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As part of a national “moonshot” to cure blindness, researchers at the CU Anschutz Medical Campus will receive as much as $46 million in federal funding over the next five years to pursue a first-of-its-kind full eye transplantation. “This is no easy undertaking, but I believe we can achieve this together,” said Dr. Kia Washington, the lead researcher for the University of Colorado-led team, during a press conference Monday. “And in fact I’ve never been more hopeful that a cure for blindness is within reach.” The CU team was one of four in the United States that received funding awards from the federal Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health , or ARPA-H. The CU-based group will focus on achieving the first-ever vision-restoring eye transplant by using “novel stem cell and bioelectronic technologies,” according to a news release announcing the funding. The work will be interdisciplinary, Washington and others said, and will link together researchers at institutions across the country. The four teams that received the funding will work alongside each other on distinct approaches, though officials said the teams would likely collaborate and eventually may merge depending on which research avenues show the most promise toward achieving the ultimate goal of transplanting an eye and curing blindness. Dr. Calvin Roberts, who will oversee the broader project for ARPA-H, said the agency wanted to take multiple “shots on goal” to ensure progress. “In the broader picture, achieving this would be probably the most monumental task in medicine within the last several decades,” said Dr. Daniel Pelaez of the University of Miami’s Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, which also received ARPA-H funding. Pelaez is the lead investigator for that team, which has pursued new procedures to successfully remove and preserve eyes from donors, amid other research. He told The Denver Post that only four organ systems have not been successfully transplanted: the inner ear, the brain, the spinal cord and the eye. All four are part of the central nervous system, which does not repair itself when damaged. If researchers can successfully transplant the human eye and restore vision to the patient, it might help unlock deeper discoveries about repairing damage to the brain and spine, Pelaez said, as well as addressing hearing loss. To succeed, researchers must successfully remove and preserve eyes from donors and then successfully connect and repair the optical nerve, which takes information from the eye and tells the brain what the eye sees. A team at New York University performed a full eye transplant on a human patient in November 2023, though the procedure — while a “remarkable achievement,” Pelaez said — did not restore the patient’s vision. It was also part of a partial face transplant; other approaches pursued via the ARPA-H funding will involve eye-specific transplants. Washington, the lead CU researcher, said she and her colleagues have already completed the eye transplant procedure — albeit without vision restoration — in rats. The CU team will next work on large animals to advance “optic nerve regenerative strategies,” the school said, as well as to study immunosuppression, which is critical to ensuring that patients’ immune systems don’t reject a donated organ. The goal is to eventually advance to human trials. Pelaez and his colleagues have completed their eye-removal procedure in cadavers, he said, and they’ve also studied regeneration in several animals that are capable of regenerating parts of their eyes, like salamanders or zebra fish. His team’s funding will focus in part on a life-support machine for the eye to keep it healthy and viable during the removal process. InGel Therapeutics, a Massachusetts-based Harvard spinoff and the lead of a third team, will pursue research on 3-D printed technology and “micro-tunneled scaffolds” that carry certain types of stem cells as part of a focus on optical nerve regeneration and repair, ARPA-H said. ARPH-A, created two years ago, will oversee the teams’ work. Researchers at 52 institutions nationwide will also contribute to the teams. The CU-led group will include researchers from the University of Southern California, the University of Wisconsin, Indiana University and Johns Hopkins University, as well as from the National Eye Institute . The teams will simultaneously compete and collaborate: Pelaez said his team has communicated with researchers at CU and at Stanford, another award recipient, about their eye-removal research. The total funding available for the teams is $125 million, ARPA-H officials said Monday, and it will be distributed in phases, in part dependent on teams’ success. U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette, a Democrat who represents Denver in Congress, acknowledged the recent election results at the press conference Monday and pledged to continue fighting to preserve ARPA-H’s funding under President-elect Donald Trump’s administration. The effort to cure blindness, Washington joked, was “biblical” in its enormity — a reference to the Bible story in which Jesus cures a blind man. She and others also likened it to a moonshot, meaning the effort to successfully put Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the moon nearly 50 years ago. If curing blindness is similar to landing on the moon, then the space shuttle has already left the launchpad, Washington said. “We have launched,” she said, “and we are on our trajectory.”DAMASCUS (AP) — Exuberant Syrians observed the first Friday prayers since the ouster of President Bashar Assad , gathering in the capital's historic main mosque, its largest square and around the country to celebrate the end of half a century of authoritarian rule. The newly installed interim prime minister delivered the sermon at the Umayyad Mosque, declaring that a new era of “freedom, dignity and justice” was dawning for Syria. The gatherings illustrated the dramatic changes that have swept over Syria less than a week after insurgents marched into Damascus and toppled Assad. Amid the jubilation, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with allies around the region and called for an “inclusive and non-sectarian” interim government. Blinken arrived in Iraq on a previously unannounced stop after talks in Jordan and Turkey, which backs some of the Syrian insurgent factions. So far, U.S. officials have not talked of direct meetings with Syria's new rulers. The main insurgent force, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, has