IEE 594: Industrial Engineering Graduate Seminar

A literature review summaries the knowledge of a particular area or field of study.   A literature review may stand alone as an individual document in which the subject is analyzed for trends, controversial issues, and what still needs to be study; these "review articles" are valuable time-savers for professionals and researchers who need a quick introduction or analysis in that subject area.  

Examples of review articles: 

• Brady, J., & Allen, T. (2006).  Six Sigma literature: A review and agenda for future research. Quality and Reliability Engineering International, 22(3), 335-367. doi: 10.1002/qre.769
  http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com.ezproxy1.lib.asu.edu/doi/10.1002/qre.769/abstract 
  
  
• Wedde, H.F., & Farooq, M. (2006).  A comprehensive review of nature inspired routing algorithms for fixed telecommuication networks.  Journal of Systems Architecture, 52(8), 461-484.  doi: 10.1016/j.sysarc.2006.02.005
  http://www.sciencedirect.com.ezproxy1.lib.asu.edu/science/article/pii/S1383762106000178  
  
  

Literature reviews are also part of dissertations/theses, research reports and scholarly journal articles; these types of documentation include a literature review in a chapter/section that discusses what hs gone bfore and how that supports the issue under current study.  Without a thoroguh literature review the academic may be repeating research that has already been discovered and the professional may be lising time and money to recreate from scrathch what is already available. 

Expamples of items that contain a literature review as a part of the document: 

• Vidal, R., Crainic, T.G., Gendreau, M., & Prins, C. (2013).  A hybrid genetic algortihm with adaptive diversity managment for a large class of vehicle routing problems with time-windows.  Computers & Operations Research, 40(1), 475.  doi: 10.1016/j.cor.2012.07.018
  http://www.sciencedirect.com.ezproxy1.lib.asu.edu/science/article/pii/S0305054812001645
  
  
  
• Ana Beatriz Lopes de Sousa Jabbour, Alceu Gomes Alves Filho, Adriana Backx Noronha Viana, & Charbel Jose Chiappetta Jabbour. (2011). Measuring supply chain management practices.  Measuring Business Excellence, 15(2), 18-31.  doi: 10.1108/13683041111131592 
  http://www.emeraldinsight.com.ezproxy1.lib.asu.edu/journals.htm?articleid=1926206&show=abstract 
  
  
  

The research databases and searching techniques are the same for both types of literature reviews; however, how they are written and their purposes are different.  

Continue on to the next section "The Process"

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