NEW YORK (AP) — Remember what you searched for in 2024? Google does. Google released its annual “Year in Search” on Tuesday, rounding up the top trending queries entered into its namesake search engine in 2024. The results show terms that saw the highest spike in traffic compared to last year — ranging from key news events, notably global elections , to the most popular songs, athletes and unforgettable pop-culture moments that people looked up worldwide. Sports — particularly soccer and cricket — dominated Google’s overall trending searches in 2024. Copa América topped those search trends globally, followed by the UEFA European Championship and ICC Men’s T20 World Cup . Meanwhile, the U.S. election led news-specific searches worldwide. Queries about excessive heat and this year’s Olympic Games followed. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump topped searches in Google’s people category this year — followed by Catherine, Princess of Wales , U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and Algerian boxer Imane Khelif , who also led athlete-specific searches. Meanwhile, the late Liam Payne , Toby Keith and O.J. Simpson led search trends among notable individuals who died in 2024. In the world of entertainment, Disney and Pixar’s “Inside Out 2” was the top trending movie of the year, while Netflix’s “Baby Reindeer” led TV show trends. And Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” dominated song trends. RELATED COVERAGE Storm Darragh batters UK and Ireland, leaving 1 dead and hundreds of thousands without power Princess of Wales takes another step in return to public life after chemotherapy with carol service Princess of Wales joins royals as Qatari state visit to the UK starts That’s just the tip of the iceberg. Queries for the Olympic village’s chocolate muffin , made famous by Norwegian swimmer Henrik Christiansen over the summer games, led Google’s global recipe trends this year. The New York Times’ “Connections” puzzle topped game searches. And in the U.S., country-specific data shows, many people asked Google about online trends like the word “demure” and “ mob wife aesthetic .” You can find more country-specific lists, and trends from years past , through Google’s “Year in Search” data published online . The California company said it collected 2024 search results from Jan. 1 through Nov. 23 of this year. Google isn’t the only one to publish an annual recap or top trends as 2024 draws to a close. Spotify Wrapped , for example, as well as Collins Dictionary and Merriam-Webster’s words of the year, have offered additional reflections for 2024.There is no doubting that Adam Keefe’s name will ultimately be listed alongside those who have made significant contributions to Giants’ history as they celebrate 25 seasons in existence. Whether any of the players on Keefe’s 2024-25 roster and which are worthy of the status of Hall of Famers may be determined over the next four months. Winning the Elite League title is always the No.1 target in Belfast — it has been since Dave Whistle, one of the inaugural Hall of Fame members, led the Giants to their first title in 2002. In a special year the motivation has an added layer. “That’s huge obviously,” said Keefe of chasing the title in the Giant’s 25th anniversary campaign. “We put a lot of stock on all the owners who have done there job to keep this team here and then the Odyssey Trust who have solidified the team and the investment that they have put into us, we want to reward that. “We want to reward our fanbase for what they are doing for us, specifically in the last two years the crows are fantastic and people are turning up, so we want to reward them.” Keefe’s stamp on the Giants is indelible. Two League titles as a player, the second as captain, have been added to with three more being won under his coaching, including a treble-winning campaign in 2023. The biggest expectation to bring more glory comes from within the 40-year-old, who has won eight trophies as Giants coach, as the team is as much part of him as he is part of the Giants. “It’s 13 years for me, minus the Covid year,” said Keefe, who was signed by Doug Christiansen in 2011 “For lack of a better term, I bleed teal and I take a lot of the history on board. “There are people did a lot of work before I got here and before these guys got here to make this place what it is and that’s not lost on me. “Some of them are still here and some of them have moved on. “This is a great place to play hockey, I got to enjoy it for six years myself and now I’ve got to enjoy seven years as a coach as well. This is my home now and it’s not just a job for me and it’s not just a job for the coaching staff, we take this pretty seriously and we want to reward everyone. “Yes, it’s a special season for us, we are excited for it.” The Giants enter a frenetic period where they play four games between now and the end of 2024, starting away to Glasgow Clan this evening, just four points behind the Cardiff Devils, with two matches in hand. The Sheffield Steelers won the League with 91 points last season — the most in a 54-game season since the Giants hit 95 more than a decade ago — and the way things are shaping up it might take another record-breaking campaign for whoever comes out as champions this time around. “Ultimately Sheffield came in and set a new bar last year. We did it the year before that, they knocked it down and they set their own,” said Keefe. “Now it’s our turn — or somebody else’s or Sheffield’s to hold on to that. We want to be that team who knocks that bar down and pushes through.”