worked to establish security and start a political transition after seizing Damascus early Sunday. The group has tried to reassure a public both stunned by Assad's fall and concerned about extremist jihadis among the rebels. Insurgent leaders say the group has broken with its extremist past, though HTS is still labeled a terrorist group by the United States and European countries. HTS's leader, Ahmad al-Sharaa, formerly known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani, appeared in a video message Friday congratulating “the great Syrian people for the victory of the blessed revolution.” “I invite them to head to the squares to show their happiness without shooting bullets and scaring people,” he said. “And then after, we will work to build this country, and as I said in the beginning, we will be victorious by the help of God.” Huge crowds, including some insurgents, packed the historic Umayyad Mosque in the capital's old city, many waving the rebel opposition flag — with its three red stars — which has swiftly replaced the Assad-era flag with with its two green stars. Syrian state television reported that the sermon was delivered by Mohammed al-Bashir, the interim prime minister installed by HTS this week. The scene resonated on multiple levels. The mosque, one of the world's oldest dating back some 1,200 years, is a beloved symbol of Syria, and sermons there like all mosque sermons across Syria were tightly controlled under Assad's rule. Also, in the early days of the anti-government uprising in 2011, protesters would leave Friday prayers to march in rallies against Assad before he launched a brutal crackdown that turned the uprising into a long and bloody civil war. “I didn’t step foot in Umayyad Mosque since 2011," because of the tight security controls around it, said one worshipper, Ibrahim al-Araby. “Since 11 or 12 years, I haven’t been this happy.” Another worshipper, Khair Taha, said there was “fear and trepidation for what’s to come. But there is also a lot of hope that now we have a say and we can try to build.” Blocks away in Damascus' biggest roundabout, named Umayyad Square, thousands gathered, including many families with small children — a sign of how, so far at least, the country's transformation has not caused violent instability. “Unified Syria to build Syria,” the crowd chanted. Some shouted slurs against Assad and his late father, calling them pigs, an insult that would have previously led to offenders being hauled off to one of the feared detention centers of Assad’s security forces. One man in the crowd, 51-year-old Khaled Abu Chahine — originally from the southern province of Daraa, where the 2011 uprising first erupted — said he hoped for “freedom and coexistence between all Syrians, Alawites, Sunnis, Shiites and Druze.” The interim prime minister, al-Bashir, had been the head of a de facto administration created by HTS in Idlib, the opposition's enclave in northwest Syria. The rebels were bottled up in Idlib for years before fighters broke out in a shock offensive and marched across Syria in 10 days. Similar scenes of joy unfolded in other major cities, including in Aleppo, Homs, Hama, Latakia and Raqqa. Al-Sharaa, HTS' leader, has promised to bring a pluralistic government to Syria, seeking to dispel fears among many Syrians — especially its many minority communities — that the insurgents will impose a hard-line, extremist rule. Another key factor will be winning international recognition for a new government in a country where multiple foreign powers have their hands in the mix. The Sunni Arab insurgents who overthrew Assad did so with vital help from Turkey, a longtime foe of the U.S.-backed Kurds . Turkey controls a strip of Syrian territory along the shared border and backs an insurgent faction uneasily allied to HTS — and is deeply opposed to any gains by Syria's Kurds. In other developments, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said Turkey’s Embassy in Damascus would reopen Saturday for the first time since 2012, when it closed due to the Syrian civil war. The U.S. has troops in eastern Syria to combat remnants of the Islamic State group and supports Kurdish-led fighters who rule most of the east. Since Assad's fall, Israel has bombed sites all over Syria, saying it is trying to prevent weapons from falling into extremist hands. It has also seized a swath of southern Syria along the border with the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, calling it a buffer zone. After talks with Fidan, Blinken said there was “broad agreement” between Turkey and the U.S. on what they would like to see in Syria. That starts with an "interim government in Syria, one that is inclusive and non-sectarian and one that protects the rights of minorities and women” and does not “pose any kind of threat to any of Syria’s neighbors,” Blinken said. Fidan said the priority was “establishing stability in Syria as soon as possible, preventing terrorism from gaining ground, and ensuring that IS and the PKK aren’t dominant” — referring to the Islamic State group and the Kurdistan Workers Party. Ankara considers the PKK within Turkey's borders a terrorist group, as it does the Kurdish-backed forces in Syria backed by the U.S. A U.S. official said that in Ankara, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Fidan both told Blinken that Kurdish attacks on Turkish positions would require a response. The official spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity to discuss private diplomatic talks. The U.S. has been trying to limit such incidents in recent days and had helped organize an agreement to prevent confrontations around the northern Syrian town of Manbij, which was taken by Turkey-backed opposition fighters from the U.S.