsibility, perceived seriousness, predictable probability, crisis communications strategies, post-crisis reputation), as well as the theory of social learning (learning through observation, modeling and imitation, positive and negative reinforcement in the formation of behavior). In addition, the nature of society's adaptation to the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic is also considered through the prism of the theory of subversive innovations (progress in communication technologies, new methods of remote work and education, the entry of social networks into the business world, the introduction of asynchronous communication). The article summarizes the scientific progress on the following main consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic in the workplace, healthcare system, and education. The study provides recommendations on the steps that individuals, institutions and governments can take to increase readiness and ability to adapt to the next crisis (interdisciplinary cooperation, analysis of communication strategies, system analysis). The analysis conducted in the article also made it possible to outline the most promising directions for further qualitative intervention studies (in-depth case studies taking into account the specific context of regions, organizations or communities to identify effective and ineffective policies and practices; qualitative interviews with key stakeholders to understand the intricacies of decision-making in the context of the pandemic crisis); qualitative action studies (building community resilience, collaborative research efforts involving policymakers, health experts and community representatives to develop crisis response policies jointly) and quantitative studies (analysis of pandemic spread, impact of vaccination on disease control, analysis of the economic effects of the pandemic, etc.).

Abstract Background The COVID-19 pandemic has presented significant global healthcare challenges, particularly impacting the continuity of essential health services in low- and middle-income countries. This study investigates the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the utilization and provision of essential health services in Armenia. Methods We employed a conventional qualitative study design, conducting semi-structured in-depth interviews (n = 17) within public and private primary healthcare (PHC) facilities in Armenia in 2021. Our study participants encompassed physicians providing specialty services in PHC facilities (e.g. endocrinologists, gynecologists/obstetricians, and pediatricians), regular visitors to PHC facilities (e.g. adults with chronic diseases, parents of children), and policymakers. Thematic analysis was conducted, yielding five emergent categories: mobilization and organization of PHC services during COVID-19; PHC visits during COVID-19; worsening of chronic conditions due to the decline in PHC visits; problems with routine childhood vaccinations; and patient-provider communication challenges. Results The number of in-person visits to PHC facilities declined due to adaptations in service delivery, imposed lockdown measures, and the public’s fear of visiting healthcare facilities. Maternal and child health services continued with no major disruptions. PHC providers deliberately limited the number of maternal and child visits to essential antenatal care, newborn screenings, and routine childhood immunizations. Still, children experienced some delays in vaccination administration. The pandemic resulted in a notable reduction in follow-up visits and monitoring of patients with chronic conditions, thereby exacerbating their chronic conditions. Phone calls were the primary method of patient-provider communication during the pandemic. Conclusions The COVID-19 pandemic has had a profound impact on the delivery and utilization of essential healthcare services at PHC facilities, especially for those with chronic conditions who needed continuous care. Unified national-level guidance and technical capacity are needed to direct the provision of essential services at the PHC level, promote effective health communication, and implement digital platforms for the uninterrupted provision of essential care during public health emergencies.

Megaprojects are large-scale, complex initiatives that often encounter major disruptions during their life cycle. These disruptions have the potential to seriously impair the viability of the megaprojects. They may also cause severe damage to the economy in the region where they are emerging. To overcome disruptions, and to enhance their delivery performance, the strategic management concept of dynamic capabilities is being increasingly applied. In the context of megaproject owners, there is a need to understand what capabilities are required and how they are developed in the face of disruptions.Drawing upon longitudinal data over a period spanning 50 years for three megaprojects in the urban development (metro rail) domain, this study examines key disruptions that may influence the development of owner capabilities. Specifically, this study identifies four project capabilities: i) a strategic capability to continuously engage with, and manage external stakeholders, ii) a strategic capability to preserve value and transform the delivery process, iii) a governance capability to enhance organizational resilience, and iv) a commercial capability to manage knowledge and partnerships. Given that disruptions are repetitive in nature, owners would need these project capabilities to overcome disruptions.