The NFL suspended Tennessee Titans safety Julius Wood six games on Tuesday for violating the policy on performing-enhancing substances. There are five games remaining this season for the Titans (3-9), so Wood's suspension will bleed into Week 1 of 2025. Wood, 23, went undrafted this spring and signed with the Dallas Cowboys as a free agent. They waived him in August, and he caught on with the Titans, who claimed him off waivers. Wood appeared in nine games, almost exclusively on special teams, and has recorded two tackles. --Field Level Media
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The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is and from collecting, using, and selling “sensitive” location data of Americans, the agency announced on Tuesday. The FTC targeted Gravy Analytics, its subsidiary Venntel, and Mobilewalla for allegedly violating the FTC Act by collecting and selling information that could be used to track people to healthcare facilities, military bases, religious sites, labor union gatherings, and other sensitive locations. The FTC says ( ) Mobilewalla “relied primarily on consumer information that Mobilewalla collected from real-time bidding exchanges” by bidding to show people personalized ads on their mobile devices and then retaining tracking info identifying them. It also bought info from other sources and used additional data to build out the profiles attached to each advertising ID. Combining that data, according to the complaint, allowed Mobilewalla to create audience segments targeting pregnant women, as well as provide analysis of people who attended protests over the death of George Floyd. Meanwhile, Venntel’s scheme is explained ( ) as collecting location data from otherwise ordinary mobile apps, and then selling access to the data to other businesses or government agencies. reports that the IRS, DEA, FBI, CBP, and ICE have all purchased Venntel data. Now, the companies must comply by never “selling, disclosing, or using sensitive location data in any product or service, and must establish a sensitive data location program.” Mobilewalla’s proposed settlement order will prohibit the company from: Senator Ron Wyden from Oregon, who led efforts to target a loophole data brokers used to sell sensitive personal data on the market, applauded the FTC and CFPB for limiting what the companies can collect. In a statement sent to , Wyden said these companies could sell information about “law enforcement, judges and members of the armed forces is on the open market” to “anyone with a credit card,” putting citizens and military personnel in danger. Wyden also said US government agencies spied on Americans by obtaining this data without a warrant. “Many federal agencies hid behind the flimsy claim that Americans consented to the sale of their data, but the FTC’s orders make it clear how untrue these claims were,” said Wyden. /
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Israeli drone strikes hit Kamal Adwan Hospital on Tuesday, wounding three medical staff at one of the few hospitals still partially operating in the northernmost part of Gaza , the facility’s director said. Dr. Hossam Abu Safiya said the drones were dropping bombs, spraying shrapnel at the hospital. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military. In Lebanon, a tenuous ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah has held despite Israeli forces carrying out several new drone and artillery strikes on Tuesday, killing a shepherd in the country's south. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed keep striking “with an iron fist” against perceived Hezbollah violations of the ceasefire. Hezbollah began launching rockets, drones and missiles into Israel last year in solidarity with Hamas militants who are fighting in the Gaza Strip. The war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking around 250 people hostage . Israel’s blistering retaliatory offensive has killed at least 44,500 Palestinians , more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not say how many of the dead were combatants. Israel says it has killed over 17,000 militants, without providing evidence. The war in Gaza has destroyed vast areas of the coastal enclave and displaced 90% of the population of 2.3 million, often multiple times . Here's the Latest: WASHINGTON — U.S. forces conducted a self-defense strike Tuesday in the vicinity of Mission Support Site Euphrates, a U.S. base in eastern Syria, against three truck-mounted multiple rocket launchers, a T-64 tank and mortars that Pentagon press secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said presented “a clear and imminent threat” to U.S. troops. The self-defense strike occurred after rockets and mortars were fired that landed in the vicinity of the base, Ryder said. The Pentagon is still assessing who was responsible for the attacks — that there are both Iranian-backed militias and Syrian military forces that operate in the area. Ryder said the attack was not connected to the offensive that is ongoing in Aleppo, where Syrian jihadi-led rebels taken over the country’s largest city. The U.S. has about 900 troops in Syria to conduct missions to counter the Islamic Stage group. CAIRO — Israeli drone strikes hit the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza on Tuesday, wounding three medical personnel, the facility’s director said. Dr. Hossam Abu Safiya said the drones were dropping bombs, spraying shrapnel at the hospital, located in the town of Beit Lahiya. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military. In comments released by Gaza’s Health Ministry, Abu Safiya said one of the injured was in critical condition and was undergoing a complex surgery. “The situation has become extremely dangerous,” he said. “We are exhausted by the ongoing violence and atrocities.” Kamal Adwan Hospital has been struck multiple times over the past two months as Israeli forces have waged a fierce offensive in the area, saying they are rooting out Hamas militants who regrouped there. In October, Israeli forces raided the hospital, saying that militants were sheltering inside and arrested a number of people, including some staff. Hospital officials denied the claim. Abu Safiya was wounded in his thigh and back by an Israeli drone strike on the hospital last month. TEL AVIV, Israel — An Israeli court has ordered Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to take the stand next week in his long-running corruption trial, ending a long series of delays. Netanyahu’s lawyers had filed multiple requests to put off the testimony, arguing first that the war in Gaza prevented him from properly preparing for his testimony, and later that his security could not be guaranteed in the court chamber. In Tuesday’s decision, judges in the Jerusalem district court said that following a security assessment, his testimony will be moved to the Tel Aviv district court. Israeli media said the session would take place in an underground chamber. His testimony in the trial, which began in 2020, is expected to begin on Dec. 10 and to last at least several weeks. Netanyahu is charged with fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes in three separate scandals involving powerful media moguls and wealthy associates. He denies wrongdoing. NABATIYEH, Lebanon — In destroyed areas of southern Lebanon, residents clearing away rubble on Tuesday said they didn’t trust Israel to abide by the week-old ceasefire with Hezbollah. “The Israelis are breaching the ceasefire whenever they can because they are not committed,” said Hussein Badreddin, a vegetable seller in the southern city of Nabatiyeh, which was pummeled by Israeli airstrikes over several weeks. “This means that they (can) breach any resolution at any time.” Since it began last Wednesday, the U.S.- and French-brokered 60-day ceasefire has been rattled by near daily Israeli strikes, although Israel has been vague about the purported Hezbollah violations that prompted them. Imad Yassin, a trader who owns a clothing shop in Nabatiyeh, said Israel was constantly breaching the ceasefire because Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants to continue the displacement of residents of southern Lebanon. “The Israeli enemy was defeated and the truth is that he is trying to get revenge. Netanyahu is trying to displace us as citizens of southern Lebanon,” Yassin said. They spoke as bulldozers cleared streets strewn with rubble and debris from destroyed buildings. Electricians worked to fix power lines in an effort to restore electricity to the city. Both men were displaced by the war and returned to Nabatiyeh on Wednesday, the day the ceasefire went into effect. Yassin found his clothing shop had been destroyed. He said he would wait to see if the state will dispense compensation funds so that he can repair and reopen his business. GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Two separate Israeli airstrikes killed at least nine people in Gaza City on Tuesday, Palestinian medical authorities said. Six people, including two children, who were killed when an Israeli strike hit a school sheltering displaced people Tuesday afternoon in the Zaytoun neighborhood, according to the Health Ministry’s emergency services. A second strike hit a residential building in the Sabra neighborhood, killing at least three people, the services said. Israeli forces have almost completely isolated northernmost Gaza since early October, saying they’re fighting regrouped Hamas militants there. That has pushed some families south to Gaza City, while hundreds of thousands more live in the territory's center and south in squalid tent camps, where they rely on international aid. JERUSALEM — Israel's military confirmed it killed a senior member of Hezbollah responsible for coordinating with Syria's army on rearming and resupplying the Lebanese militant group. Syrian state media said a drone strike on Tuesday hit a car in a suburb of the capital Damascus, killing one person, without saying who was killed. Israel's military said he was Salman Nemer Jomaa, describing him as “Hezbollah’s representative to the Syrian military,” and that killing him “degrades both Hezbollah’s presence in Syria and Hezbollah’s ongoing force-building efforts.” Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes on targets inside government-controlled parts of war-torn Syria in recent years. Israel rarely acknowledges its actions in Syria, but it has said that it targets bases of Iran-allied militant groups. Iran supports both Hezbollah and the Syrian government of President Bashar Assad, which is currently fighting to push back jihadi-led insurgents who seized the country’s largest city of Aleppo . TUBAS, West Bank — Israeli soldiers opened fire inside a hospital in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday during a raid to seize the bodies of alleged militants targeted in earlier airstrikes, a Palestinian doctor working at the hospital told The Associated Press. Soldiers entered the Turkish Hospital complex in Tubas after the bodies of two Palestinians killed and one wounded in airstrikes in the northern West Bank on Tuesday were