-backed Kurdish forces earlier this week. In Baghdad, Blinken met with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed al-Sudani, saying both countries wanted to ensure the Islamic State group — also known by its Arabic acronym Daesh — doesn't exploit Syria's transition to re-emerge. “Having put Daesh back in its box, we can’t let it out, and we’re determined to make sure that that doesn’t happen," Blinken said. The U.S. official who briefed reporters said that Blinken had impressed upon al-Sudani the importance of Iraq exercising its full sovereignty over its territory and airspace to stop Iran from transporting weapons and equipment to Syria, either for Assad supporters or onward to the militant Hezbollah group in Lebanon. Lee reported from Ankara, Turkey. Associated Press writers Suzan Fraser in Ankara and Sally Abou AlJoud in Beirut contributed to this report.TORONTO - Canada’s main stock index fell more than 100 points Friday, led by losses in base metal and telecom stocks, while U.S. stock markets were mixed ahead of next week’s interest rate decision from the U.S. Federal Reserve. This week, the Bank of Canada announced another outsized interest rate cut of half a percentage point while also signalling it plans to slow the pace of cuts going forward. Allan Small, senior investment adviser at iA Private Wealth,said the central bank is juggling a lot of balls heading into the new year, including a faltering economy, a housing market that’s poised to heat up, and a U.S. Fed likely to cut much slower next year. “If (the Bank of Canada) continues to cut when the U.S. doesn’t, where does that leave our dollar?” asked Small. “They’re flying by the seat of their pants.” The S&P/TSX composite index closed down 136.41 points at 25,274.30. In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average was down 86.06 points at 43,828.06. The S&P 500 index was down 0.16 points at 6,051.09, while the Nasdaq composite was up 23.88 points at 19,926.72. The Fed has done a better job of tamping down inflation while not harming the economy too much, said Small. The Fed is expected to cut by a quarter-percentage point next week, and its path is clearer than the Bank of Canada’s, said Small. “I don’t think they have much room to cut more,” he said, noting this week saw U.S. inflation data tick up from the month before. “Most people think they’ll go 25 (basis points) and pause for a little while,” said Small. “Would I be surprised to see them not cut at all? No, but I think the market would take that negatively.” Heading into the last few weeks of the year, Small said if there’s a so-called Santa Claus rally, it may be more muted than usual. “It’s quite possible we’ve taken some gains that we normally would have had in December, brought them forward into November, and now December might not be as strong as we normally see,” he said. On Wall St., the Nasdaq did a little better than its U.S. peers as semiconductor company Broadcom saw its stock gain more than 24 per cent after reporting earnings. “I think the commentary on the conference call really caused the stock to shoot up,” said Small. The company gave a bright forecast for investors on the back of expected growth in artificial intelligence. This week, Broadcom and Apple also announced a deal to develop a chip for AI. The Canadian dollar traded for 70.27 cents US compared with 70.48 cents US on Thursday. The January crude oil contract was up US$1.27 at US$71.29 per barrel and the January natural gas contract was down 18 cents at US$3.28 per mmBTU. The February gold contract was down US$33.60 at US$2,675.80 an ounce and the March copper contract was down five cents at US$4.15 a pound. — With files from The Associated Press This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 13, 2024. Companies in this story: (TSX:GSPTSE, TSX:CADUSD)

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Lonnie Walker IV is attracting interest from NBA teams and is available for a buyout from his Žalgiris contract in the EuroLeague, with any NBA team able to make the move until Feb. 18, according to NBA Insider Marc Stein . The Philadelphia 76ers, Minnesota Timberwolves, Miami Heat, Denver Nuggets and Boston Celtics have all been mentioned as potential suitors, per Stein. Walker notably participated in Boston's camp. This article will be updated soon to provide more information and analysis. For more from Bleacher Report on this topic and from around the sports world, check out our B/R app , homepage and social feeds—including Twitter , Instagram , Facebook and TikTok .How major US stock indexes fared Thursday, 11/21/2024

Uruguay to pick new president in a run-off set to go down to the wire

AP Sports SummaryBrief at 5:47 p.m. ESTPOLICE BLOTTER

In college hoops action on Sunday, the Portland Pilots versus the Princeton Tigers is among the 10 games that made our list of best bets against the spread. Watch men’s college basketball, other live sports and more on Fubo. What is Fubo? Fubo is a streaming service that gives you access to your favorite live sports and shows on demand. Use our link to sign up for a free trial. Not all offers available in all states, please visit BetMGM for the latest promotions for your area. Must be 21+ to gamble, please wager responsibly. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, contact 1-800-GAMBLER .CHICAGO — IBM, the tech giant known for revolutionizing computing over the past 70 years, is setting up shop on Chicago’s South Side to develop what could be the field’s next big leap: quantum technology. It’s part of a multi-year effort from Gov. JB Pritzker, state officials and economic development groups to turn Illinois into a global hub for quantum computing and research. IBM announced Thursday it will open a facility known as the National Quantum Algorithm Center that will bring together experts and researchers to focus on ways to combine quantum computers and traditional computers to solve complex problems. It will also house IBM’s Quantum System Two, a quantum computer that can be upgraded as the company develops its technology further. Quantum technology uses quantum mechanics – the sometimes counterintuitive physics of very small particles – to perform calculations and do other computing tasks very quickly, some of which would take a traditional computers thousands or even millions of years. IBM is the latest organization to join the state’s efforts to make Illinois a quantum computing hub. Over the past year, several quantum computing organizations have made Chicago a go-to destination for quantum researchers and businesses, capitalizing on Pritzker’s goals for the research park. In July, the federal Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, announced it was going to launch a program meant to serve as a “proving ground” for quantum technologies – testing how useful they could be in real-world settings. The same month, the state unveiled its plans for a quantum research and business park – with $700 million in tax incentives, grants and other financial support. The Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park, or IQMP, is set to open in about two years with California-based PsiQuantum as its first anchor tenant. DARPA and IBM will also have facilities at the quantum park, with the state kicking in $25 million to purchase equipment and make preparations to house IBM’s new quantum computer. As part of its initial commitment to