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This study aims to investigate the impact of authentic leaders on the performance of educational leaders in public and private universities in Pakistan. The study further examines the moderating role of social capital in this relationship.

The authors collected data from 259 academic heads of public and private universities and tested hypotheses using macro PROCESS.

The findings demonstrate that authentic leaders have a significant positive effect on team leader performance in both public and private universities. In addition, the authors establish that the positive impact of authentic leaders on team leader performance is stronger among employees with high social capital.

The education literature lacks evidence of the process through which authentic leaders influence team leader performance. The study is unprecedented in assessing whether social capital moderates the direct influence of authentic leaders on team leader performance.

This study examines the impact of five dimensions of decent work on the faculty engagement in Pakistan’s higher education institutions. Furthermore, it examines the moderating influence of intrinsic religiosity on the associations above.

This research employed a cross-sectional approach to collect data from 542 faculty members working with higher education institutions through electronic and in-person questionnaire administration.

The findings indicate that safe interpersonal working conditions, opportunities for free time and rest, adequate compensation, and the availability of healthcare services significantly positively impact the level of work engagement among faculty members. Additionally, the research revealed that intrinsic religiosity reinforces the previously established significant associations.

The research acknowledges specific constraints that could impact the applicability of its findings, including the utilization of a cross-sectional methodology, the dependence on self-reported information, and the possibility of sample biases. Subsequent investigations may rectify these constraints to provide a more all-encompassing comprehension of the subject matter.

The findings possess practical significance for the management of HEIs in cultivating an ideal working atmosphere for faculty members. Ensuring adequate compensation, secure working environments and healthcare accessibility is underscored to enhance faculty engagement. Furthermore, acknowledging the significance of intrinsic religiosity can improve faculty engagement.

This research contributes to the current body of literature by investigating the complex relationship among decent work, faculty engagement, and intrinsic religiosity in the specific context of higher education institutions in Pakistan.

The purpose of this paper is to design an output-feedback algorithm based on low-power observer (LPO), robust chattering-free controller and nonlinear disturbance observer (DO) to achieve trajectory tracking of quadrotor in the Cartesian plane.

To achieve trajectory tracking control, firstly the decoupled rotational and translational model of quadrotor are modified by introducing backstepped state-space variables. In the second step, robust integral sliding mode control is designed based on the proportional-integral-derivative (PID) technique. In the third step, a DO is constructed. In next step, the measurable outputs, i.e. rotational and translational state variables, are used to design the LPO. Finally, in the control algorithm all state variables and its rates are replaced with its estimates obtained using the state-observer.

The finding includes output-feedback control (OFC) algorithm designed by using a LPO. A modified backstepping model for rotational and rotational systems is developed prior to the design of integral sliding mode control based on PID technique. Unlike traditional high-gain observers (HGO), this paper used the LPO for state estimation of quadrotor systems to solve the problem of peaking phenomenon in HGO. Furthermore, a nonlinear DO is designed such that it attenuates disturbance with unknown magnitude and frequency. Moreover, a chattering reduction criterion has been introduced to solve the inherited chattering issue of controllers based on sliding mode technique.

This paper presents input and output data-driven model-free control algorithm. That is, only input and output of the quadrotor model are required to achieve the trajectory tracking control. Therefore, for practical implementation, the number of on-board sensor is reduced.

Although extensive research has been done for designing OFC algorithms for quadrotor, LPO has never been implemented for the rotational and translational state estimations of quadrotor. Furthermore, the mathematical model of rotational and translational systems is modified by using backstepped variables followed by the controller designed using PID and integral sliding mode control technique. Moreover, a DO is developed for attenuation of disturbance with unknown bound, magnitude and frequency.

Academic rankings are facing various issues, including the use of data sources that are not publicly verifiable, subjective parameters, a narrow focus on research productivity and regional biases and so forth. This research work is intended to enhance creditability of the ranking process by using the objective indicators based on publicly verifiable data sources.

The proposed ranking methodology – OpenRank – drives the objective indicators from two well-known publicly verifiable data repositories: the ArnetMiner and DBpedia.

The resultant academic ranking reflects common tendencies of the international academic rankings published by the Shanghai Ranking Consultancy (SRC), Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) and Times Higher Education (THE). Evaluation of the proposed methodology advocates its effectiveness and quick reproducibility with low cost of data collection.