This article presents an approach to planning rail freight transport taking into account the disruptions that occur during their implementation. The issues raised are related to the multi-aspect perception of factors influencing the organization of transport, in which immunity and safety play significant roles. The authors present an analysis of disruptions relating to the causes and effects of adverse events for selected traffic and operational parameters, including delays of freight trains in Poland from 2019-2022. The analysis of adverse events (accidents and serious accidents) in the rail transport system made it possible to present the rates of accidents when crossing tracks in prohibited places, at crossings on the public and separate networks, related to signals passed at danger events, and related to track works and the technical condition of rolling stock. In the case of the effects of adverse events, a rate was determined for freight train delays. The authors also developed a method for determining the value of disruptions in rail freight transport. A case study containing disruption quantification for a given freight train route is presented. The article emphasizes that a significant challenge in the rail transport sector is the proper organization of the operational activities of railway carriers concerning disruptions occurring during transport. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The healthcare sector stands as a cornerstone of every nation's economy, while playing a vital role in fostering the health and wellbeing of populations. Numerous studies have addressed the effective management of healthcare supply chains to ensure optimal healthcare provision. Implementing efficient strategies not only reduces costs but also enhances quality, efficiency, and adaptability. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed significant shortcomings in Healthcare Supply Chain (HSC) risk management strategies. This pandemic has shown that the HSC was unprepared for such disruption and that the traditional supply chain risk strategies followed are restrictive in tackling long-term global pandemic disruptions. To contribute to the current research on this topic, we introduce a framework that identifies and comprehends disruption risks, their origins, and impacts. Through a thorough literature review and interviews with HSC specialists, risks are identified and prioritized using Bayesian Belief Networks (BBN). The findings of this study seek to provide HSC decision-makers with valuable insights into the primary risks associated with HSC disruptions, paving the way for the development of effective mitigation strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study attempts to shed light on the nature of the contribution of digital learning orientation (DLO), as an intangible resource, to the development of the dynamic capability of supply chain data analytics powered by artificial intelligence (SCDA-AI) as well as to the moderation of its effects on the enhancement of the operational capabilities of supply chain flexibility (SCFL), supply chain resilience (SCRE) and supply chain responsiveness (SCRES) in order to stabilize and improve supply chain performance (SCPER) in times of uncertainties and disruptions. The study was based on survey data collected from 200 foreign companies based in Morocco. Respondents were mainly senior and middle managers with experience in general management and supply chain (SC). Validity and reliability analyses and hypothesis testing were carried out using structural equation modelling (SEM) with SPSS Amos. The results revealed that DLO acts as an antecedent to SCDA-AI without moderating its effects on the three operational capabilities of SCFL, SCRE and SCRES. In addition, this study provides further empirical evidence that dynamic capabilities can produce significant results in terms of stabilizing and improving performance through the generation and/or reconfiguration of operational capabilities in situations of uncertainties and disruptions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The situation of Spanish Early Career Researchers (ECRs) during the pandemic is presented, taking into account the main changes caused by confinement in their work habits and academic communication practices. Based on the information extracted from interviews and surveys, the transformations experienced in the following areas are analyzed: distance teaching, research production, the evaluation system and the metrics used, the progress of open science, peer review, ethically questionable practices, collaboration and networking, online meetings and conferences, scientific dissemination and outreach and the use of social networks. After the pandemic, some disruptions have reversed. However, others have remained. The pandemic has normalized the use of virtual and hybrid events and promoted researchers' dissemination practices, among other changes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social scripts, like A gives a compliment , B says 'thank you' , pervade and shape natural language discourse and social interactions. Scripts usually promote cooperation between conversational participants, but not always. For example, if A pays B a 'compliment' like 'nice legs' , A puts B in a double bind of either abiding by the compliment script by saying 'thank you' and being humiliated, or breaking the script and risking escalation. In this paper, I take a philosophical lens to the notion of a social script. I give a theoretical overview of what it would mean to disrupt a social script and explain why and when it is prudential to do so. Then I give several examples of disruptions of social scripts. This essay makes four key contributions to the philosophical literature on social scripts: (1) it introduces a new distinction between interpersonal and structural scripts; (2) it illuminates how interpersonal social scripts can be pernicious by creating a double bind; (3) it analyzes what it is to disrupt a social script; and (4) in doing so, it challenges the orthodoxy about the relationship between cooperation and disruption in political action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The available slack-based methods for measuring the robustness of schedule networks do not pay sufficient attention to the structural characteristics of such networks nor do they provide a comparison point for measuring the sensitivity to changes. This research fills these gaps by addressing a core research question: How can an integrative measure of schedule robustness be developed? To answer this question, this paper performs a centrality analysis to capture the structural characteristics of the schedule network. Further, it draws on the concept of perfect uniformity to establish a baseline for measuring the degree of schedule sensitivity to disruptions. Finally, it uses entropy theory to develop an integrative measure of schedule robustness by combining two classes of robustness measures: quality and solution robustness. An experimental analysis is undertaken to evaluate the statistical performance of the new measure. The validation results show a high inverse correlation between the proposed measure and a cost-based indicator of schedule performance; in turn, proving the better performance of the new measure compared to the two widely discussed and quoted slack-based measures of robustness. This can be ascribed to the ability of the new measure to simultaneously capture various attributes of a schedule network. The results of this research can assist decision makers in making informed decisions in the appraisal and monitoring phases of construction projects. This research provides the opportunity for future studies to extend the proposed method by incorporating resource-constrained and cost-related attributes of project activities into the formulation of schedule robustness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Families face challenging decisions about early care and education (ECE) for their children. Decisions about what is best for each child and family are constrained by family and contextual factors and are prone to disruptions. This study provides a descriptive look at patterns of ECE settings children were in the year prior to kindergarten, beginning in Fall 2019 through Spring 2021, a period during which most ECE arrangements were disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, and into the 2020–2021 kindergarten year. Analyses of survey (N = 121) and interview (n = 25) data from families whose children entered kindergarten in Fall 2020 revealed multiple and cascading disruptions during this time. Disruptions were nearly universal, and families made continual accommodations as they juggled employment needs and children's ECE needs. Findings from this study have implications for how actual and anticipated disruptions may have a greater influence on families' child care decision-making into the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Disruptions in the food supply chain are events that affect the flow of products and can be caused by extreme weather, natural disasters, conflicts, pandemics, and political situations, among others. These events can significantly impact food products' availability, quality, and cost, creating risks to the well-being of local populations and livelihoods. The specific literature on food supply chains needs to address other approaches to risk categorisation, which allow for establishing reference frameworks focused on the general classification of types of disruption and parameters related to solution methods. In this paper, we present a literature review to analyse the disruptions in the food supply chain. We classified 74 papers according to the types of disruptions, stakeholders, response level, supply chain echelon, solution methods, goals, and related considerations. The review results showed that the most common disruptions in the food supply chain are climatic, biological and environmental, logistics and infrastructure, and supply. The results of this review allow us to suggest some new research directions.