brought there, said Dr. Mahmoud Ghanam, who works in the hospital’s emergency department. The troops briefly handcuffed and arrested Ghanam and another doctor. “The army entered in a brutal way, and they were shooting inside the emergency department,” said Ghanam. “They handcuffed us and took me and my colleague.” The military confirmed that its troops were operating around the hospital searching for those targeted in the airstrikes, which they said had hit a militant cell near the Palestinian town of Al-Aqaba in the Jordan Valley. It denied that troops had entered the hospital building or fired gunshots inside. The soldiers left after learning that the wounded man had been transferred to another hospital, Ghanam said. The soldiers wanted to take the bodies of the two men killed in the strike, but the hospital’s manager refused to hand over the bodies, Ghanam said. Israeli raids on hospitals in the West Bank are rare but have grown more common since the start of the Israel-Hamas war. In Gaza, Israeli troops have systematically besieged, raided and damaged many hospitals. About 800 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank since Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack out of Gaza ignited the war there. Israel has carried out near-daily military raids in the West Bank that it says are aimed at preventing attacks on Israelis — attacks which have also been on the rise. Israel captured the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians seek all three territories for an independent state. CAIRO — Palestinian officials say Fatah and Hamas are closing in on an agreement to appoint a committee of politically independent technocrats to administer the Gaza Strip after the war . It would effectively end Hamas’ rule and could help advance ceasefire talks with Israel. The rival factions have made several failed attempts to reconcile since Hamas seized power in Gaza in 2007. Israel has meanwhile ruled out any postwar role in Gaza for either Hamas or Fatah, which dominates the Western-backed Palestinian Authority . A Palestinian Authority official on Tuesday confirmed that a preliminary agreement had been reached following weeks of negotiations in Cairo. The official said the committee would have 12-15 members, most of them from Gaza. It would report to the Palestinian Authority, which is headquartered in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, and work with local and international parties to facilitate humanitarian assistance and reconstruction. A Hamas official said that Hamas and Fatah had agreed on the general terms but were still negotiating over some details and the individuals who would serve on the committee. The official said an agreement would be announced after a meeting of all Palestinian factions in Cairo, without providing a timeline. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief media on the talks. There was no immediate comment from Israel. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to continue the war until Hamas is dismantled and scores of hostages are returned. He says Israel will maintain open-ended security control over Gaza , with civilian affairs administered by local Palestinians unaffiliated with the Palestinian Authority or Hamas. No Palestinians have publicly volunteered for such a role, and Hamas has threatened anyone who cooperates with the Israeli military. The United States has called for a revitalized Palestinian Authority to govern both the West Bank and Gaza ahead of eventual statehood. The Israeli government is opposed to Palestinian statehood. Associated Press writers Samy Magdy in Cairo and Josef Federman in Jerusalem contributed. NUSEIRAT REFUGEE CAMP, Gaza Strip — Palestinians lined up for bags of flour distributed by the U.N. in central Gaza on Tuesday morning, some of them for the first time in months amid a drop in food aid entering the territory. The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, gave out one 25-kilogram flour bag (55 pounds) to each family of 10 at a warehouse in the Nuseirat refugee camp, as well as further south in the city of Khan Younis. Jalal al-Shaer, among the dozens receiving flour at the Nuseirat warehouse, said the bag would last his family of 12 for only two or three days. “The situation for us is very difficult,” said another man in line, Hammad Moawad. “There is no flour, there is no food, prices are high ... We eat bread crumbs.” He said his family hadn’t received a flour allotment in five or six months. COGAT, the Israeli army body in charge of humanitarian affairs, said it facilitated entry of a shipment of 600 tons of flour on Sunday for the World Food Program. Still, the amount of aid Israel has allowed into Gaza since the beginning of October has been at nearly the lowest levels of the 15-month-old war. UNRWA’s senior emergency officer Louise Wateridge told The Associated Press that the flour bags being distributed Tuesday were not enough. “People are getting one bag of flour between an entire family and there is no certainty when they’ll receive the next food,” she said. Wateridge added that UNRWA has been struggling like other humanitarian agencies to provide much needed supplies across the Gaza Strip. The agency this week announced it was stopping delivering aid entering through the main crossing from Israel, Kerem Shalom, because its convoys were being robbed by gangs. UNRWA has blamed Israel in large part for the spread of lawlessness in Gaza. The International Criminal Court is seeking to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister over accusations of