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WASHINGTON — Drivers and airline passengers without reindeer and sleighs better make a dash for it: it's beginning to look like another record for holiday travel in the U.S. The auto club AAA predicts that more than 119 million people will travel at least 50 miles from home between Saturday and New Year’s Day, which would top the previous holiday-season high set in 2019. The two weekends on either side of Christmas look to be some of the most crowded times on the road and at airports. Trade group Airlines for America also foresees record travel , saying it expected U.S. airlines to carry 54 million passengers during a 19-day period that started Thursday and ends Monday, Jan. 6. The number would represent a 6% increase over last year. A government shutdown that could start as soon as Saturday would likely be too close to the holidays to immediately affect flights and airport operations, but that might change if a shutdown dragged on. What will be the busiest travel days? Airlines expect to have their busiest days on Friday and Sunday, and on Dec. 26, Dec. 27 and Dec. 29. Flight traffic is expected to be light on both Christmas Day and New Year's Day. The slowest U.S. air-travel day this year — by a wide margin — was Thanksgiving Day. The Transportation Security Administration expects to screen 40 million passengers over the holidays and through January 2. About 90% of Americans traveling far from home over the holidays will be in cars, according to AAA. “Airline travel is just really high right now, but most people do drive to their destinations, and that is true for every holiday,” AAA spokesperson Aixa Diaz said. Gasoline prices are similar to last year. The nationwide average Thursday was $3.05 a gallon, down from $3.08 a year ago, according to AAA. Charging an electric vehicle averages just under 35 cents per per kilowatt hour, but varies by state. Transportation-data firm INRIX says travel times on the nation’s highways could be up to 30% longer than normal over the holidays, with Sunday expected to see the heaviest traffic. Boston, New York City, Seattle and Washington, D.C., are the metropolitan areas primed for the greatest delays, according to the company. Weather and other wildcards Because the holiday travel period lasts weeks, airports and airlines typically have smaller peak days than they do during the rush around Thanksgiving, but the grind of one hectic day followed by another takes a toll on flight crews. And any hiccups — a winter storm or a computer outage — can snowball into massive disruptions. That is how Southwest Airlines stranded 2 million travelers in December 2022, and Delta Air Lines suffered a smaller but significant meltdown after a worldwide technology outage in July caused by a faulty software update from cybersecurity company CrowdStrike. Many flights during the holidays are sold out, which makes cancellations even more disruptive than during slower periods. That is especially true for smaller budget airlines that have fewer flights and fewer options for rebooking passengers. Only the largest airlines, including American, Delta and United, have “interline agreements” that let them put stranded customers on another carrier's flights. This will be the first holiday season since a Transportation Department rule took effect that requires airlines to give customers an automatic cash refund for a canceled or significantly delayed flight. Most air travelers were already eligible for refunds, but they often had to request them. Passengers still can ask to get rebooked, which is often a better option than a refund during peak travel periods. That's because finding a last-minute flight on another airline yourself tends to be very expensive. “When they rebook you, they will pay for the fare difference. If my flight to visit grandma that I booked six months ago for $200 gets canceled, and I turn around and book a flight four hours from now for $400, I have to pay that difference,” said Sally French, a travel expert at consumer-affairs company Nerdwallet. People traveling on budget airlines with fewer flights and no partnerships with other carriers may face a difficult choice in the event of a canceled flight . “They will put you on the next outgoing Spirit or Frontier flight, but that could be a while from now. Sometimes waiting three days for that next flight is not going to work for you," and paying more to rebook on a big airline might be worthwhile, French said. Some airlines are taking advantage of a provision in the new Transportation Department rule that defined a significant delay as three hours for a domestic flight and six hours for an international flight. According to Brett Snyder, who runs the Cranky Flyer website, airlines that previously issued refunds for shorter delays — Delta, United and JetBlue, for example — are now using the government standard. Delayed flights increase the risk that bags will get lost. Passengers who get separated from their bags should report it to the airline and ask what the airline will cover. Links to the customer-service plans of major U.S. airlines are at the bottom of this page . Would a government shutdown affect flights and airports? A government shutdown could occur if Congress doesn’t pass a funding bill with a midnight Friday deadline . Most TSA workers at airports, air traffic controllers and customs agents are considered essential and would be required to work without pay in the event of a shutdown. More uncompensated workers might call out sick the longer a shutdown lasts, which could lead to longer