This paper empirically investigates the impact of exchange rate volatility on the real exports in India using the ARDL bounds testing procedure proposed by Pesaran et al. (2001). Using annual time series data, the empirical analyses has been carried out for the period 1970 to 2011. The study results confirm that real exports are cointegrated with exchange rate volatility, real exchange rate, gross domestic product and foreign economic activity. Our findings indicate that the exchange rate volatility has significant negative impact on real exports both in the short-run and long-run, implying that higher exchange rate fluctuation tends to reduce real exports in India. Besides, the real exchange rate has negative short-run and positive long-run effects on real exports. The empirical results reveal that GDP has a positive and significant impact on India’s real exports in the long-run, but the impact turns out to be insignificant in the short-run. In addition, the foreign economic activity exerts significant negative and positive impact on real exports in the short-run and long-run, respectively.

Beams are the constituent elements of several machine parts and sophisticated structures. In this paper, efforts are made to develop suitable methods that can serve as the basis to detect crack location and to crack size from measured axial vibration data. This method is used to address the inverse problem of assessing the crack location and crack size in various beam structure. The method is based on measurement of axial natural frequencies, which are global parameter and can be easily measured from any point on the structure. In theoretical analysis, the relationship between the natural frequencies, crack location, and crack size has been developed. For identification of crack location and crack size, it was shown that data on the variation of the first two natural frequencies is sufficient. The experimental analysis is done to verify the practical applicability of the theoretical method developed.

Nowadays, environmental issues are considered as the most important factor for competition. In this era, just modern companies can compete with each other and any environment friendly firm plays essential role in gaining more market share. Besides, the 21st century is the era of modern steel and Iranian iron steel industry plays important role in the domestic and international trade only through emphasizing on protection of environment. Therefore, designing a model for strengthening the environmental performance in steel industries is necessary to get some advantages such as energy saving, reducing pollutants, eliminating (declining) of waste, creating value for customers and improving the productivity. In this research, first, we explain green supply chain management and then grey-based DEMATEL Technique is used to identify different factors influencing the green supply chain. Eventually, the green supply chain model (GSCM) is applied for the steel industry. The result determines the most prominence factors of GSCM in Yazd Steel Industry.

Lightweight concrete is a suitable constructional material, which can decrease the weight of buildings and the hazards of earthquake loads. Hence, a large number of research studies have been focused on designing and manufacturing high strength lightweight concretes. In this research using the natural and industrial lightweight aggregates frequently found in the south-east region of Iran (Kerman province), high strength and low cost light weight concretes were manufactured. The effects of aggregate type, aggregate size, and concrete mixture were studied experimentally on the compressive strength of concretes and the density and cost of manufactured samples.

An important problem in control chart implementation is the availability of resources to collect and analyze data for control charts implementation. This paper proposes a method to prioritize and select final product parameters to control. The prioritization is based on cost of quality and technical criticality of those parameters. The prioritization method is demonstrated by a case study of flexible printed circuit manufacturing.

In the present study, the nonlinear forced vibration of symmetric laminated rectangular plates, including Glare fiber metal laminated rectangular plate, is investigated based on the first order shear deformation theory. The boundary condition is considered to be immovable simply support. The Galerkin method is used to obtain the nonlinear ordinary differential equation in terms of an unknown time function. The obtained equation is solved analytically by the multiple time scales method. The obtained results are compared with the numerical solution of the nonlinear ordinary differential equation of motion and a good agreement is found between them.

Leagile supply chain management has emerged as a proactive approach for improving business value of companies. The companies that face volatile and unpredictable market demand of their products must pioneer in leagile supply chain strategy for competition and various demands of customers. There are literally many approaches for performance metrics of supply chain in general, yet little investigation has identified the reliability and validity of such approaches particularly in leagile supply chains. This study examines the consistency approaches by confirmatory factor analysis that determines the adoption of performance dimensions. The prioritization of performance enablers under these dimensions of leagile supply chain in small and medium enterprises are determined through fuzzy logarithmic least square method (LLSM). The study developed a generic hierarchy model for decision-makers who can prioritize the supply chain metrics under performance dimensions of leagile supply chain.

Finite element method is used to study the free vibration analysis of functionally graded skew plates. The material properties of the skew plates are assumed to vary continuously through their thickness according to a power-law distribution of the volume fractions of the plate constituents. The first order shear deformation theory is used to incorporate the effects of transverse shear deformation and rotary inertia. Convergence study with respect to the number of nodes has been carried out and the results are compared with those from past investigations available in the literature. Two types of functionally graded skew plates - Al/ZrO2 and Al/Al2O3 are considered in this study and the effects of the volume fraction, different external boundary conditions and thickness ratio on the natural frequencies are studied in detail.

In this paper, butt joining of Al5083 to commercially pure copper is investigated by friction stir welding method. The effects of transverse welding speed of the tool on the mechanical properties and microstructure of the joint were studied, experimentally. By examining different circumstances, changes in the joint strength were studied and optimized in term of transverse speed. Based on the obtained results, welding speed can improve or reduce the joint strength and an optimum value can be found for the welding speed. Welded Joint that was conducted at the rotation speed of 800 RPM and tool traverse speed of 60 mm min?1 had the highest tensile strength (i.e. about 98% of the weak base metal). Intermetallic compounds were formed in the stir zone and XRD results indicated that Al4Cu9 and Al2Cu were the intermetallic compounds in the stir zone. Micro-cracks formed around the intimatelic particles were observed in the section of joint.

This paper presents production-inventory models for deteriorating items with increasing-steady-decreasing demand pattern under the effect of inflation and time value of money. This type of demand behavior can be observed in some fashion products or seasonal products in general. Shortages are allowed with partial backlogging of demand and a two-parameter Weibull-distribution function is used for the deterioration of items in order to make the models more generalized and realistic. The models generate optimal values of initial production run time, onset of shortages, production recommencement time, and total production quantity that minimizes the total relevant costs of production and inventory for any given set of system parameters. Various possible production strategies available for items with variable demand pattern are examined to determine the optimal production strategy. The discounted cash flow approach and trust region optimization methods are used to obtain the optimal results. The Numerical examples and sensitivity analysis show that the optimal production strategy may vary with changes in system parameters.