the state, IBM said its development will bring 50 permanent jobs to the park in addition to construction work. IBM CEO Arvind Krishna said Thursday he expects the company’s overall investment in the facility to be in the tens of millions or low hundreds of millions. He said he expects that figure – and the number of jobs generated by the project – to grow as the company begins to host student intern programs, graduate fellowships and university faculty for research projects. “Being at the forefront of this industry holds the potential to deliver long-term, broad-based economic prosperity for our people,” Pritzker said Thursday. The IQMP is being built at the lakefront site of a former U.S. Steel plant on Chicago’s South Side. That plant closed in the early 1990s, but at its height of its operations was the source of tens of thousands of jobs and significant economic activity for its surrounding neighborhood. Some local residents are worried that the benefits of a high-tech research and business facility won’t reach the neighborhood that still feels the absence of U.S. Steel’s plant. “We’re a very unique and diverse community with a lot of talent, but there’s been a lot of disinvestment,” Vanessa Schwartz, a born-and-raised resident of the Southeast Side, told Capitol News Illinois in a late-November interview. “That property alone has had a lot of investors with plans that have fallen through, so there’s some kind of reticence with the community to see if this is going to be something like that.” Schwartz, who now runs the Metropolitan Family Services’ Southeast Chicago Center, said residents in her community feel wary of the potential environmental impacts of the project and are worried they will lose access to a lakefront park at the site. “The real fear is what’s going to happen to the local residents and the local neighborhood,” Schwartz said. “Will they be priced out, will rents increase?” Schwartz said there have been several well-attended community meetings held to discuss the development, but much of the information provided to residents so far has been in “broad strokes” and been “too vague.” Pritzker and others on Thursday defended efforts to meet with the community and address these concerns. He noted a “real commitment” from himself and many of the groups involved in the quantum park to address concerns from residents. Rep. Curtis Tarver, D-Chicago, represents the district where the IQMP is being built and he said his office has received calls with concerns that are “very relevant,” but that he didn’t think a formal community benefits agreement was necessary for the project. Still, he applauded the community engagement efforts he’s seen so far. “I’ve been around a long time. I used to work for Mayor (Richard M.) Daley’s office almost 20 years ago,” Tarver said. “This is as much engagement as I’ve seen on a project in quite some time. It really is.”Morgan Stanley Cuts Valvoline (NYSE:VVV) Price Target to $42.00

Published 4:48 pm Friday, December 13, 2024 By Data Skrive Six games on the Saturday college basketball schedule feature a ranked team, including the matchup between the UCLA Bruins and the Long Beach State Beach. Watch women’s college basketball, other live sports and more on Fubo. What is Fubo? Fubo is a streaming service that gives you access to your favorite live sports and shows on demand. Use our link to sign up. Catch tons of live women’s college basketball , plus original programming, with ESPN+ or the Disney Bundle.

Syrians cheer end of 50 years of Assad rule at first Friday prayers since government fellGuest Opinion: Beware the return of nuclear power plantsThese days, many tech enthusiasts and market watchers recognize Elon Musk and Sam Altman as rivals. But it wasn’t always that way. The two founded OpenAI in 2015 with a shared vision of advancing artificial intelligence. But by 2018, it became clear that the two tech visionaries had different ideas about what that would look like (but that’s another story for another day). So, Elon Musk left OpenAI. And a few years later – in 2022 – ChatGPT-4 debuted and kickstarted the AI Boom. Not to be outdone, Musk founded his own AI startup in 2023: xAI. And since then, the world’s richest man has been working furiously to catch up in the AI race. One way he’s been doing this is through Colossus, the world’s largest supercomputer. Located in Memphis, Tennessee, it currently has 100,000 graphics processing units (GPUs) and was built within 122 days. For this kind of project, it would typically take months or years to build. If that weren’t enough, last Wednesday, December 4, we learned that Colossus is about to get a LOT bigger. The Greater Memphis Chamber announced that xAI will begin expanding its supercomputer to hold at least 1 million GPUs. The GPUs are used to train xAI’s chatbot, Grok which was the first product to come out of the startup. Two AI companies are key in this expansion: NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA) and Super Micro Computer, Inc. (SMCI). The former supplies Colossus with its GPUs, and the latter, along with Dell Technologies Inc. (DELL), assembled the supercomputer’s server racks. These are, essentially, a specialized cabinet used to organize multiple servers in a data center. The three tech giants will also establish operations in Memphis to support the buildout. Now, NVIDIA and Super Micro have been under Wall Street’s microscope lately as recent pressure continues to mount. So, in today’s Market 360, I want to talk about the ramifications of this announcement on the AI Boom. I’ll also briefly address the reasons behind NVIDIA’s and Super Micro’s pullbacks this week, and whether investors can feel confident in these names moving forward. NVIDIA Gets Accused of Being a Monopoly Let’s talk about the latest news regarding NVIDIA. You probably noticed that the stock fell 5% earlier this week and is down roughly 5.7% for the week overall. There is one reason why: China accused it of being a monopoly and is opening an investigation into the company. Well, my comment is this: Of course, it’s a monopoly – that’s why I own it! As I mentioned in last Saturday’s Market 360 , I believe NVIDIA is the stock of the decade because of its monopolistic characteristics. In other words, it is so dominant that there are virtually no competitors. The reality is China is very frustrated with the Biden administration as it has restricted the type of chips that NVIDIA can sell to China. At one time, NVIDIA modified its chips to shrink the bus width, which is the rate of data transfer, and shipped those chips to China. But