security lines and other delays. That appeared to be the case several weeks into a government shutdown that started in December 2019. "While our personnel have prepared to handle high volumes of travelers and ensure safe travel, an extended shutdown could mean longer wait times at airports,” TSA spokesman Carter Langston said in a statement. AAA advises travelers to “continue with their holiday plans, even if the shutdown materializes,” spokesperson Diaz said. “Airport operations will continue as normal, but perhaps run a bit slower than usual, so travelers should be aware of that.” Planning ahead for 2025 Airline fares were up 4.7% in November, compared with a year earlier, according to U.S. government figures. But early 2025 is a good time to start planning next year's trips, including for spring breaks and summer vacations. “Because travel is so popular, you're not going to find anything that feels very rock-bottom, but January and February are great times to plan for March, April and May,” Laura Motta, an editor at travel-guide publisher Lonely Planet, said. “If you want to go to Paris in the spring, you need to be thinking about that in January." ___ AP Reporters Mae Anderson in Nashville, Tennessee, and Mike Pesoli in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report.super ufa 。

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Tiny, wireless antennas use light to monitor cellular communication December 20, 2024 Massachusetts Institute of Technology Researchers developed a biosensing technique that eliminates the need for wires. Instead, tiny, wireless antennas use light to detect minute electrical signals in the solution around them. Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIN Email Monitoring electrical signals in biological systems helps scientists understand how cells communicate, which can aid in the diagnosis and treatment of conditions like arrhythmia and Alzheimer's. But devices that record electrical signals in cell cultures and other liquid environments often use wires to connect each electrode on the device to its respective amplifier. Because only so many wires can be connected to the device, this restricts the number of recording sites, limiting the information that can be collected from cells. MIT researchers have now developed a biosensing technique that eliminates the need for wires. Instead, tiny, wireless antennas use light to detect minute electrical signals. Small electrical changes in the surrounding liquid environment alter how the antennas scatter the light. Using an array of tiny antennas, each of which is one-hundredth the width of a human hair, the researchers could measure electrical signals exchanged between cells, with extreme spatial resolution. The devices, which are durable enough to continuously record signals for more than 10 hours, could help biologists understand how cells communicate in response to changes in their environment. In the long run, such scientific insights could pave the way for advancements in diagnosis, spur the development of targeted treatments, and enable more precision in the evaluation of new therapies. "Being able to record the electrical activity of cells with high throughput and high resolution remains a real problem. We need to try some innovative ideas and alternate approaches," says Benoît Desbiolles, a former postdoc in the MIT Media Lab and lead author of a paper on the devices. He is joined on the paper by Jad Hanna, a visiting student in the Media Lab; former visiting student Raphael Ausilio; former postdoc Marta J. I. Airaghi Leccardi; Yang Yu, a scientist at Raith America, Inc.; and senior author Deblina Sarkar, the AT&T Career Development Assistant Professor in the Media Lab and MIT Center for Neurobiological Engineering and head of the Nano-Cybernetic Biotrek Lab. The research appears today in Science Advances . "Bioelectricity is fundamental to the functioning of cells and different life processes. However, recording such electrical signals precisely has been challenging," says Sarkar. "The organic electro-scattering antennas (OCEANs) we developed enable recording of electrical signals wirelessly with micrometer spatial resolution from thousands of recording sites simultaneously. This can create unprecedented opportunities for understanding fundamental biology and altered signaling in diseased states as well as for screening the effect of different therapeutics to enable novel treatments." Biosensing with light The researchers set out to design a biosensing device that didn't need wires or amplifiers. Such a device would be easier to use for biologists who may not be familiar with electronic instruments. "We wondered if we could make a device that converts the electrical signals to light and then use an optical microscope, the kind that is available in every biology lab, to probe these signals," Desbiolles says. Initially, they used a special polymer called PEDOT:PSS to design nanoscale transducers that incorporated tiny pieces of gold filament. Gold nanoparticles were supposed to scatter the light -- a process that would be induced and modulated by the polymer. But the results weren't matching up with their theoretical model. The researchers tried removing the gold and, surprisingly, the results matched the model much more closely. "It turns out we weren't measuring signals from the gold, but from the polymer itself. This was a very surprising but exciting result. We built on that finding to develop organic electro-scattering antennas," he says. The organic electro-scattering antennas, or OCEANs, are composed of