Author: IQ TIMES MEDIA
The holiday season is often painted as an idyllic vision of rest, conjuring images of warm beverages and bountiful time with loved ones. But many people have trouble unwinding at this time of year. Why do the December holidays offer the promise of respite but never seem to deliver? And is more restorative rest possible during this busy season?I am a psychologist who studies how rest supports learning, creativity and well-being. Sleep is often the first thing that many people associate with rest, but humans also require restorative downtime when awake. These active rest periods include physical, social and creative…
Amazon is adding a new feature to Alexa+ that adds a conversational AI to Ring doorbells, letting users manage deliveries, turn down sales folks, and let family or friends leave a message when they are not around. Called Greetings, the feature helps Ring determine who is visiting your house based on their apparel, actions, and what they are holding, and responds accordingly. For example, if the system sees a person in a delivery uniform dropping off a package, it will respond based on your instructions. The feature adds settings that let you specify where delivery people can leave packages, and…
Dec 18 (Reuters) – Moderna will get up to $54.3 million in funding from a global coalition to support late-stage development of its experimental bird flu vaccine, the U.S. drugmaker said on Thursday.The vaccine, mRNA-1018, would be the first mRNA-based bird flu vaccine to enter a pivotal trial, Moderna said.In May, the Trump administration had canceled a $700 million contract with Moderna to develop the vaccine.The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, or CEPI, is a global partnership working to accelerate the development of vaccines against epidemic and pandemic threats.As part of the agreement, Moderna will reserve 20% of its production…
Dec 18 (Reuters) – Eli Lilly’s oral pill, orforglipron, helped maintain weight loss in patients switching from injectable versions of GLP-1 drugs, the company said on Thursday, in a boost to deliver a more convenient obesity treatment option.An oral weight-loss pill would help Lilly further widen its lead over Novo Nordisk.Both Lilly and Novo are awaiting U.S. regulatory approvals for their pills, with a decision on Novo’s oral Wegovy expected later this year and on Lilly’s orforglipron early next year.In the late-stage trial, patients who took orforglipron for 52 weeks, after an initial treatment period of 72 weeks with Wegovy…
Kyra Hailey remembers “caring” for a fake baby on the night of her 16th birthday. The common high school assignment is meant to discourage teen pregnancy but, according to one study, might actually encourage it. That wasn’t the case for Hailey. “I failed because I shook the ‘baby,’ because I was so mad that it was taking away my sleep,” she tells Yahoo. “That was the day I knew that I didn’t want kids.”For the next 12 years, her mother, friends and doctors insisted she would change her mind about having children when she was older, when she met someone.…
MADRID, Dec 18 (Reuters) – Spanish police searched a state-funded laboratory near Barcelona on Thursday as part of an investigation into the origin of the African swine fever outbreak in the same area, regional police said.The court-ordered move follows concerns raised this month that the outbreak detected in wild boars could have been caused by a laboratory leak. Genome sequencing showed the strain is similar to that used in research and vaccine development and different from other cases in Europe.African swine fever is harmless to humans but can be fatal to pigs and wild boars, and spreads rapidly.Spain is the…
2025-12-18T10:03:01.268Z Share Facebook Email X LinkedIn Reddit Bluesky WhatsApp Copy link lighning bolt icon An icon in the shape of a lightning bolt. Impact Link Save Saved Read in app This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers. Become an Insider and start reading now. Have an account? Log in. Tech unicorns valued at $1 billion aren’t all that special anymore. The hectocorn, companies valued at $100 billion or more, are the hot new thing. OpenAI, SpaceX, and Anthropic are leading the way with multi-centibillion-dollar valuations. Nearly two decades ago, tech startups used to chase the distinct pedigree of…
SHELBYVILLE, Ky. (AP) — When the funding for Shannon Johnson’s job as a school mental health counselor came to an abrupt end, two years into a five-year grant, she thought about the work left to be done.Johnson taught elementary and middle-school students in rural Kentucky how to navigate conflict, build resilience and manage stress and anxiety before a crisis happens. Few districts, especially rural ones, can dedicate a full-time role to early intervention amid a national shortage of mental health staff. But the Trump administration discontinued her grant, giving her a sudden end date. So when another job opened in…
Palmer Luckey recently launched what might be his most ambitious endeavor yet. He’s calling it his “I told you so tour.”On his raucous, relentless, revenge roadshow, the memelord weapons manufacturer has boasted to Joe Rogan that he has “plenty of money,” and that when he retires he’ll investigate UFOs as “the government’s privately funded X-Files.” He’s told CBS News top dog Bari Weiss that America must become “the world’s gun store,” and has bragged about his distinctive métier: “I build cruise missiles, and I post on X.” He’s told tech’s most terminally online podcasting bros that his AI munitions company,…
A highly contagious virus that causes vomiting and diarrhea is likely affecting some people in Los Angeles County.Concentrations of norovirus, sometimes referred to as the “winter vomiting disease,” detected in wastewater is increasing in the county, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health told the USA TODAY Network in an email on Tuesday, Dec. 16. Officials use wastewater to monitor the presence of infectious diseases within a community, like norovirus or the virus that causes COVID-19.The county public health department said that wastewater detection of norovirus increased 154% in Los Angeles for three weeks ending on Dec. 11. In…