Introduction: This work explores the use of eXplainable artificial intelligence (XAI) to analyze a convolutional neural network (CNN) trained for disruption prediction in tokamak devices and fed with inputs composed of different physical quantities.Methods: This work focuses on a reduced dataset containing disruptions that follow patterns which are distinguishable based on their impact on the electron temperature profile. Our objective is to demonstrate that the CNN, without explicit training for these specific mechanisms, has implicitly learned to differentiate between these two disruption paths. With this purpose, two XAI algorithms have been implemented: occlusion and saliency maps.Results: The main outcome of this paper comes from the temperature profile analysis, which evaluates whether the CNN prioritizes the outer and inner regions.Discussion: The result of this investigation reveals a consistent shift in the CNN’s output sensitivity depending on whether the inner or outer part of the temperature profile is perturbed, reflecting the underlying physical phenomena occurring in the plasma.

The Port serves as a pivotal intermodal (rail and road) and international nexus, seamlessly connecting land-sea transportation across a dense network of European markets. Different disruptions, primarily originating from external forces, profoundly influence its stakeholder engagement strategies, data digitization efforts, and the pursuit of sustainable transformation.This paper delineates how the Port employs foresight methodologies to effectively address these disruptions. Providing a contextual backdrop, the paper outlines the Authority’s origins, organizational structure, core objectives, operational mandates, and mechanisms of accountability. The paper elucidates the ramifications of these disruptions on initiatives related to digitalization, environmental sustainability, and stakeholder management, offering a comprehensive analysis of their implications.

Unoccupied aerial vehicle (UAV) swarms have the ability to exhibit improved capabilities and performance when compared to individual UAVs. However, their target operation environment is fraught with disruptions, including communication limitations, sensor failures, and dynamic environmental conditions, which can significantly impact swarm performance and robustness. To address these challenges, the proposed unified swarm management and resource tracking (U-SMART) framework focuses on enabling resiliency within UAV swarms. Resiliency refers to the swarm's ability to adapt, recover, and maintain functionality in the face of disruptions. The framework integrates features such as agent well-being tracking, collision and obstacle avoidance, energy management, and task control to enhance the swarm's ability to withstand disruptions and continue operating effectively to provide a comprehensive solution for unified swarm management. The modular design allows flexible configuration, upgrades, and the addition of new components. This facilitates easy adaptation to specific swarm requirements and evolving operational needs. Using frameworks like U-SMART, swarm operators can efficiently manage and control UAV swarms, mitigate disruptions, and maintain high situational awareness in challenging environments. Performance is validated for the integrated modules to test feasibility for different experiment scenarios. For each module and feasibility test, thresholds were set to indicate acceptable performance in the presence of disruptions, and results for the swarm running on the proposed framework showed the acceptable performance of agents validated using explicitly designed metrics.