PEDOT:PSS. This polymer attracts or repulses positive ions from the surrounding liquid environment when there is electrical activity nearby. This modifies its chemical configuration and electronic structure, altering an optical property known as its refractive index, which changes how it scatters light. When researchers shine light onto the antenna, the intensity of the light it scatters back changes in proportion to the electrical signal present in the liquid. With thousands or even millions of tiny antennas in an array, each only 1 micrometer wide, the researchers can capture the scattered light with an optical microscope and measure electrical signals from cells with high resolution. Because each antenna is an independent sensor, the researchers do not need to pool the contribution of multiple antennas to monitor electrical signals, which is why OCEANs can detect signals with micrometer resolution. Intended for in vitrostudies, OCEAN arrays are designed to have cells cultured directly on top of them and put under an optical microscope for analysis. "Growing" antennas on a chip Key to the devices is the precision with which the researchers can fabricate arrays in the MIT.nano facilities. They start with a glass substrate and deposit layers of conductive then insulating material on top, each of which is optically transparent. Then they use a focused ion beam to cut hundreds of nanoscale holes into the top layers of the device. This special type of focused ion beam enables high-throughput nanofabrication. "This instrument is basically like a pen where you can etch anything with a 10-nanometer resolution," he says. They submerge the chip in a solution that contains the precursor building blocks for the polymer. By applying an electric current to the solution, that precursor material is attracted into the tiny holes on the chip, and mushroom-shaped antennas "grow" from the bottom up. The entire fabrication process is relatively fast, and the researchers could use this technique to make a chip with millions of antennas. "This technique could be easily adapted so it is fully scalable. The limiting factor is how many antennas we can image at the same time," he says. The researchers optimized the dimensions of the antennas and adjusted parameters, which enabled them to achieve high enough sensitivity to monitor signals with voltages as low as 2.5 millivolts in simulated experiments. Signals sent by neurons for communication are usually around 100 millivolts. "Because we took the time to really dig in and understand the theoretical model behind this process, we can maximize the sensitivity of the antennas," he says. OCEANs also responded to changing signals in only a few milliseconds, enabling them to record electrical signals with fast kinetics. Moving forward, the researchers want to test the devices with real cell cultures. They also want to reshape the antennas so they can penetrate cell membranes, enabling more precise signal detection. In addition, they want to study how OCEANs could be integrated into nanophotonic devices, which manipulate light at the nanoscale for next-generation sensors and optical devices. This research is funded, in part, by the U.S. National Institutes of Health and the Swiss National Science Foundation. Story Source: Materials provided by Massachusetts Institute of Technology . Original written by Adam Zewe. Note: Content may be edited for style and length. Journal Reference : Cite This Page :LAWRENCEBURG – Two Dearborn County high school seniors recently learned they are the 2025 recipients of a prestigious Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship. The Dearborn Community Foundation staff made surprise visits to award the full-tuition scholarships to East Central High School’s Annabelle Black and Lawrenceburg High School’s Nathan Parker. Each Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship provides for full tuition, required fees and a special allocation of up to $900 per year for required books and required equipment for four years of undergraduate study on a full-time basis leading to a baccalaureate degree at any eligible Indiana public or private nonprofit college or university. Lilly Endowment Community Scholars may also participate in the Lilly Scholars Network, which connects scholars with resources and opportunities to be active leaders on their campuses and in their communities. Both the scholarship program and the LSN are supported by grants from Lilly Endowment to Independent Colleges of Indiana, and Indiana Humanities. “Annabelle and Nathan epitomize what the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship is all about: community involvement, academic achievement, character and leadership,” said Fred McCarter, Executive Director of DCF. “They were selected from among a competitive group of applicants for this high honor and our community should be very proud of Annabelle, Nathan, and the other four finalists.” Black is the daughter of Kelly and B.J. Black. She plans to study Optometry at Hanover College. She was shocked and excited to learn she is a Lilly Scholar. “I’m appreciative and grateful,” she said. “I’m excited for the future.” At East Central, Black has been active in many clubs and groups: National Honor Society (Indiana Rising Star Award); Trojan Exchange; Eco Club; and AOK Club. She also participated in soccer, basketball and softball. She also completed a significant number of volunteer service hours. Parker is the son of Amanda and Brandon Parker. He plans to study Computer Science/Computer Software Engineering. He’s undecided, but leaning toward