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December 30 - Cam Carter scored LSU's first eight points and finished with a game-high 23 and LSU raced to a 37-8 lead on its way to a 110-45 victory against outmanned Mississippi Valley State on Sunday in Baton Rouge, La. Vyctorius Miller added 20 points and Jordan Sears and Daimion Collins scored 15 each for the Tigers (11-2), who led 55-13 at halftime. It was their final game before opening Southeastern Conference play against visiting Vanderbilt on Saturday. LSU, which defeated Mississippi Valley 106-60 last season, shot 65.7 percent (46 of 70) from the floor. The Delta Devils (2-11) had no player score in double figures. The closest was Alvin Stredic with eight points. Mississippi Valley State remained winless against Division I opponents and have an average margin of defeat of 44.2 points heading into their Southwestern Athletic Conference opener at Alabama State on Jan. 4. Stredic's field goal tied the score at two before Carter made a tie-breaking 3-pointer to give LSU the lead for good. Carter made another 3-pointer during a 7-0 run that increased the lead to 12-4. Another field goal by Stredic ended that run before Carter and Sears each made a 3-pointer and the Tigers pushed the lead to 20-6. Stredic made another field goal, giving him six of his team's first eight points, before Carter made a 3-pointer and another basket to help fuel a 17-0 run that enabled LSU to build the 37-8 bulge. Johnathan Pace made a field goal to stop the run, but Sears and Curtis Givens III each made a 3-pointer to complete a 10-0 run that expanded the lead to 47-10. Jair Horton answered with the Delta Devils' only 3-pointer of the half before Miller and Sears each scored four points and the Tigers led by 42 at the break. Carter (16 points) and Sears (10) combined to score twice as many points as Mississippi Valley State in the half. Carter made 6-of-10 3-pointers and Sears made 4 of 8. --Field Level Media Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles. , opens new tab
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Award-winning singer Raye treated King Charles to a performance of Christmas songs during his visit to Apple’s London headquarters on Thursday afternoon. The monarch toured the tech giant’s HQ at the iconic Battersea Power Station with the company’s Chief Executive, Tim Cook, before heading outside to unveil a plaque and enjoy a surprise performance by Raye, whose hits include Worth It and Oscar Winning Tears . Raye seemed overwhelmed as she was introduced on stage, although she had previously met the King ahead of her performance inside the headquarters and in a more intimate setting. As she took to the stage, in front of Apple employees who had been unaware of her attendance, she bowed her head, shook his hand and said ‘hello’. The King appeared to comment on her black strapped dress and asked her if she felt the cold. “I don’t, I don’t,” she said, as she smiled and put her thumb up as they took a picture. The King then walked off stage alongside Tim Cook to listen to Raye’s set, “thank you, I hope you enjoy it,” she told the small crowd. King Charles stayed to listen to her sing her first song, as she said: “What an honour to be in the presence of His Majesty today. It’s all very scary and very fancy so it’s very amazing.” Raye’s special playlist began with an incredible rendition of Oh Holy Night , one her favourite Christmas carols. Following the end of the song, he then slipped off given the cold and rain. Raye continued her set and sang several more songs, including Jingle Bells and Cry me a River . Ahead of her performance, Apple Chief Executive Tim praised the monarch: “We are honoured to host His Majesty King Charles III at Apple Battersea....at Apple we are honoured to call this our home in the UK and we are so grateful to His Majesty for visiting us this afternoon.” He praised his “extraordinary leadership, his service to the United Kingdom and his lifelong commitment to philanthropy and the betterment of humanity.” He also praised the King’s Trust “incredible work in powering and educating and next generations and creating opportunity by teaching vital skills like coding”. The King was then invited to unveil a plaque commemorating his visit - and laughed as he got a “wolf whistle” as he did.As Earth grows warmer, its ground is becoming drier and saltier, with profound consequences for the planet’s 8 billion inhabitants — nearly a third of whom already live in places where water is increasingly scarce and the ability to raise crops and livestock is increasingly difficult. Climate change is accelerating this trend. New research has found global warming has made 77 percent of the Earth’s land drier over the past three decades while rapidly increasing the proportion of excessively salty soils. Drylands, or arid areas where water is hard to come by, now make up more than 40 percent of the planet (excluding Antarctica), a likely permanent consequence of climate change, according to a landmark report by the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification, or