Special Issue "Cutting Edge Research on Sustainable Product and Systems Development"

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Economic and Business Aspects of Sustainability".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 August 2022.

Special Issue Editors

Dr. António J. Baptista
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Institute of Science and Innovation in Mechanical and Industrial Engineering (INEGI), Porto, Portugal
Interests: product and system development; complex system descriptive modelling; multi-dimensional and agnostic performance framework design; sustainability and circular economy
Special Issues and Collections in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Marco Leite
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Technical University of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal
Interests: materials and technology evaluation and selection; product development; composite materials; mechanical design; rapid prototyping; additive manufacturing
Special Issues and Collections in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Climate change mitigation imposes urgent changes on new products and system design. The design of sustainable products involves holistic approaches, methodologies, and tools, namely within the paradigm of circular economy by ruling out waste and greenhouse gas emissions, and the application of R-Imperatives. In this context, precise evaluation and management of the product’s life cycle, and related impacts (environmental, economic, social), can actively contribute to the achievement of sustainability of products’ and systems’ life spans and multiple use-phases. Regarding system design, new approaches and guidelines must be introduced, not just in terms of a new system design (e.g., production systems), but also to modify existent systems toward an extended life span, with the overall goal of reducing environmental impacts.

This Special Issue will comprise a selection of papers developing and deploying approaches, methods, and tools for assessing, designing, and managing products and systems from a cutting-edge sustainability perspective for contemporary challenges. Research papers should present and discuss, among others:

  • Approaches, methods, and tools to evaluate and decision support selection toward design alternatives, based on sustainability criteria assessment;
  • Strategies and guidelines to incorporate sustainability assessment, in the early design phase activities of new products and systems, or redesign of products or existing systems;
  • Design frameworks and approaches to ensure the accurate lifecycle management of new products and systems;
  • Models and tools to support informed and sustainability-based decisions during products’ or systems’ life cycle assessment (environmental, economic and social);
  • Strategies and tools for incorporating circular economy-oriented design, such by R-Imperatives (Design for: efficiency; -reuse, -retrofit, -refurbish, -remanufacture, -repurpose, -recycle, -end of life, etc.), bio-based solutions and material application, design leveraging by industrial symbiosis (waste and secondary materials into new products);
  • Implementation frameworks toward sustainable products, via new circular business models combining products and services.

These topics can be addressed by revision-based papers proposing guidelines for design and/or management frameworks or approaches, by research-based papers demonstrating the benefits and limitations of the proposed strategies or methods, or by case study papers exploring and validating tools and models’ applications.

Papers selected for this Special Issue will be subject to a rigorous peer-review procedure with the aim of rapid and wide dissemination of research results, developments, and applications.

Dr. António J. Baptista
Prof. Dr. Marco Leite
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All papers will be peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • sustainable design
  • eco-design
  • circular design
  • sustainability
  • circular economy
  • product development
  • systems design
  • Design-for-X, R-Imperatives
  • circular business models
  • product-service sustainability

Published Papers

This special issue is now open for submission.
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