How beautiful is your local college campus?

Travel + Leisure shared their list of the “30 Most Beautiful College Campuses in the U.S.”

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Which college was ranked the prettiest of them all? The honor went to Stanford University in California, according to Travel + Leisure:

“The entryway to Stanford is arguably the grandest of any beautiful college campus. A mile-long palm-lined drive leads up to the expansive green oval Main Quad, surrounded by red-roofed buildings and the school’s architectural crown jewel, Memorial Church with its striking mosaic façade. Beauty continues at the Cantor Arts Center, which has 170 bronzes by Auguste Rodin, one of the largest collections outside of Paris. Take in the view of the 8,180-acre campus and the surrounding area—including the San Francisco skyline on a clear day—from the Hoover Tower observation platform.”

Other noted locations include New York’s Bard College, Texas’ Rice University, and more.

Ranking 15th overall, Yale University in Connecticut beat out other colleges like Duke, Wellesley College and The College of William & Mary, according to Travel + Leisure.

“While some campuses cling to their past, Yale embraces changing architectural movements,” according to Travel + Leisure. “The buildings span from the Georgian-style red-brick Connecticut Hall (whose construction predates the Revolutionary War) to the postmodern Ingalls Rink by Eero Saarinen.

“There’s also the School of Management’s Edward P. Evans Hall, a Norman Foster project completed in 2014. Duck inside the wondrous Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, which houses volumes in a six-story glass-enclosed tower, set against translucent grained Vermont marble panels. The most impressive items in the collection are an original Gutenberg Bible and a 12th-century book of Buddhist prayers.”

Find the full list of campuses to make the list here, courtesy of Travel + Leisure.

By Fiona Rutherford and Micah Barkley, Bloomberg News

Nonalcoholic beer needs a second act.

The category boomed in recent years as the likes of Anheuser-Busch InBev, Heineken NV and Diageo Plc poured in money. But after those gains made it one of brewing’s few bright spots, it’s still just 2% of the global beer market’s volume, according to IWSR.

And now growth rates are slowing. After a surge late last decade and another jump in 2021, recent increases have settled into the single digits. IWSR now projects annual gains of about 8% through 2029. That would only boost its market share to a little less than 3%.

The push into nonalcoholic beer is a reminder of how much the industry is struggling. Craft beer peaked. The hard seltzer boom fizzled. Younger adults are going out less. Legalized cannabis is replacing six packs. Weight-loss drugs are a threat. Global beer volume has declined the past two years. Meanwhile, stocks of the world’s big brewers haven’t returned to their pre-pandemic levels.

“They have no choice but to get into alcohol free,” said Kenneth Shea, senior analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence. It’s one of the few remaining growth levers for large brewers as they adapt to changing consumer habits, he said.

Nonalcoholic craft beer is offered for sale at a big box store on January 06, 2023 in Hillside, Illinois. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

Brewing has consolidated about as far as it can, with the five biggest companies controlling more than half the global market. Investors are looking for organic growth, and that’s why nonalcoholic beer has become the sector’s latest shiny object. But at this point it’s far from a panacea. IWSR projects that global beer volumes will be flat over the next five years, even with the growth in nonalcoholic brews.

The first phase of nonalcoholic beer’s expansion came from startups that focused on it. Firms such as Athletic Brewing Co. pushed the category toward craft brewing with tastier styles like IPA. They marketed around wellness, moderation and active lifestyles.

Breweries are now trying to broaden nonalcoholic beer’s appeal to win over more habitual beer drinkers. There’s been a shift in marketing. Nonalcoholic beer ads used to lean heavily on responsibility and reducing alcohol consumption. Heineken 0.0 ran a spot featuring Formula 1 superstar Max Verstappen promoting designated driving.

Now brands pitch nonalcoholic beer as a casual, anytime drink. Heineken’s newer “0.0 Reasons Needed” campaign encourages people to drink it whenever they want, with no explanation required. The marketing is part of the brewer’s push to reduce the stigma around nonalcoholic beer. One survey Heineken cited showed that about 40% of Gen Z men would only consider such options if their friends did.

Company founder Bill Shufelt shows a can of beer at Athletic Brewing’s nonalcoholic brewery and production plant on March 20, 2019 in Stratford, Connecticut. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

Guinness emphasizes how closely its nonalcoholic version matches the original and brought in NFL legend Joe Montana to promote the brand.

AB InBev, the world’s largest brewer, turned Michelob Ultra into its best-selling beer in the US by pitching it as a lower calorie option for sporty types. It announced a nonalcoholic version — Michelob Ultra Zero — in September. A commercial features young adults taking a break from beach volleyball to crack one open and then running back to play as the voiceover states: “Stay in the game.”