UNCCD. Another new analysis, by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, or FAO, found that roughly 10 percent of the world’s soils are affected by excess salt, with another 2.5 billion acres at risk. These interwoven trends threaten agricultural productivity, biodiversity, and ecosystem health while exacerbating food and water insecurity. Together, the two reports sound an urgent alarm: Unless the world curbs emissions, these shifts will continue, with grave implications. “Without concerted efforts, billions face a future marked by hunger, displacement, and economic decline,” said Nichole Barger, an aridlands ecologist who works with the UNCCD. Some 7.6 percent of the planet’s land was remade by climate change between 1990 and 2020, with most of the impacted areas shifting from humid landscapes to drylands — defined as an area where 90 percent of rainfall evaporates before reaching the ground. Together, they cover a geographic expanse larger than Canada, researchers found, and in 2020 were home to about 30 percent of the world’s population. That’s a jump of more than 7 percent in recent decades. Unless the world sharply limits emissions, that proportion could more than double by the end of the century. By that point, more than two-thirds of land worldwide, with the exception of Greenland and Antarctica, is expected to store less water . These changes are not limited to regions already considered dry, or expected to experience desertification. When modeling global high-emissions scenarios, the researchers found similar changes could occur in the Midwest, central Mexico, and the Mediterranean, to name three examples. The researchers have no expectation that this trend will reverse. What Hannah Waterhouse, a soil and water scientist at the University of California, Santa Cruz, finds “important, and unnerving to emphasize” is that this expansion occurred under conditions that aren’t nearly as hot as what’s to come. That suggests the problem will only escalate and, as food and water grow more scarce, usher in issues like widespread conflict , she said. “We can look to current geopolitical and ecological events that are playing out currently to understand what we can expect in the future,” Waterhouse said. “Think of what is occurring in Sudan right now, where climate change is exacerbating resource scarcity, which is interacting in governance and geopolitics in violent outcomes for civilians.” Aridity is not to be confused with drought. Drought is best described as a sudden and startling, but temporary, water shortage often caused by low precipitation, high temperatures, little humidity, and unusual wind patterns. Arid regions, on the other hand, experience persistent, long-term climatic conditions in which evaporation exceeds rainfall, creating conditions in which it can be difficult to sustain life. It is much more subtle than a drought, but no less significant. “Droughts end,” Ibrahim Thiaw, executive secretary of the UNCCD, said in a statement . “When an area’s climate becomes drier, however, the ability to return to previous conditions is lost. The drier climates now affecting vast lands across the globe will not return to how they were, and this change is redefining life on Earth.” Expanding drylands are widely considered the biggest contributor to the degradation of Earth’s agricultural systems and difficulty producing enough food. Such conditions also have been linked to loss of gross domestic product, large-scale migration, and adverse health impacts and rising mortality. They intensify wildfires, sand storms, and dust storms while degrading ecosystems. They also promote erosion and the salinization of water and soil. Climate change is already hampering food production, leaving one in 11 people worldwide hungry last year, and the research suggests the problem will intensify, particularly in much of Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia. Under the business-as-usual emissions scenario, sub-Saharan Africa could lose as much as 22 percent of its current crop production capacity by 2050. The production of staple food crops grown in regions highly susceptible to aridity, such as soybeans, wheat, and rice, could plummet worldwide as well. Rapid expansion of the world’s drylands is “100 percent interconnected” with the coinciding surge in saltier soils, said Maria Konyushkova, a soil scientist at the Food and Agriculture Organization and lead author of the report the U.N. agency released December 11. The more arid an area is, the less freshwater is available. That requires farmers to rely upon brackish water, increasing soil salinity. While water-soluble salt is a component of all soils, too much of it impairs plants’ water absorption, effectively stealing moisture from them and suppressing their growth. High salinity also changes soil structure, making it more prone to erosion. All of this diminishes soil fertility, and could lead to yield losses as high as 70 percent for crops like rice and beans in the countries most impacted, the researchers found. Roughly 10 percent of the world’s irrigated cropland, and a similar