using “starvation as a method of warfare” by restricting humanitarian aid into Gaza. Israel rejects the allegations and says it has been working hard to improve entry of aid. JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the war isn't over against Hezbollah and vowed to use "an iron fist" against the Lebanese militant group for any perceived violations of a week-old ceasefire. “At the moment we are in a ceasefire, I note — a ceasefire, not the end of the war," Netanyahu said at the start of the government meeting Tuesday. He said the military would retaliate for “any violation — minor or major.” Netanyahu also thanked U.S. President-elect Donald Trump for his recent demands for Hamas to release the remaining Israeli hostages in Gaza. Trump posted on social media Monday that if the hostages are not freed before he takes office in January there would be “HELL TO PAY.” Netanyahu convened Tuesday's meeting in northern Israel, where around 45,000 Israelis had been displaced by the war as of last week, according to the prime minister’s office. Netanyahu said the government was focused on getting them back in their homes and rehabilitating the area. BERLIN — German authorities have arrested a Lebanese man accused of being a member of Hezbollah and working for groups controlled by the militant organization in Germany. Federal prosecutors said the suspect, identified only as Fadel R. in line with German privacy rules, was arrested in the Hannover region on Tuesday. The man is suspected of membership in a foreign terrorist organization and is not accused of direct involvement in any violence. Prosecutors said he joined Hezbollah in the summer of 2008 or earlier and took part in leadership training courses in Lebanon. From 2009, he allegedly had leadership duties in two groups controlled by Hezbollah in the Hannover area, organizing appearances by preachers close to the militants. According to prosecutors, he was briefly a correspondent for a Hezbollah media outlet in 2017 and was tasked with coordinating building work at a mosque. Germany is a staunch ally of Israel. It is also home to a Lebanese immigrant community of more than 100,000. BEIRUT — The Lebanese army is looking for more recruits as it beefs up its presence in southern Lebanon after the Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire. Lebanon’s army is a respected national institution that kept to the sidelines during the nearly 14-month conflict. During an initial 60-day truce, thousands of Lebanese troops are supposed to deploy in southern Lebanon, where U.N. peacekeepers also have a presence. Hezbollah militants are to pull back from areas near the border as Israel withdraws its ground forces. The army said those interested in joining up have a one-month period to apply, starting Tuesday. The Lebanese army has about 80,000 troops, with around 5,000 of them deployed in the south. DAMASCUS, Syria — Syria’s state news agency says a drone strike hit a car in a suburb of the capital, Damascus, killing one person. The agency did not give further details or say who was killed. It said the attack occurred Tuesday on the road leading to the Damascus International Airport south of the city. The area is known to be home to members of Iran-backed militant groups. Israel is believed to have carried out a number of strikes in the area in recent months as it has battled Iran-backed Hezbollah in neighboring Lebanon. Israeli officials rarely acknowledge such strikes. JERUSALEM — Israel’s defense minister warned that if the shaky ceasefire with Hezbollah collapses, Israel will widen its strikes and target the Lebanese state itself. He spoke the day after Israel carried out a wave of airstrikes that killed nearly a dozen people. Those strikes came after the Lebanese militant group fired a volley of projectiles as a warning over what it said were previous Israeli violations. Speaking to troops on the northern border Tuesday, Defense Minister Israel Katz said any violations of the agreement would be met with “a maximum response and zero tolerance.” He said if the war resumes, Israel will widen its strikes beyond the areas where Hezbollah’s activities are concentrated, and “there will no longer be an exemption for the state of Lebanon.” During the 14-month conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, which came to an end last week with a ceasefire brokered by the United States and France, Israel largely refrained from striking critical infrastructure or the Lebanese armed forces, who kept to the sidelines . When Israeli strikes killed or wounded Lebanese soldiers, the Israeli military said it was accidental . The ceasefire agreement that took effect last week gives 60 days for Israel to withdraw its forces from Lebanon and for Hezbollah militants to relocate north of the Litani River. The buffer zone is to be patrolled by Lebanese armed forces and U.N. peacekeepers. Israel has carried out multiple strikes in recent days in response to what it says are violations by Hezbollah. Lebanon’s parliament speaker, Nabih Berri, accused Israel of violating the truce more than 50 times in recent days by launching airstrikes, demolishing homes near the border and violating Lebanon’s airspace. Berri, a Hezbollah ally, had helped mediate the ceasefire. JERUSALEM — Palestinian officials say an Israeli airstrike in the northern West Bank has killed two Palestinians. Israel’s military said it struck a militant cell near the town of Al-Aqaba, in the Jordan Valley. It did not immediately give more details. The Palestinian Health Ministry confirmed the two deaths and said a