Heineken 0.0, which in 2023 became the first nonalcoholic beer to air a Super Bowl ad, is now one of the five most-seen beer or seltzer brands on US television, according to researcher iSpot. It’s offered in more than 100 countries and grew more than 10% last year.

The spending on US advertising has helped grow nonalcoholic beer more than other markets. IWSR expects US nonalcoholic volume to gain 16% a year over the next decade.

Mark Ruf, a longtime beer drinker, has been won over. The 31-year-old from Columbus, Ohio, now drinks a nonalcoholic beer for every regular one — a practice that’s been dubbed zebra striping — to cut back on his booze consumption when he’s at home or out with friends. He got so into the category that he started a blog and nonalcoholic beer subscription service.

“I still hate to put an end to a good time,” Ruf said. “But I start mixing it in with NA beer, so I’m not regretting it the next day.”

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Nonalcoholic beer used to be a category dominated by options such as O’Doul’s, owned by AB InBev, and similar legacy brands. These brews often struggled to win fans because the process of getting rid of the alcohol included heating up the beer, which muted flavors.

Brewers have been investing in new techniques to improve taste. At AB InBev’s research center in Belgium, scientists have spent more than a decade refining nonalcoholic brewing. The company now removes the alcohol using low-temperature methods, then adds back key aromas to preserve more of the original flavor and smell.

“It is really an art, and it is also a science,” said David De Schutter, AB InBev’s vice president of global innovation.

AB InBev has also launched alcohol-free versions of Budweiser, Stella Artois and Corona. In May, Chief Executive Officer Michel Doukeris told investors that its nonalcoholic portfolio was growing more than 30%. Corona Cero was the first ever beer sponsor of the Olympics at last year’s games in Paris.

Diageo has invested more than 60 million euros (about $70 million) in Guinness 0 production since the product launched globally in 2021. In the US, Guinness 0 made up more than half of the Guinness brand’s growth last year, the company said. And there’s been little cannibalization, with just 2% consumer overlap between Guinness 0 and the brand’s traditional beers.

All that focus has led to consumers now expecting nonalcoholic beer to taste good, according to Laura Merritt, president of beer and pre-mix at Diageo North America.

“It’s not like 10 years ago, where you just had to take what you got,” Merritt said of NA beer’s lack of choices. “The standards for great nonalcoholic beverages are the same high standard for great alcoholic beverages.”

But meeting standards doesn’t mean more and more people will convert to beer with the alcohol removed. There are many examples of food and beverages that initially do well by offering moderation and less harm. The question is whether nonalcoholic beer will recede the same as plant-based meat or become a sustainable category like diet soda.

©2025 Bloomberg L.P. Visit bloomberg.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

BIRMINGHAM, England (AP) — The “home of metal” is honoring one of its most cherished sons.

Thousands of Black Sabbath fans were paying their respects Wednesday to frontman Ozzy Osbourne as his hearse made its way through the streets of Birmingham, the English city where he grew up and where the band was formed in 1968.

The hearse carrying Osbourne, who died last Tuesday at the age of 76, was making its way down Broad Street, the city’s major thoroughfare, to the Black Sabbath bench, which was unveiled on the Broad Street canal bridge in 2019.

“Ozzy, Ozzy, Ozzy, oi, oi, oi,” fans screamed as the hearse arrived.

Six vehicles carrying the Osbourne family, who paid for the procession, followed. The family emerged briefly, with his wife of 43 years Sharon, visibly moved.

Since his death was announced, fans have made pilgrimages to sites around Birmingham, which has embraced its reputation as the birthplace of heavy metal. Among his peers, Osbourne was metal’s godfather.

“Ozzy was more than a music legend — he was a son of Birmingham,” said city official Zafar Iqbal. “We know how much this moment will mean to his fans.”

Osbourne and his Black Sabbath bandmates, Terence Butler, Tony Iommi and Bill Ward, were recently awarded the Freedom of the City in recognition of their services to Birmingham.

“I think he really impacted everyone here, especially in Birmingham as well,” said fan Evie Mayo. “Now that he’s not here anymore, you can feel the impact of it. He inspired a lot of people and he was a great person.”

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Black Sabbath’s story began in Birmingham in 1968 when the four original members were looking to escape a life of factory work. Without doubt, the sound and fury of heavy metal had its roots in the city’s manufacturing heritage. Osbourne never forgot his working-class roots, and his Brummie accent remained.

Black Sabbath has been widely credited with defining and popularizing the sound of heavy metal — aggressive, but full of melodies.