that wasn’t enough for the Biden administration, and NVIDIA had to modify the chips further. These technology curbs and uncertainty about the types of technology restrictions the incoming Trump administration could implement has China lashing out. But I don’t want you to worry. NVIDIA’s fundamentals have not changed. All that happened was that the trading algorithms of major institutions and hedge funds saw negative news and hit the stock. Super Micro Gets a Key Extension You may recall that Super Micro Computer found itself in hot water earlier this year when Hindenberg Research, an unscrupulous short seller, issued a report claiming that Super Micro committed accounting violations based on the story of a disgruntled former employee. After an independent review, no evidence of accounting fraud was found. Shares of Super Micro surged 30% in one day following the news. Then, on Friday, December 6, the NASDAQ granted Super Micro’s request for an extension to allow more time to submit its 10-K and 10-Q filings, along with any other required reports. Super Micro now has until February 25, 2025, to file all required reports to remain listed on the NASDAQ. This triggered another 7% pop in the stock. In recent comments, CEO Charles Liang said that he is confident the company will meet the deadline. That didn’t stop investors from taking profits, though, and the stock was down about 10% this week. The bottom line is that Super Micro continues to dominate liquid-cooled AI chips in data centers, which are becoming faster and faster all the time. So, the company’s solutions remain in hot demand. Super Micro Computer even revealed recently that it shipped a record 100,000 GPUs in the most recent quarter. What’s more, an article in Investor’s Business Daily recently pointed out that Super Micro Computer’s customers are sticking with the company. In other words, the company’s massive order backlog persists – and the company is on track to ramp up production at its new plant in Malaysia in the first half of 2025. It’s also important to remember that this has always been a very volatile stock. So, while the stock was down this week, it has gone up 65% over the last month. Your Next Stock-Picking Tool to Have in Your Arsenal From what I can see, the AI Boom isn’t slowing down any time soon. It is in full force and will stay that way for the foreseeable future. This latest news from xAI is proof of that. Planning to make what is already the world’s largest supercomputer 10 times more powerful just speaks to the magnitude of the arms race taking place between not only xAI and OpenAI, but dozens of other well-funded AI unicorn startups – not to mention Big Tech. And as long as this enormous arms race continues, that’s fantastic news for the likes of NVIDIA and Super Micro. So, folks, there’s nothing to worry about with NVIDIA and Super Micro. Now, I’ve been able to find companies with superior fundamentals like NVIDIA and Super Micro thanks to my proprietary Stock Grader tool. I’ve seen my fair share of stock-picking tools in my 40-plus years in the business. But when I saw the system that my friend and InvestorPlace colleague Luke Lango created, I was impressed. It’s called Auspex . Every month, it analyzes stocks that have strong fundamental, technical and sentimental factors. Based on the analysis, Luke will let you know which stocks are the best to buy and which ones to sell. It couldn’t be any easier. But I’m a numbers guy, so I wanted to see how it performed against the broader market. Thankfully, Luke and his team did thorough backtesting between September 2019 to September 2024. If rebalanced monthly, Auspex would have returned 1,054%. In comparison, the S&P 500 only had 109% in returns. That’s really impressive. This past Wednesday, Luke shared more about how his Auspex tool works in The Auspex Anomaly Event . This replay will only be available for the next few days, so you don’t want to miss it! Click here now to watch the replay of The Auspex Anomaly Event . Sincerely, Louis Navellier Editor, Market360 The Editor hereby discloses that as of the date of this email, the Editor, directly or indirectly, owns the following securities that are the subject of the commentary, analysis, opinions, advice, or recommendations in, or which are otherwise mentioned in, the essay set forth below: NVIDIA Corporation ( NVDA ) and Super Micro Computer, Inc. (SMCI)

Research is underway to find out what is holding back female participation in local councils, with recommendations to correct gender imbalance expected next year. Only 27 per cent of candidates in this year’s local council elections were female, with just over a quarter (28%) of those candidates elected, said Equality junior minister Rebecca Buttigieg and Local Government junior minister Alison Zerafa Civelli on Saturday. There are currently six localities that do not have any female councillors at all, Buttigieg noted while stressing the importance of female perspectives in local council discussions. The research, which is being carried out by University of Malta Pro-Rector for Student and Staff Affairs and Outreach Carmen Sammut, follows a recommendation earlier this year from a technical committee that evaluated candidacy in the local council elections. Sammut said the parliamentary gender corrective mechanism first seen in the general election two years ago could not necessarily be carried across to local council elections, with her research intended to find other methods of ensuring gender parity. Civelli said Sammut’s research – which is due to be concluded by next September – should be joined by “other activities that are encouraging the further increase of the visibility of women in political life”. Saturday’s press conference comes seven months after Equality Commissioner Renee Laiviera the government reform local councils to make them more gender inclusive. Speaking in April, Laiviera said: “Our biggest challenge is not that people don’t vote for female candidates but a lack of female candidates”. And while last May the government the idea of introducing a gender corrective mechanism for local councils as part of its 'National Strategic Vision for Local Governments', the change was not introduced in time for this year’s elections. Although more female councillors were this year than in 2019, the number of female mayors dropped by half, with only seven of Malta’s 68 local councils now led by a female mayor. Only Birkirkara, Għargħur, Mqabba, Santa Luċija, Xewkija, Żejtun and Żurrieq have a woman at the helm. You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.