Implementation of the OpenRank methodology faced the issue of availability of the quality data. In future, accuracy of the academic rankings can be improved further by employing more relevant public data sources like the Microsoft Academic Graph, millions of graduate's profiles available in the LinkedIn repositories and the bibliographic data maintained by Association for Computing Machinery and Scopus and so forth.

The suggested use of open data sources would offer new dimensions to evaluate academic performance of the higher education institutions (HEIs) and having comprehensive understanding of the catalyst factors in the higher education.

The research work highlighted the need of a purposely built, publicly verifiable electronic data source for performance evaluation of the global HEIs. Availability of such a global database would help in better academic planning, monitoring and analysis. Definitely, more transparent, reliable and less controversial academic rankings can be generated by employing the aspired data source.

We suggested a satisfying solution for improvement of the HEIs' ranking process by making the following contributions: (1) enhancing creditability of the ranking results by merely employing the objective performance indicators extracted from the publicly verifiable data sources, (2) developing an academic ranking methodology based on the objective indicators using two well-known data repositories, the DBpedia and ArnetMiner and (3) demonstrating effectiveness of the proposed ranking methodology on the real data sources.

The purpose of the study is to examine the sliding wear performance of plasma transfer arc (PTA) deposited and laser surface melted (LSM) Mo modified Stellite 12 hardfacings under high contact stresses (i.e. >20 GPa).

For this purpose, after structural characterization, sliding wear tests have been conducted using sphero-conical diamond indenter as the counterface with different normal loads. The wear tracks formed on the hardfacings were examined by atomic force microscopy and scanning electron microscopy.

Both hardfacings showed severe wear (at high contact stress levels ranging from 24 to 41 GPa), which progressed by plastic deformation, although the wear resistance of LSMed hardfacings was better than the PTA hardfacings by a factor of two due to its near surface microstructure characterized as carbide-rich zone.

Sliding wear characterization of a promising 10 Wt.% Mo modified version of commercial Stellite 12 hardfacings (as reported previously by authors) was done in as PTA and LSMed states using nanomechanical test system. To the best of authors’ knowledge, no report is available in the open literature on such hardfacings under these testing conditions.

The purpose of the study is to identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in higher education regarding distance learning system in Pakistan.

A mixed-method research design was used in this study. The population of the study was all the previous students of research work and all the teachers of these students working at MPhil and PhD level in AIOU in Pakistan. Stratified random sampling technique was used in this study. This study used the questionnaire and interview technique to collect data. Data of questionnaire was in numbers and data of interview was narrative. So it was the need of the study that a mixed-method approach, i.e. both quantitative and qualitative techniques should be used in this study.

The findings of the study show that AIOU has also strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in higher education related to distance education like all the formal and distance universities of Pakistan and World. This study reflected that AIOU is a great blessing for those who cannot acquire their education regularly because of financial/family problems or they are job holders. But this study also described that at higher level students are facing a lot of problems especially there is a delay in research process and provision of no scholarships to students. The teachers have a low salary package than the other public universities of Pakistan and a lot of responsibilities to attend meetings, seminars, conferences and workshops. So they have less time for research work. And AIOU provides them fewer opportunities to go abroad for further studies or to attend conferences/seminars. This study recommended that there should be adopted such policies in AIOU that students could get their study materials, assignments duration, workshops schedule and degrees in time, the teachers of the concerned departments should allow to take more in numbers the students under their supervision, the pay package for the teachers working at MPhil and PhD level should be raised and the opportunities for the faculty members to go.

This study is limited to analyze the higher education system especially the distance learning system in Pakistan.

This study has indicated the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in higher education which the AIOU is facing recently and the policymakers can develop plans/strategies to make better the distance learning system especially at higher level in Pakistan. This study can be helpful for the stakeholders who are interested in distance learning system. This study was conducted at higher level in the distance learning system but it can open the ways for the other researchers to conduct research in other disciplines related to distance education, i.e. at matric level, F.A/F.SC, B.Sc programs, Master level and M.Sc programs at AIOU.

Through this study, it can be acknowledged how the AIOU is providing the opportunity of education to a large number of people in the society who cannot study regularly in the formal institutions especially those who are job holders, some financial problems and women who have some family problems and above one million people are benefitting from AIOU in Pakistan and world.