proportion of its rain-fed cropland, already has been impacted by this dire trend. As it stands, 10 countries, including China, Russia, and the United States, account for 70 percent of the planet’s salt-affected soils. This costs the global agriculture sector at least $27 billion every year. If the world continues to warm at its current rate, past research has estimated that more than 50 percent of the world’s cropland would be similarly impacted by 2050, exacerbating the declining yields that are already driving rising hunger rates . Where to go from here was the central topic of UNCCD COP16 earlier this month, as representatives of nearly 200 nations gathered in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, to discuss land degradation, desertification, and drought. “We depend on land for our survival,” U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said at the conference . “Yet we treat it like dirt.” Nature-based solutions like agroecology are among the slate of locally-deployed mitigation and adaptation tactics the two reports suggest, alongside improved crop and water management, technological solutions, and the development of water-efficient and salt-resistant varieties of crops. Big-dollar investments are being touted as solutions, too. Previous UNCCD reports found that halting the planet’s rate of land degradation, which they suggest could lose the global economy $23 trillion by 2050, would cost roughly $4.6 trillion. The agency told negotiators at the summit that at least $2.6 trillion for restoration and resilience purposes is needed by 2030. By the time the summit concluded, just over $12 billion had been pledged to tackle the issue across 80 vulnerable countries, while negotiators departed having failed to agree on a legally binding protocol for action. Waterhouse has doubts about some proposals highlighted in the research she considers “top-down technocratic solutions.” The Great Green Wall, a multibillion-dollar initiative to plant trees to combat desertification in the Sahel region of Africa, is one example. The effort, launched in 2007, has drawn criticism for exacerbating water scarcity and biodiversity loss. Konyushkova considers the two reports an urgent call for governments worldwide to prioritize investing in resilience efforts to manage what is clearly becoming a crisis. “All the trends show that the freshwater resources will be depleting ... but we have so many approaches to adapt,” she said. “We just need to start doing it right now, because it’s already here. Even if governments don’t always understand, it’s already here, and deteriorating.” Grist is a nonprofit, independent media organization dedicated to telling stories of climate solutions and a just future. Learn more at Grist.orgTrump is welcomed by Macron to Paris with presidential pomp and joined by Zelenskyy for their talks PARIS (AP) — French President Emmanuel Macron has welcomed Donald Trump to Paris with a full a dose of presidential pomp. And they held an impromptu meeting with Ukraine’s Volodymr Zelenskyy on a day that's mixing pageantry with attention to pressing global problems. The president-elect's visit to France is part of a global a celebration of the reopening of Notre Dame Cathedral five years after a devastating fire. Macron and other European leaders are trying to win Trump’s favor and persuade him to maintain support for Ukraine in its defense against Russia’s invasion. Syrian insurgents reach the capital's suburbs. Worried residents flee and stock up on supplies BEIRUT (AP) — Insurgents’ stunning march across Syria is gaining speed with news that they have reached the suburbs of the capital of Damascus. The government on Saturday was forced to deny rumors that President Bashar Assad had fled the country. The rebels’ moves around Damascus were reported by an opposition war monitor and a rebel commander. They came after the Syrian army withdrew from much of southern part of the country, leaving more areas, including two provincial capitals, under the control of opposition fighters. The advances in the past week were among the largest in recent years by opposition factions. The factions are by a group that has its origins in al-Qaida and is considered a terrorist organization by the U.S. and the United Nations. Trump isn't back in office but he's already pushing his agenda and negotiating with world leaders NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump is making threats, traveling abroad, and negotiating with world leaders. He has more than a month-and-a-half to go before he’s sworn in for a second term. But the president-elect is already moving aggressively to not only fill his Cabinet and outline policy goals, but also to try to achieve his priorities. In recent days, Trump has threatened to impose a 25% tariff on goods from Canada and Mexico, two of the country’s largest trading partners. That led to emergency calls and a visit. And he's warned of “ALL HELL TO PAY” if Hamas doesn't release the hostages still being held captive in Gaza. South Korea's president avoids an impeachment attempt over short-lived martial law SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s embattled President Yoon Suk Yeol has avoided an opposition-led attempt to impeach him over his short-lived imposition of martial law. Most of Yoon's ruling party lawmakers boycotted a parliamentary vote Saturday to deny a two-thirds majority needed to suspend his presidential powers. The scrapping of the motion is expected to intensify protests calling for Yoon’s ouster and deepen political chaos in South Korea. A survey suggests a majority of South Koreans support the president’s impeachment. Yoon’s martial law declaration drew criticism from his own ruling conservative People Power Party. But the party also apparently fears losing the presidency to liberals. Days after gunman killed UnitedHealthcare's CEO, police push to ID him and FBI offers reward NEW YORK (AP) — Nearly four days after the shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, police still do not know the gunman’s name or whereabouts or have a motive for the killing. But they have made some progress in their investigation into Wednesday's killing of the leader of the largest U.S. health insurer, including that the gunman likely left New York City on a bus soon after fleeing the scene. The also found that the gunman left something behind: a backpack that was discovered in Central Park. Police are working with the FBI, which on Friday night announced a $50,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction. UnitedHealthcare CEO's shooting opens a door for many to vent frustrations over insurance The fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare's CEO has opened the door for many people to vent their frustrations and anger over the insurance industry. The feelings of exasperation, anger, resentment, and helplessness toward insurers aren’t new. But the shooting and the headlines around it have unleashed a new wave of patients sharing such sentiments and personal stories of interactions with insurance companies. Conversations at dinner tables, office water coolers, social gatherings and on social media have pivoted to the topic. Many say they hope the new amplified voices can bring about change for companies often accused of valuing profits over people. The DNC chair candidates discuss Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and winning Latino voters SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. (AP) — Four Democrats are running for Democratic National Committee chair, looking to take on the task of reinvigorating a party demoralized by a second loss to President-elect Donald Trump. Others may still get into the race as Democrats reckon with what went wrong in the 2024 election, which saw Trump gain with nearly every demographic group in a decisive repudiation of the incumbent party. The 448 DNC members will elect a successor for outgoing Chair Jaime Harrison on Feb. 1. The party’s Rules and Bylaws Committee is scheduled to meet next week to approve rules for the contest. 100-year-old Pearl Harbor survivor recalls confusion and chaos during Japanese bombing 83 years ago PEARL HARBOR, Hawaii (AP) — The bombing of Pearl Harbor 83 years ago launched the United States into World War II. Two survivors are planning to return to the Hawaii military base on Saturday for a remembrance ceremony on the attack's anniversary. They are each over 100 years old. They will join active-duty troops, veterans and members of the public for a remembrance ceremony hosted by the Navy and the National Park Service. A third survivor was planning to join them but had to cancel due to health issues. The bombing killed more than 2,300 U.S. servicemen. An explosion destroys an apartment block in a Dutch city, killing at least 3 and injuring others THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — An explosion and fire has rocked a neighborhood in the Dutch city of The Hague, killing three people and injuring other people and destroying several apartments. The cause of the disaster is unclear. Emergency authorities said four people were rescued from the rubble and taken to the hospital. The mayor said rescuers were no longer looking for survivors but for eventual bodies, but could not specify how many people might still be unaccounted for. Residents of the northeastern neighborhood of Mariahoeve in The Hague heard a huge bang and screams before dawn. Dutch authorities have deployed a specialized urban search and rescue team to find victims. Do weighted blankets help you sleep better? Here's what to know NEW YORK (AP) — Weighted blankets are a popular choice to warm up in cold weather, but research on their effectiveness is limited. Such blankets come with extra heft in the form of glass beads, pellets or cotton. They're also more expensive than regular blankets. Scientists think the added pressure could calm the brain’s fight-or-flight response or signal the brain to produce what’s called the love hormone. There isn’t a ton of research on whether weighted blankets actually work, and the studies that do exist are on small groups. Experts say there’s no harm in giving them a try if you're willing to splurge.