Colts coach Shane Steichen feeling heat after playoff eliminationResearchers launch “moonshot” to cure blindness through eye transplantsAs part of a national “moonshot” to cure blindness, researchers at the CU Anschutz Medical Campus will receive as much as $46 million in federal funding over the next five years to pursue a first-of-its-kind full eye transplantation. “This is no easy undertaking, but I believe we can achieve this together,” said Dr. Kia Washington, the lead researcher for the University of Colorado-led team, during a press conference Monday. “And in fact I’ve never been more hopeful that a cure for blindness is within reach.” The CU team was one of four in the United States that received funding awards from the federal Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health , or ARPA-H. The CU-based group will focus on achieving the first-ever vision-restoring eye transplant by using “novel stem cell and bioelectronic technologies,” according to a news release announcing the funding. The work will be interdisciplinary, Washington and others said, and will link together researchers at institutions across the country. The four teams that received the funding will work alongside each other on distinct approaches, though officials said the teams would likely collaborate and eventually may merge depending on which research avenues show the most promise toward achieving the ultimate goal of transplanting an eye and curing blindness. Dr. Calvin Roberts, who will oversee the broader project for ARPA-H, said the agency wanted to take multiple “shots on goal” to ensure progress. “In the broader picture, achieving this would be probably the most monumental task in medicine within the last several decades,” said Dr. Daniel Pelaez of the University of Miami’s Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, which also received ARPA-H funding. Pelaez is the lead investigator for that team, which has pursued new procedures to successfully remove and preserve eyes from donors, amid other research. He told The Denver Post that only four organ systems have not been successfully transplanted: the inner ear, the brain, the spinal cord and the eye. All four are part of the central nervous system, which does not repair itself when damaged. If researchers can successfully transplant the human eye and restore vision to the patient, it might help unlock deeper discoveries about repairing damage to the brain and spine, Pelaez said, as well as addressing hearing loss. To succeed, researchers must successfully remove and preserve eyes from donors and then successfully connect and repair the optical nerve, which takes information from the eye and tells the brain what the eye sees. A team at New York University performed a full eye transplant on a human patient in November 2023, though the procedure — while a “remarkable achievement,” Pelaez said — did not restore the patient’s vision. It was also part of a partial face transplant; other approaches pursued via the ARPA-H funding will involve eye-specific transplants. Washington, the lead CU researcher, said she and her colleagues have already completed the eye transplant procedure — albeit without vision restoration — in rats. The CU team will next work on large animals to advance “optic nerve regenerative strategies,” the school said, as well as to study immunosuppression, which is critical to ensuring that patients’ immune systems don’t reject a donated organ. The goal is to eventually advance to human trials. Pelaez and his colleagues have completed their eye-removal procedure in cadavers, he said, and they’ve also studied regeneration in several animals that are capable of regenerating parts of their eyes, like salamanders or zebra fish. His team’s funding will focus in part on a life-support machine for the eye to keep it healthy and viable during the removal process. InGel Therapeutics, a Massachusetts-based Harvard spinoff and the lead of a third team, will pursue research on 3-D printed technology and “micro-tunneled scaffolds” that carry certain types of stem cells as part of a focus on optical nerve regeneration and repair, ARPA-H said. ARPH-A, created two years ago, will oversee the teams’ work. Researchers at 52 institutions nationwide will also contribute to the teams. The CU-led group will include researchers from the University of Southern California, the University of Wisconsin, Indiana University and Johns Hopkins University, as well as from the National Eye Institute . The teams will simultaneously compete and collaborate: Pelaez said his team has communicated with researchers at CU and at Stanford, another award recipient, about their eye-removal research. The total funding available for the teams is $125 million, ARPA-H officials said Monday, and it will be distributed in phases, in part dependent on teams’ success. U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette, a Democrat who represents Denver in Congress, acknowledged the recent election results at the press conference Monday and pledged to continue fighting to preserve ARPA-H’s funding under President-elect Donald Trump’s administration. The effort to cure blindness, Washington joked, was “biblical” in its enormity — a reference to the Bible story in which Jesus cures a blind man. She and others also likened it to a moonshot, meaning the effort to successfully put Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the moon nearly 50 years ago. If curing blindness is similar to landing on the moon, then the space shuttle has already left the launchpad, Washington said. “We have launched,” she said, “and we are on our trajectory.”Bitcoin has