Efficient management of pharmaceutical supply chains during the COVID-19 pandemic is critical to mitigate material and human losses. This paper addresses the design of a pharmaceutical supply chain network under pandemic disruption, introducing a novel bi-objective mathematical model. Traditional supply chain management strategies often fall short in the face of sudden disruptions, necessitating the development of resilient systems. Our model seeks to minimise economic costs and shortages as primary objectives, addressing the specific challenge of sudden surges in demand for pharmaceuticals. To enhance resilience, we propose solutions including the establishment of temporary distribution points and the creation of backup inventory. We employ a scenario-based, discrete, and linear modelling approach, solving the model using goal-planning methods and validating its efficacy through numerical examples. Additionally, we conduct a case study in the metropolitan area of Mashhad, further demonstrating the applicability and effectiveness of our approach. This research contributes to the advancement of resilient supply chain design in the pharmaceutical sector, offering insights that can inform improved management practices and bolster resilience in pharmaceutical supply chains.

Purpose – First, this paper aims to identify and discuss the paradoxical relationship between theology and technology. Second, it also demonstrates the urgency of the digitalization of the Church ministry. Third, this paper offers an understanding of technology and theology through the missional perspective of the Church. Fourth, this paper asks the following questions: (1) Can the Church innovate ways of using technology while maintaining the social aspect of the organism? (2) Can organizations migrate to digital technology with adequate technology/human interface to engage innovations? (3) How can organizations renew their products via technological platforms? (4) From a socio-technical perspective on the digital era, can the Church keep abreast of its workforce in a way that provides adequate participative opportunities? and finally, this paper further interacts with views on the paradigm shift of practical theology and techno-theological practice and possible inclusion in the theology vocabularies of the Church. Design/methodology/approach – A thorough search on the subject of techno-theology (TTheo) reveals that there are no scholarly works that offer a conceptual understanding of TTheo. However, TTheo derives an interdisciplinary definition from innovative leadership, socio-religious transformation, transformational leadership, anthropological studies, strategic leadership (and authentic leader AL), scenario thinking/planning, technological disruptions, digital transformation and Church sustainability. There are multiple inferences in the literature on the advantages and disadvantages of technology in human relations (Banks et al., 2016; Dyer, 2011). Findings – Innovation is open-ended. It can take place anywhere and anytime. All it requires are human entities who are creative enough to respond appropriately. The author agrees with Goldsmith that innovation is not limited to a single aspect of any system (Goldsmith et al., 2010, p. xxiv). Innovation can occur anywhere, and there is no limit to it. The only hindrance to innovation is the lack of creative leaders, creative agents of change and an enabling environment to foster change (Teece, 2018, 2010; Bounfour, 2016; Hanna, 2016). While technological innovation is a good development, other factors drive innovation. Technological innovation is not an end by itself. It is a means to an end. And it cannot stand in isolation from other factors that support it. It competes with some external factors which can sustain it or obstruct it. Research limitations/implications – This paper used the traditional (or narrative), meta-analysis and meta-synthesis methods of literature reviews to study scenario thinking, system thinking, planning and TTheo principles to find a suitable space to redefine and reconstruct the Church’s ministry engagement in a technologically avowed age. This paper is not a technology text, nor does it pose to answer technology questions. Instead, it focuses on the role of technology in Christian ministry. Practical implications – This paper recommended that the Church redefines its digital transformation perspective by adopting a TTheo that embraces digital materials and hybrid technology in its ministry engagement across the board. This paper further interacts with views on the paradigm shift of practical theology and techno-theological practice and possible inclusion in the theology vocabularies of the Church. Social implications – Technology shapes human interactions in a sociopolitical, socioreligious and sociocultural environment (Dyer, 2011; Postman, 2021; McLauhan, 1994, p. 7). As a community of faith, the Church is a segment of the broader cultural environment with a cross-section of people from various works of life and opinions. Language, customs and practice differ significantly from others in every environment. Hence, each setting is unique in multiple ways (Teece, 2018, 2010). The world continues to experience developments in many areas. Due to the symbiotic nature of humans and the environment, cross-breeding and cross-fertilization of ideas are inevitable. As one organization reacts to its unique existence, it indirectly or directly affects another. Hence, while growth may be relative, its impacts are overtly universal. Originality/value – The term “Techno-theology” is a newcomer in the theological circle. Hence, there are practically little or minimal literature on this subject area. In this paper, the author has written the original concept of the subject matter (TTheo). This paper is part of the ground-breaking research the author is conducting on “Techno-theology.” The author’s PhD research proposal was approved in December 2022. The author’s research focuses on the subject matter of this paper (TTheo). The author also looks forward to leading a deeper conversation among scholars.