attending Indiana University, Bloomington. “I don’t have any words,” Black said upon learning he was a 2025 Lilly Scholar. “It’s life changing. It’s a blessing and something I’ve been striving toward a lot.” At Lawrenceburg High School, Parker participated in the Hope Squad throughout high school and completed a significant number of community service hours: providing Chromebook onboarding and repair, IT helpdesk support for both students and staff; and working as a teacher’s assistant, helping both students and staff with technological issues/assignments. He also found the time to hold down a job during the school year. DCF administers the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship Program in Dearborn County. A five-member scholarship committee and the DCF staff annually review each application during Phase I of the scholarship process. During Phase I, committee members assign scores to each blinded application based on an essay written to address a specific question. DCF assigns additional scores based on financial need, cumulative academic scores, and number of family dependents. Based on the highest total scores during Phase I of the process, six Lilly finalists are selected to move on to Phase II of the selection process. In October, the finalists complete Phase II, which consists of a personal interview, including a PowerPoint presentation to the scholarship committee and writing an impromptu essay on a specific topic. The scholarship committee then submits the top-scoring applicants to the DCF Board for approval before sending the nominations to the statewide administrator for LECSP, Independent Colleges of Indiana, for the selection of scholarship recipients. Lilly Endowment Inc. created the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship Program for the 1997-1998 school year and has supported the program every year since with tuition grants totaling more than $505 million. More than 5,300 Indiana students have received the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship since the program’s inception. The primary purposes of the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship Program are: 1) to help raise the level of educational attainment in Indiana; 2) to increase awareness of the beneficial roles Indiana community foundations can play in their communities; and 3) to encourage and support the efforts of current and past Lilly Endowment Community Scholars to engage with each other and with Indiana business, governmental, educational, nonprofit and civic leaders to improve the quality of life in Indiana generally and in local communities throughout the state. The four remaining LECSP finalists are recognized as 2025 Dearborn Community Foundation Scholarship recipients. Each student receives a $1,000 scholarship paid directly to the student’s school. The scholarship is renewable for up to four years of secondary education at the college or university of the student’s choice. The Foundation is pleased to award the 2025 DCF scholarships to: Emily Klem, East Central High School; Isabel Pearson, South Dearborn High School (SDHS); Sophie Ferguson, SDHS; and Trinity Taylor, LHS. Lilly Endowment Inc. is an Indianapolis-based private philanthropic foundation created in 1937 by J.K. Lilly Sr. and his sons Eli and J.K. Jr. through gifts of stock in their pharmaceutical business, Eli Lilly and Company. Although the gifts of stock remain a financial bedrock of the Endowment, it is a separate entity from the company, with a distinct governing board, staff and location. In keeping with the founders’ wishes, the Endowment supports the causes of community development, education and religion. The Endowment funds significant programs throughout the United States, especially in the field of religion. However, it maintains a special commitment to its founders’ hometown, Indianapolis, and home state, Indiana. Since 1997, Independent Colleges of Indiana has administered the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship Program statewide with funding provided by Lilly Endowment. Founded in 1948, ICI serves as the collective voice for the state’s 29 private, nonprofit colleges and universities. ICI institutions employ over 22,000 Hoosiers and generate a total local economic impact of over $5 billion annually. Students at ICI colleges have Indiana’s highest four-year, on-time graduation rates, and ICI institutions produce 30 percent of Indiana’s bachelor’s degrees while enrolling 20 percent of its undergraduates.

Should You Buy This Millionaire-Maker Stock Instead of Palantir?Published 5:12 pm Monday, November 25, 2024 By Data Skrive Six games on the Tuesday college basketball schedule feature a ranked team, including the matchup between the Duke Blue Devils and the Kansas Jayhawks. Below, we offer against-the-spread picks for each contest. Place your bets on any men’s college basketball matchup at BetMGM. Sign up today using our link. Bet on the Creighton-San Diego State spread—or any other NCAA men’s basketball matchup—with BetMGM ! Bet on the Texas A&M-Oregon spread—or any other NCAA men’s basketball matchup—with BetMGM ! Bet on the Kentucky-Western Kentucky spread—or any other NCAA men’s basketball matchup—with BetMGM ! Bet on the Alabama-Houston spread—or any other NCAA men’s basketball matchup—with BetMGM ! Bet on the Kansas-Duke spread—or any other NCAA men’s basketball matchup—with BetMGM ! Bet on the Notre Dame-Rutgers spread—or any other NCAA men’s basketball matchup—with 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 .

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