reached a historic milestone, surpassing $100,000 per coin and a $2 trillion market capitalization, defying expectations with its rapid ascent. For bitcoin investors all over the world, today marks a landmark victory for the cryptocurrency. Bitcoin has made cryptocurrency history exceeding the level of $100,000 and $2 trillion capitalization that was forecast to happen – but not as quickly. In the last 24 hours, advances of more than five per cent see the price of the largest cryptocurrency on the market soar to record breaking heights reaching a price of $101,500. Donald Trump’s US election was a catalyst to surge in bitcoin price Politics has always dominated money and vice versa. And with the recent surge in bitcoin’s price, this is no different. The price of the main cryptocurrency has surpassed the famous reference of $100,000 and is trading above $102,300 – a landmark victory no less. Add this to its market capitalization which also breaks another round limit of $2 trillion and it looks like 2024 could be the year for crypto assets. Donald Trump ’s election in the US of course was behind a lot of this. The leader who also backs Elon Musk with his very own Dogecoin cryptocurrency, took bitcoin by the horns during weeks of his election campaign. He promised to create a strategic reserve of cryptocurrencies in the US. This is yet to be seen and was only mentioned last summer in an event about cryptocurrencies – it wasn’t part of his official elecotoral programme. Most Read on Euro Weekly News FBI warning: 'Encryption is your friend.' Avoid texting at all costs Poliovirus detected in 3 European countries 150 million mental health cases linked to leaded petrol in the US Either way, Trump spurred trust in bitcoin and as a consequence, its price has skyrocketed from $69,373 on November 5 to $102,354 currently. This represents a rise of nearly 50 per cent in one month. Referring back to politics, another top dog had a stake in the impressive price hike. Paul Atkins, Trump’s newly-elected chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has also been a boost for bitcoin. Green numbers dominate in crypto trends not only for bitcoin but also with regards to other cryptocurrencies. Ethereum has soared by over 7.5 per cent, while XRP rose by over 62 per cent. BNB saw an increase of 12 per cent, Musk’s Dogecoin almost 10 per cent and Cardano more than 21 per cent. This all points to a combined market capitalization value in excess of $3.68 trillion. Days ago the price of bitcoin was stuck; then it soared to record heights As aforementioned, this boom was expected and analysts had been awaiting the breakthrough to the $100,000 mark. Yet not so suddenly. Mark Greenber, global CEO of Kraken, outlined a few days ago that “the price of bitcoin is stuck below $100,000 due to a large number of sell orders at that price. These orders act as a ceiling, preventing the price from rising. We saw a similar pattern in late 2017 when bitcoin was approaching $10,000. It took time for those sell orders to process, but once they did, they sold out and the price rose sharply. Breaking the $100,000 barrier will depend on whether buyer demand is strong enough to absorb all the sell orders at that level.” Bitcoin’s meteoric rise to record levels, fueled in part by the market’s reaction to Donald Trump’s election, marks a landmark moment in the cryptocurrency’s journey. The unexpected speed of this surge underscores the shifting dynamics of global finance and investor sentiment. It not only highlights Bitcoin’s resilience but also cements its role as a key player in the future of decentralized assets and speculative investment. Read more about Finance and Cryptocurrency

LAS VEGAS -- The Milwaukee Bucks are making a return trip to the NBA Cup semifinals after falling short in Sin City last season. This time around, they'll have the responsibility of stopping one of the game's great entertainers in Trae Young and the Atlanta Hawks. Young rolled a pair of imaginary dice over the New York Knicks' midcourt logo in the closing moments of the Hawks' 108-100 win in the quarterfinals on Tuesday, a nod to the Hawks' trip to Vegas. It was yet another example of Young's showmanship, something the Knicks have seen firsthand over the years. The Bucks also got to experience a bit of Young's big-game prowess in the 2021 Eastern Conference finals, but Young suffered an ankle injury in Game 3 of that series and wasn't the same the rest of the way. If "Ice Trae" has it his way, the Bucks will be the latest victim of his prime-time heroics on Saturday night. Even if he doesn't like to linger on the memories of that series. "I don't let past things make me mad (and I don't) hold a grudge on those things," the 26-year-old Young said. "Yeah, I'm young. I'm not super young anymore, where I like, let those things really affect me. "I remember it like it was yesterday. It definitely hurts, but I mean, this is a new team. I'm part of a new team. They're a different team. So I can't let my past affect my mental and my focus on right now, because it's a totally different team and totally different place." Young is averaging 21 points per game to go along with 12.2 assists, numbers that have only been equaled by Magic Johnson and Isiah Thomas over the course of an entire NBA season. He's gotten a fair bit of help too, most notably in the form of 19.8 points and a team-high 10.1 rebounds per game from fourth-year forward Jalen Johnson. The Hawks earned the No. 3 seed in NBA Cup knockout play after going 3-1 in the East Group C stage. Atlanta's among the hottest teams in the league at the moment, having won seven of its last eight games