• We study the impact of supply information on an inventory system under disruptions. • We analyze two advance information regimes: full and partial delivery information. • We provide exact long-run average cost models for both regimes under a multi-mode extensions of (S, T) policy. • For both regimes, we derive closed form optimal EOQ type solutions for the policy variables. • Comparisons show the importance of advance delivery information for effective planning. In this paper, we consider the impact of advanced delivery information on the performance of supply chains facing endogenous disruptions. We study a single-echelon EOQ-based inventory model with backorders where the supplier could fail to deliver shipments on time following a Bernoulli process, a measure of the supplier service quality. Two extreme advance information regimes are analyzed: (1) full delivery information (FDI), where the timing of the next delivery is always known, and (2) partial delivery information (PDI), where the timing of the next delivery is known if it coincides with the next planned delivery. For both regimes, we use a natural adaptation of the base-stock policy, having multiple order up-to levels, each corresponding to the level of available information when ordering. We then model the long-run average cost and determine the policy variables that minimize this cost. While the analysis of the FDI model proved straightforward, the PDI model involved the solution of a mixed-integer nonlinear optimization problem. We found closed-form solutions for both models. Numerical results show that, by reducing planning uncertainty, advanced information directly reduces operating costs. They also show that the cost of the case of full information is higher than that of the EOQ model, suggesting the importance of finding reliable suppliers for disruption-free operations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic in late 2019 led to a global crisis of unprecedented scale and complexity that disrupted almost every aspect of human life. The pandemic has taken people, institutions and governments by surprise, so the impact of the virus has been profound and far-reaching. The rapid and relentless spread of the pandemic has challenged global health systems, strained economies, altered daily routines in educational settings and at work, and tested the resilience of communities worldwide. Different studies have identified vulnerabilities in the world's ability to respond to health emergencies at the individual and societal levels. This study presents a systematic literature review and theoretical analysis of the disruptions caused by COVID-19 to help formulate strategies that encourage flexibility and resilience in the face of such complex and interconnected disruptions. The article analyzes the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic through the prism of two main theories: the theory of situational crisis communications (type of crisis, its history, responsibility, perceived seriousness, predictable probability, crisis communications strategies, post-crisis reputation), as well as the theory of social learning (learning through observation, modeling and imitation, positive and negative reinforcement in the formation of behavior). In addition, the nature of society's adaptation to the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic is also considered through the prism of the theory of subversive innovations (progress in communication technologies, new methods of remote work and education, the entry of social networks into the business world, the introduction of asynchronous communication). The article summarizes the scientific progress on the following main consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic in the workplace, healthcare system, and education. The study provides recommendations on the steps that individuals, institutions and governments can take to increase readiness and ability to adapt to the next crisis (interdisciplinary cooperation, analysis of communication strategies, system analysis). The analysis conducted in the article also made it possible to outline the most promising directions for further qualitative intervention studies (in-depth case studies taking into account the specific context of regions, organizations or communities to identify effective and ineffective policies and practices; qualitative interviews with key stakeholders to understand the intricacies of decision-making in the context of the pandemic crisis); qualitative action studies (building community resilience, collaborative research efforts involving policymakers, health experts and community representatives to develop crisis response policies jointly) and quantitative studies (analysis of pandemic spread, impact of vaccination on disease control, analysis of the economic effects of the pandemic, etc.). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Despite crises being a dominant theme in organizational research, little inquiry has been conducted into how small firms built resilience and coped with uncertainties created by the COVID-19 pandemic. In this study, we explore the challenges faced by small firms during this crisis and how they handled it and built resilience. We collected qualitative data using the open-ended essay method to answer our research questions. Findings reveal that small firms encountered challenges that were predominantly related to employees, technology, and liquidity. Three key paradoxes also emerged during the crisis: short-term and long-term performance, efficiency and adaptability, and safety and profit. The findings further revealed that small firms employed digitalization, prior and new knowledge, and leadership to cope with these challenges. By elucidating these challenges and coping strategies, the research contributes to the existing literature on resilience in small firms. Our findings emphasize that the survival prospects of small firms during the COVID-19 crisis depended on understanding potential paradoxes that needed to be resolved and utilizing the coping mechanisms developed to build resilience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]