Wheel ..

An Air Canada Express flight lost a wheel shortly after takeoff from Montreal-Trudeau International Airport, forcing the plane to turn back.

One of the 49 passengers on board captured video of the wheel detaching from the plane's left main landing gear and shared it on social media.

The  passenger paired the video with a sarcastic caption: "I'm currently on a plane that just lost a wheel. 2020 starting off well."

Pilots were able to turn the Dash 8-300 around and land safely.

"The experienced pilots maintained complete control of the aircraft," Manon Stuart, a spokesperson for Jazz Aviation, the operator of the flight, said in a statement.

Badaboom...

The US economy added 145,000 jobs in December, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said Friday.

Although the headline number slightly missed economists' expectations, the unemployment rate remained steady at 3.5%, a historic low. Over the past three months, an average of 184,000 new positions were added per month.

While job growth on average slowed in 2019 relative to 2018, if employment continues to grow steadily after the tenth year of economic expansion, it would still paint a relatively robust picture, and support US consumer strength.

Forest.

Can't see the forest for the fire.

Gentry...

 Kentucky family court judge accused was temporarily suspended with pay this week while officials continue to investigate allegations of  ethics violations leveled against her last month.

Dawn Gentry was accused of having a threesome with her secretary, Laura Aubrey, and Penrose while in a courthouse office during work hours. She denied the allegationbut that is what's going to stick in the mind.

She also is accused of hiring other employees not based on merit and of making unwanted sexual advances toward others through the social media platform “Snapchat.”

Gentry faces disciplinary action for falsifying timesheets, delaying hearings for or dismissing attorneys who did not support her bid for Kenton County Family Court judge,

Hunter...

 There was always someone in Joe Biden’s life to help him out with Hunter.  But little boys have little needs, while big boys have bigger needs.

Soon enough, directionless Hunter has a six-figure job at a bank run by Biden supporters. When Hunter grows bored, there’s another lucrative job under the tutelage of a former Biden staffer. When Hunter wants a house he can’t afford, he receives a loan for 110 percent of the purchase price. And when he goes bust, another friendly banker mops up the damage.

Then his brother Beau contracts fatal brain cancer, and the last wobbly wheels come off Hunter Biden’s fragile self. At this point,  much of the story is narrated by Hunter himself — of hallucinations, a car abandoned in the desert, maxed-out credit cards, a crack pipe, a strip club and a brandished gun.

 By the time the senator was vice president, there was a Chinese businessman who, Hunter said, left him a large diamond as a nice-to-meet-you gift. And a Ukrainian oligarch who hired Hunter at a princely sum to do nothing much. (Neither the firm nor Hunter Biden identified any specific contribution he made).  

Less privileged Americans can’t be faulted if they wonder why their addicted loved ones are on the streets or in the morgue. Multitudes locked up for years under Joe Biden’s crime bill might ask why the author’s son traveled the world scot-free. And sober working people making $50,000 a year may be skeptical of a system in which a vice president’s addicted son reportedly collected that sum every month.

Memories...

Shining light directly into areas of the brain damaged in Alzheimer's may reverse the the course of the disease, scientists believe.  

Researchers are trialling a headset mounted with LEDs that beams pulses of gamma waves into the hippocampus, the region responsible for memory.  

The daily treatment is said to boost mitochondria – the cell's batteries, which sweep away toxic proteins that build up in the brains of patients.

A 12-week trial into its effectiveness has just begun after early results saw patients regain their memory, as well as reading and writing skills, in three months.

With no known Alzheimer's cure in sight, the headset offers a ray of hope for around 850,000 sufferers in Britain and nearly six million in the US.

Deepfake...

Facebook says it is banning “deepfake” videos, the false but realistic clips created with artificial intelligence and sophisticated tools, as it steps up efforts to fight online manipulation.

The social network said that it's beefing up its policies to remove videos edited or synthesized in ways that aren't apparent to the average person, and which could dupe someone into thinking the video's subject said something he or she didn't actually say.

Created by artificial intelligence or machine learning, deepfakes combine or replace content to create images that can be almost impossible to tell are not authentic.

The U.S. tech company has been grappling with how to handle the rise of deepfakes after facing criticism last year for refusing to remove a doctored video of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi slurring her words, which was viewed more than 3 million times. Experts said the crudely edited clip was more of a “cheap fake” than a deepfake.

It Could...

Guy...

Key...

Image is not related.

The study, by researchers at Linköping University, Sweden, looked at 15 healthy, non-smoking young men aged 20 to 27 years old with a normal body mass index (BMI).

The participants were asked to follow a diet set by the researchers for a two-week period. During the first week, they were provided meals based on  a diet high in cereals, bread, potatoes, fruits and vegetables, and low in fats and sweets, and includes a moderate amount of dairy, meat, fish, eggs and beans.

The findings, published online in PLOS Biology, showed that one-third of the participants had low sperm motility  at the start of the study. However, the team were surprised to find that by the end of the study, the sperm motility of all participants had become normal, with the most pronounced improvement becoming apparent after the first week.

The researchers added that, the increase of sperm motility might have been a direct result of the healthy diet, which could have persisted into the second week when participants were also eating more sugar.