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In this article, the most common method by which private equity firms value potential private company acquisitions – “discounted cash-flow” – is deconstructed and simplified for lawyers. For an M&A lawyer, a deeper understanding of how companies are valued can be an important aid to providing effective advice to private equity clients.

BACKGROUND: Access to affordable inhaled medicines for chronic respiratory diseases (CRDs) is severely limited in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), causing avoidable morbidity and mortality. The International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease convened a stakeholder meeting on this topic in February 2022.METHODS: Focused group discussions were informed by literature and presentations summarising experiences of obtaining inhaled medicines in LMICs. The virtual meeting was moderated using a topic guide around barriers and solutions to improve access. The thematic framework approach was used for analysis.RESULTS: A total of 58 key stakeholders, including patients, healthcare practitioners, members of national and international organisations, industry and WHO representatives attended the meeting. There were 20 pre-meeting material submissions. The main barriers identified were 1) low awareness of CRDs; 2) limited data on CRD burden and treatments in LMICs; 3) ineffective procurement and distribution networks; and 4) poor communication of the needs of people with CRDs. Solutions discussed were 1) generation of data to inform policy and practice; 2) capacity building; 3) improved procurement mechanisms; 4) strengthened advocacy practices; and 5) a World Health Assembly Resolution.CONCLUSION: There are opportunities to achieve improved access to affordable, quality-assured inhaled medicines in LMICs through coordinated, multi-stakeholder, collaborative efforts. Funder: Medical Research Council

“Missing markers problem”, that is, missing markers during a motion capture session, has been raised for many years in Motion Capture field. We propose the locally weighted principal component analysis (PCA) regression method to deal with this challenge. The main merit is to introduce the sparsity of observation datasets through the multivariate tapering approach into traditional least square methods and develop it into a new kind of least square methods with the sparsity constraints. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first least square method with the sparsity constraints. Our experiments show that the proposed regression method can reach high estimation accuracy and has a good numerical stability.

ABSTRACT This article charts a decade-long project on the trial of the Islandmagee witches in County Antrim (Northern Ireland) in 1711. The project comprised three overlapping and connected phases that negotiated a pathway between researching the history of the trial, its interpretative representation in public discourse, and finding impactful ways to bring this research to wider audiences. It demonstrates that creatively and carefully pitched, microhistories of specific trials can fruitfully add to key historiographical debates in witchcraft studies but when combined with sustained, targeted dissemination and co-produced and collaborative public history, it can open up hidden, but important parts of cultural history and dark heritage to wider audiences. This is especially important in countries such as Northern Ireland that have largely overlooked their witch hunting past and where public remembrance and commemoration of witch trials can be difficult and provoke controversy.

In this article I discuss an innovative museum strategy that aims to create a more evocative and engaging visitor experience. I argue that the inclusion of contemporary art, and specifically sculpture in exhibition design, activates visitor agency, empowering the public to take part in interpreting the human past. I explore the unique sensory engagement sculpture provides and the important role this can play for the public presentation of archaeology. I also examine an existing project that has called upon sculpture as an interpretive resource at the National Museum of Scotland, discussing its impact on visitors and its contribution to the discipline. I conclude with a discussion of a selection of living sculptors including Rachel Whiteread and Antony Gormley whose work, I argue, signals exciting opportunities for future artist-curator collaboration. By considering both current examples and future possibilities, this article builds a case for sculpture as an important and dynamic tool for the public understanding of archaeology in museums.

AbstractThe article offers a contribution to wider dialogues on history creation and the analytical superstructures that influence how authors use the past to construct and legitimise identities tied to conquest and settlement. It takes as its case study the twelfth‐century Chronicon of the Jerusalemite writer William of Tyre, and his crafting of an account of the First Crusade that demonstrated the legal validity of the new Latin polities created in the Levant and Syria (the so‐called crusader states). It demonstrates his use of translatio imperii (translation of empire) to frame settlement as a continuation of Christian authority in the East. This work also marks the changing purpose of his writing away from a solely Eastern Latin audience towards promoting crusading from Europe. In paying attention to this shift, this article demonstrates how subsequent edits he made to his work(s) led to narrative dilemmas and discontinuities that spoke to the fragmented social and political value of crusading between the Latin East and Latin West. In other words, this article offers an important window onto not only the historians’ craft, but also the value of incorporating premodern works into modern historiographical debates, especially those surrounding notions of European settler identities.