third person was moderately wounded. About 800 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank since Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack out of Gaza ignited the war there. Israel has carried out near-daily military raids in the West Bank that it says are aimed at preventing attacks on Israelis, which have also been on the rise. Israel captured the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians want all three territories for an independent state. BEIRUT — Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon made his first public appearance in Beirut since he was wounded in an attack involving exploding pagers in mid-September. Mojtaba Amani, who returned to Lebanon over the weekend after undergoing treatment in Iran, visited on Tuesday the scene south of Beirut where Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli airstrike on Sept. 27. Speaking about the airstrike that destroyed six buildings and killed Nasrallah and others, Amani said Israel should get for its act “the highest medal for sabotage, terrorism, blood and killing civilians.” Amani suffered serious injuries in his face and hands when a pager he was holding exploded in mid-September. The device was one of about 3,000 pagers that exploded simultaneously, killing and wounding many Hezbollah members. A day after the pager attack, a similar attack struck walkie-talkies. In total, the explosions killed at least 37 people and wounded more than 3,000, many of them civilians. Last month, a spokesperson for the office of Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the pager attack was approved by Netanyahu.In industrial stamping processes, several hundred sheet metal parts are typically produced per minute. Together with the stamped parts manufacturer Quittenbaum GmbH, researchers at Fraunhofer IPM have now for the first time developed and installed an optical inspection system that checks the dimensional accuracy of every single component in high-speed stamping processes—with an accuracy in the range of 100 micrometers. Connectors, sleeves or pins are stamped from sheet metal with high precision and in high volumes. They are used in numerous high-tech products such as automobiles, in telecommunications, in or in medical technology. Until now, has not been able to keep pace with the high production cycle in stamping processes. As a result, stamped parts are usually only tested on a random basis by visual or with the help of CT scans. Using a free-fall inspection system, a team from Fraunhofer IPM has succeeded in checking the geometric dimensional accuracy of 3D precision parts in the production cycle for the first time. The system was tested in a production process for plug connectors made of copper sheet, of which 330 parts per minute are manufactured. A component feeder developed by the manufacturer transports the individual parts, which are up to 40 mm in size, from the punching machine into a test sphere without any further handling. As the parts fall through the sphere, they are captured from different perspectives by 16 high-resolution cameras. The objects are captured without shadows or reflections thanks to an indirect LED flash illumination. The measurement data is checked against the nominal CAD model so that defective parts can be ejected immediately. The high processing rate for this computationally intensive analysis is achieved by fast inspection algorithms, parallelized camera control and several evaluation computers. During test operation, defective parts with geometric deviations in the range of 100 micrometers were reliably identified. The measurements were verified on a random basis using CT scans. In a follow-up project, the partners from Fraunhofer IPM and Quittenbaum intend to investigate how the surface of the stamped parts can be efficiently inspected.A festive fundraising program is helping adults with developmental disabilities in Waterloo Region. Members of Adults in Motion have been busy making keychains, cards and more for the holidays. “We made mini Christmas trees, mini Christmas tree ornaments,” program member Cassie told CTV News. Adults in Motion offers people with developmental disabilities a chance to learn new skills, socialize and be creative. Members of Adults in Motion make Christmas ornaments. “These are folks who are looking for something interesting, exciting to do with their days, looking to learn new skills, maintain skills and a lot of social friendships and socializing,” explained executive director Shelley Murphy. Sale proceeds will go directly back into the program. “It can be for admissions into different events, it can be for more outings, it can go towards supplies,” said Murphy. “Our members are really driving the decision as to what the money raised goes towards.” Christmas ornaments made by members of Adults in Motion. Devitt House in Waterloo has offered to sell the goods. “I saw how very hard [Adults in Motion] worked to keep [the program] alive and to provide for their participants during COVID, which was a really difficult time,” said owner Jennifer Devitt. “The kind of work that they do and the hours they put in, I’d love to see them get supported directly.” Participants also feel a sense of achievement when they see their completed work. “We’ve had a number of times where members have come in and said, ‘I saw my item’ or ‘I saw my keychain’ that someone had. So there’s a lot of pride associated with what they’re making,” Murphy explained. Gift boxes and keychains are also available through the Adults in Motion website. https://adultsinmotion.org/
