Research4life Initiative, International Transactions in Operational Research, and 15th PhD student to be defending

Today I received an email message from Dr. Celso Carneiro Ribeiro of Brazil, who is the Editor of the journal, International Transactions in Operational Research (ITOR), that this journal will be added to the list of journals included in the Research4Life Initiative, which provides low-cost access for developing nations to journal content. Wiley-Blackwell, the publisher of ITOR (and our Fragile Networks book, as well), is committed to the Research4Life initiative. In particular, Wiley-Blackwell is a member of the International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers and ITOR, with its overarching theme of Operations Research, is applicable to all three areas covered by the initiative, that is, health, agriculture, and the environment. I urge you to read up on the Research4Life initiative and note that the testimonials are very touching. Research4Life is a partnership seeking to help out in achieving the United Nation's Millennium Development goals.

I am very honored to be a member of the Editorial Board of ITOR and the paper, co-authored with Trisha Woolley and Patrick Qiang, entitled, "Multiproduct Supply Chain Horizontal Network Integration: Models, Theory, and Computational Results," has now been published online by this journal. Coincidently, Patrick Qiang was my 14th PhD student to complete his dissertation (in May 2009) and Trisha Woolley will be defending her doctoral dissertation, entitled, Sustainable Supply Chains: Multicriteria Decision-Making and Policy Analysis for the Environment, next month. She will be my 15th PhD student, quite the milestone! Trisha Woolley begins next week her tenure-track Assistant Professorship at Texas Wesleyan University in its School of Management.

It is terrific to have students who are carrying out research on sustainable supply chains and policy interventions ranging from carbon taxes to tradable pollution permit systems (also known as cap and trade systems). Some of our recent research publications and studies can be found on the Virtual Center for Supernetworks website.

My former doctoral students who have conducted research on transportation, supply chains, and environmental concerns have now assumed positions in such universities as the University of Sydney in Australia, York University in Canada, the University of Connecticut, DePaul University in Chicago, and two different Penn State campuses. One of my former doctoral students, Dr. Padma Ramanujam, whose dissertation received the Transportation Science dissertation prize, is with SAS in North Carolina. Needless to say, I am so very proud of all those students, whose doctoral dissertations I have had the privilege to chair!