overall. The Bucks, on the other hand, are the only team of the four remaining that made it to the NBA Cup semifinals in Las Vegas last season. They had a short trip, falling 128-119 to the Pacers, but the hope is that last year's experience better prepared them for all of the outside hoopla that comes with this stage. At the very least, they have a much better understanding of what winning the NBA Cup would entail. "I think last year, most people didn't even understand what was going on until they got to the final stages," Bucks star Damian Lillard said. "When we got to the game against New York last year, where the winner got to go to Vegas, we started to have a better understanding of what was on the line. "Coming into this season, I think everybody understood better. Everybody cared more, not just because it's an opportunity to win money. Even though it's not the ultimate goal, I think it gives you an edge. We want to be the last team standing in it. We want to win the money. We want to continue going in the right direction as a team." The Bucks entered Tuesday's quarterfinal as the East's top seed in NBA Cup play, going 4-0 in East Group B play despite a turbulent 2-8 start to the season. They've won nine of their last 11 games and eclipsed .500 for the season by beating the Brooklyn Nets on Sunday and the Orlando Magic on Tuesday. Giannis Antetokounmpo sits atop the NBA scoring leaders as of Friday afternoon, averaging 32.7 points and a team-high 11.4 rebounds per game. Lillard has also played at an All-Star level, averaging 25.8 points per game in addition to 7.6 assists. Bobby Portis (13.2 ppg) and Brook Lopez (11 ppg) are the only other Bucks averaging double figures. --Will Despart, Field Level MediaOne of the country’s largest health insurers reversed a change in policy Thursday after widespread outcry, saying it would not tie payments in some states to the length of time a patient went under anesthesia. Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield said in a statement that its decision to backpedal resulted from “significant widespread misinformation” about the policy. “To be clear, it never was and never will be the policy of Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield to not pay for medically necessary anesthesia services,” the statement said. “The proposed update to the policy was only designed to clarify the appropriateness of anesthesia consistent with well-established clinical guidelines.” Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield would have used "physician work time values," which is published by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, as the metric for anesthesia limits; maternity patients and patients under the age of 22 were exempt. But Dr. Jonathan Gal, economics committee chair of the American Society for Anesthesiologists, said it's unclear how CMS derives those values. In mid-November, the American Society for Anesthesiologists called on Anthem to “reverse the proposal immediately,” saying in a news release that the policy would have taken effect in February in New York, Connecticut and Missouri. It's not clear how many states in total would have been affected, as notices also were posted in Virginia and Colorado . People across the country registered their concerns and complaints on social media, and encouraged people in affected states to call their legislators. Some people noted that the policy could prevent patients from getting overcharged. Gal said the policy change would have been unprecedented, ignored the “nuanced, unpredictable human element” of surgery and was a clear “money grab.” “It’s incomprehensible how a health insurance company could so blatantly continue to prioritize their profits over safe patient care,” he said. "If Anthem is, in fact, rescinding the policy, we’re delighted that they came to their senses.” Prior to Anthem's announcement Thursday, Connecticut comptroller Sean Scanlon said the “concerning” policy wouldn't affect the state after conversations with the insurance company. And New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said in an emailed statement Thursday that her office had also successfully intervened. The insurance giant’s policy change came one day after the CEO of UnitedHealthcare , another major insurance company, was shot and killed in New York City. ___ The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Internet sleuths hunt for clues on murder of UnitedHealth’s CEOSyrians cheer end of 50 years of Assad rule at first Friday prayers since government fell

There is a lot to be excited about on Saturday in AAC play, including the Memphis Tigers squaring off against the Clemson Tigers. If you’re looking for picks against the spread, see below. Catch tons of live college basketball , plus original programming, with ESPN+ or the Disney Bundle. Place your bets on any men’s college basketball matchup at BetMGM. Sign up today using our link. Pick: Memphis +6.5 vs. Clemson Bet on this or any men’s college basketball matchup at BetMGM. Pick: DePaul -1.5 vs. Wichita State Bet on this or any men’s college basketball matchup at BetMGM. Pick: Texas State +8.5 vs. Florida Atlantic Bet on this or any men’s college basketball matchup at BetMGM. Pick: Tulsa +13.5 vs. UCF Bet on this or any men’s college basketball matchup at BetMGM. Pick: Georgia State -1.5 vs. Charlotte Bet on this or any men’s college basketball matchup at BetMGM. Not all offers available in all states, please visit BetMGM for the latest promotions for your area. Must be 21+ to gamble, please wager responsibly. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, contact 1-800-GAMBLER .