This study is original in this respect because the data has been collected from the participants, i.e. students and teachers of AIOU. And it has also great value because this is the first SWOT analysis which has been conducted in this university to examine the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats facing AIOU at present time. This study can also become a base for the stakeholders', i.e. policymakers, administration and higher education depart. of Pakistan in developing strategies to improve and amend the distance learning system of Pakistan especially at higher level in AIOU.

The purpose of this paper is to observe whether measurement of social capital is an effective tool or can be used as a standard tool for community‐based initiatives (CBI) evaluation. It also points at the significance of social capital in the health related grass root initiatives.

CBI is an integrated socio‐economic development approach implemented by the organized communities, supported by inter‐sectoral actions for improvement of quality of life and health of the people. Support by WHO's office of Eastern Mediterranean Region, Islamic Republic of Iran implement programmes like basic development needs, healthy cities, healthy villages and women in health and development, that are evaluated during 2005‐2006. Social capital, that includes the networking, sharing norms and cooperation amongst communities, is measured as one of the indicators during the evaluation, by surveying 240 households in three CBI and three control villages, using the World Bank's, Social Development Department's Social Capital Assessment Tool for data collection.

The evaluation results reveal that the social capital indicators like affiliation percentage; trust reciprocity; and collective action are better in CBI areas than their controls. CBI areas have a better access to public services, are more peaceful, people are more willing to help others and there is less segregation due to income and social status.

The evaluation findings support the use of social capital indicators for investigating the impact and affectivity of CBI for health and development, and underlines the need for their consideration during implementation processes and further investigation.

This paper aims to assess the influence of a set of human and organizational factors in information system deployments on the probability that a number of security‐related mistakes are in the deployment.

A Bayesian network (BN) is created and analyzed over the relationship between mistakes and causes. The BN is created by eliciting qualitative and quantitative data from experts of industrial control system deployments in the critical infrastructure domain.

The data collected in this study show that domain experts have a shared perception of how strong the influence of human and organizational factors are. According to domain experts, this influence is strong. This study also finds that security flaws are common in industrial control systems operating critical infrastructure.

The model presented in this study is created with the help of a number of domain experts. While they agree on qualitative structure and quantitative parameters, future work should assure that their opinion is generally accurate.

The influence of a set of important variables related to organizational/human aspects on information security flaws is presented.

The context of this study is deployments of systems that operate nations' critical infrastructure. The findings suggest that initiatives to secure such infrastructures should not be purely technical.

Previous studies have focused on either the causes of security flaws or the actual flaws that can exist in installed information systems. However, little research has been spent on the relationship between them. The model presented in this paper quantifies such relationships.

The growth of sustainable tourism has emerged as a major topic of discussion on a global scale, and the hospitality industry is playing a crucial part in the achievement of this goal. The hospitality industry in China is experiencing rapid growth, and with the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI), the country may be able to realize sustainable growth in the tourism sector. Within the context of the Chinese hospitality industry, this chapter investigated the role AI plays in promoting sustainable tourism and how the Chinese government is supporting the hospitality industry in doing so. Sustainable tourism practices increase travellers' trip experiences while protecting the environment and local people; however, China could invest more in AI technology to promote sustainable tourism, which might benefit the economy, environment and society. This chapter examines AI deployment in the Chinese hotel industry and its challenges and benefits. AI technology can increase service quality, operational efficiency and hospitality operators' competitiveness, according to the authors. AI application requires careful consideration of employee training, ethics and customer privacy.

This book is essential for anyone in artificial intelligence (AI) and destination management in the tourism industry or government. The book includes both theoretical and practical writings for stakeholders. In all chapters, we provide titles including AI, regenerative and green destinations, sustainable tourism, tourist motivations and expectations, good examples of smart destinations and regions, the regeneration of the tourism industry via AI, rethinking tourism activities and products, current issues in robots, self-service technology, effect of pandemic on smart destinations, sustainable gastronomy and regenerative tourism and tourism issues are discussed in the management plans of the centralisation. This book provides cases and empirical studies that deal in depth with the current situation, challenges, solutions and future strategies after technological development of tourism and increasing interest on smart destinations from a responsible perspective, for readers with an equitable interest or involvement with the organizations in inquiry.