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This research evaluates the impact of sales promotional tools, namely coupon, price discount, free sample, bonus pack, and in‐store display, on product trial and repurchase behaviour of consumers. In addition, the moderation role of fear of losing face (or embarrassment) on the relationship between the sales promotional tools and product trial was examined. The sample points for the research were supermarkets in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia. A total of 420 randomly selected customers were surveyed using structured questionnaire, out of which, 312 usable responses were received. The results of data analysis show that price discounts, free samples, bonus packs, and in‐store display are associated with product trial. Coupon does not have any significant effect on product trial. Trial determines repurchase behaviour and also mediates in the relationship between sales promotions and repurchase. Fear of losing face significantly moderates the relationship between in‐store display and product trial. Details of the findings and their implications are discussed.

This paper's aim is to study the tribological properties of hyrid monolayer composited by γ‐mercapto‐propyl trimethoxysilane (MPTS) and γ‐methacryloxy propyltrimethoxysilane (MPTES), and estimated the action mechanism.

MPTS‐MPTES were self‐assembled on a hydroxylated silicon substrate to form a two‐dimensional hybrid monolayer. Atomic force microscope (AFM), X‐ray photoelectron spectrometry and contact angle measurement were used to characterize the MPTS‐MPTES hybrid self‐assembled monolayer (SAM). The macrofriction and wear behaviors of the film sliding against an AISI‐52100 steel ball were examined on a unidirectional friction and wear tester, and the worn surface morphologies were observed on an AFM.

The tribological results show that the friction coefficient of silicon substrate reduces from 0.86 to 0.18 after the formation of the MPTS‐MPTES hybrid SAM on its surface, and the thin film has a long wear life (2,620 sliding pass). It is demonstrated that the MPTS‐MPTES SAM exhibited good wear resistant property with a low friction coefficient, and the superior friction reduction and wear life were attributed to the low surface energy and the characteristics of the hybrid SAM.

The film's tribological performance under dynamic load is not estimated.

A hybrid monolayer with superior tribological property was synthesized on a silicon substrate by self‐assembly process, and maybe it is the potential solution for micro‐electromechanical‐system lubrication.

This paper provides a study way of hybrid SAM on a silicon substrate as lubricating coating.

The authors discuss the case of Whang-od, a renowned and revered tattooist in the Philippines, whose skill with batok (traditional tattoos) has generated worldwide attention. While batok was originally designed for a warrior class to signify their power and elite status, it has been transformed into a commodity for national and global audiences and promoted via social media. Utilizing participation observation of, and interviews with, visitors to the village where Whang-od lives, the authors show how this form of “ethnic tourism” is built around the status of batok as an authentic practice that influences both the ways that locals present, and tourists, try to consume, the culture of the village.

BY 1985 half the cars in Britain will be leased as companies throughout the country step up the general move to leasing. Such has been the thumbs‐up approval given to leasing that the business has rocketed 80 times in the last four years; today, over £450m worth of cars on British roads are leased. What's more, the trend is accelerating despite tax changes in the last two budgets.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of a key logistics and distribution variable, case pack quantity, on a consumer packaged goods (CPG) manufacturing firm's performance. The paper builds theory with respect to case pack quantity's dichotomous impact on the retail shelf replenishment process and subsequent impact on market share depending on product rate‐of‐sale (ROS).

The study empirically tests the case pack quantity phenomenon using monthly in‐store data collected over a two year time period, market share data and data provided by a leading US CPG manufacturer in the ready‐to‐eat cereal category. Regression analysis is used to determine if case pack quantity significantly impacts firm market share.

According to compelling theoretical and empirical evidence, the number of units per retail shipping container (case pack quantity) has a significant impact on retail market share. The evidence indicates that the effect of case pack quantity on market share depends upon the ROS of a given stock‐keeping unit (SKU). For faster selling SKUs, larger case packs should increase market share. For slower selling SKUs, larger case pack quantities reduce market share because of additional stockouts at the retail level, resulting from execution problems caused by the larger case pack quantities.

Given the study's findings, CPG manufacturing firms must align case pack quantities with SKU ROS to positively affect the shelf replenishment process.

The paper demonstrates that case pack quality has a significant impact on retail market share.

Identifies a set of manufacturing data interfaces that could be standardized for the effective computer integration of the information required to operate an apparel manufacturing enterprise. The interfaces are called Application Protocols. Describes a method using pieces of information, referred to as Units of Functionality, as building blocks for designing Application Protocols.

Man has been seeking an ideal existence for a very long time. In this existence, justice, love, and peace are no longer words, but actual experiences. How ever, with the American preemptive invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq and the subsequent prisoner abuse, such an existence seems to be farther and farther away from reality. The purpose of this work is to stop this dangerous trend by promoting justice, love, and peace through a change of the paradigm that is inconsistent with justice, love, and peace. The strong paradigm that created the strong nation like the U.S. and the strong man like George W. Bush have been the culprit, rather than the contributor, of the above three universal ideals. Thus, rather than justice, love, and peace, the strong paradigm resulted in in justice, hatred, and violence. In order to remove these three and related evils, what the world needs in the beginning of the third millenium is the weak paradigm. Through the acceptance of the latter paradigm, the golden mean or middle paradigm can be formulated, which is a synergy of the weak and the strong paradigm. In order to understand properly the meaning of these paradigms, however, some digression appears necessary.

This paper aims to propose a new microfluidic portable experimental platform for quick detection of heavy metal ions (HMIs) in picomolar range. The experimental setup uses a microfabricated piezoresistive sensor (MPS) array of eight cantilevers with ion-selective self-assembled monolayer's (SAM).

Most of the components used in this experimental setup are battery operated and, hence, portable to perform the on-field experiments. HMIs (antigen) and thiol-based SAM (antibody) interaction start bending the microcantilever. This results in a change of resistance, which is directly proportional to the surface stress produced due to the mass of targeted HMIs. The authors have used Cysteamine and 4-Mercaptobenzoic acid as a thiol for creating SAM to test the sensitivity and identify the suitable thiol. Some of the cantilevers are blocked using acetyl chloride to use as a reference for error detection.

The portable experimental platform achieves very small detection time of 10-25 min with a lower limit of detection (LOD) 0.762 ng (6.05 pM) for SAM of Cysteamine and 4-Mercaptobenzoic acid to detect Mn2+ ions. This technique has excellent potential and capability to selectively detect Hg2+ ions as low as 2.43 pM/mL using SAM of Homocysteine (Hcys)-Pyridinedicarboxylic acid (PDCA).

As microcantilever is very thin and fragile, it is challenging to apply a surface coating to have selective detection using Nanadispenser. Some of the cantilevers get broken during this process.

The excessive use and commercialization of NPs are quickly expanding their toxic impact on health and the environment. Also, LOD is limited to nanomolar range. The proposed method used the combination of thin-film, NPs, and MEMS-based technology to overcome the limitation of NPs-based technique and have picomolar range of HMIs detection.