Osbourne was the band’s frontman during its peak period in the 1970s.

His antics, on and off stage, were legendary, and often fueled by copious amounts of drinks and drugs. He was widely known as the “Prince of Darkness.”

The band’s eponymous debut album in 1970 made the U.K. top 10 and paved the way for a string of hit albums, including 1971’s “Master of Reality” and “Vol. 4” a year later. It went on to become one of the most influential and successful metal bands of all time, selling more than 75 million albums worldwide.

At the final show on July 5, 42,000 fans watched the band perform for the first time in 20 years at Villa Park, home of the city’s biggest soccer club, Aston Villa, with Osbourne seated on a black throne. Osbourne had been in poor health in recent years, especially after being diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2019.

Osbourne, who also had a successful solo career, found a new legion of fans in the early 2000s reality show “The Osbournes” in which he starred alongside Sharon and two youngest children, Kelly and Jack.

By Niamh Ordner, Los Angeles Times

LOS ANGELES — Serious liver disease is becoming more common among Americans who drink heavily, according to a new study from Keck Medicine of USC.

It’s not that more people are partying with alcohol. And it’s not that the drinkers are having more drinks. It’s that more of the people who drink regularly are becoming sick.

Over the last two decades, the share of heavy drinkers who have advanced liver scarring jumped from 1.8% to 4.3%. For women, more than 1.5 drinks per night, on average, is considered heavy drinking. For men, it’s 2 drinks.

“The fact that the risk not only increased but that it more than doubled — almost tripled — is really astonishing,” said Dr. Brian P. Lee, a liver transplant specialist at Keck Medicine of USC and lead author on the study.

It was published in the journal Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology on Wednesday. Lee said he thinks patients might dramatically change their thinking and behavior if they had this information.

The increase in illness was seen especially in women, older people and those with conditions like obesity or diabetes.

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Three USC researchers analyzed national health data from more than 44,000 adults surveyed between 1999 and 2020 in a well-known national heath study known as NHANES. Of those, 2,474 were heavy drinkers according to the definition of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism — 20 grams of alcohol per day for women and 30 grams for men, roughly the equivalent of 1.5 and 2 drinks.

They found a more than twofold increase over the two decades in significant liver fibrosis, a condition where healthy liver tissue is replaced by stiff, fibrous tissue — like a sponge hardening into leather. If left unchecked, this can eventually lead to liver failure or cancer.

By comparison, non-heavy drinkers saw a much smaller increase, from 0.8% to 1.4% over the same period.

This rise in liver damage is especially troubling because many people don’t realize anything is wrong until the disease is advanced. “Liver disease is silent,” Lee said. “Most people won’t, even if they have [advanced liver scarring], have any symptoms at all.”

Drinking patterns did not change much over the study period. But the health profiles of heavy drinkers did. Rates of metabolic syndrome — a cluster of conditions including obesity, diabetes, and high blood pressure — increased from 26% of people, to nearly 38%. Demographics shifted too: heavy drinkers became more likely to be women, people over the age of 45, and those living in poverty.

“We’re showing with this study that the picture of the American drinker is changing dramatically,” Lee said. “You have more women who are drinking heavily, more ethnic minorities who are drinking heavily, and these are groups that are known to have a higher sensitivity to alcohol in causing liver damage.”

Other factors may also be at play, said Dr. Sammy Saab, medical director of the Pfleger Liver Institute at UCLA, who was not involved in the study. People could be consuming different types of drinks, or at different times. “Have we moved away from beer, wine, to hard cocktails? Have we moved away from drinking with food, where the food absorbs some of the alcohol you consume, versus drinking without food where alcohol is better absorbed?” Saab asked.

Then there are cultural changes, he said. “In the old days, if you drank, you’d still have to drive home, but now we’ve got Uber, we have Lyft,” he said, which may remove some deterrents to heavy drinking.

The current definition of heavy drinking in the U.S. may actually be too lenient, Lee said, especially compared to evolving global standards. Canada, for example, now advises no more than two drinks per week to minimize health risks.

“In the U.S. right now, we consider heavy drinking to be eight drinks or more per week for women and 15 or more for men — but that’s quite high,” he said. “We’ve shown in prior studies that you can develop liver disease at lower quantities than the U.S. threshold.”

The study’s findings highlight the need to rethink long-held assumptions about alcohol-related liver disease, and Lee hopes it can be used to develop more effective screening methods for early detection.

The paper raises a lot of good questions, Saab said, serving as a call to action for researchers and clinicians to better understand this increase in alcohol-associated liver disease — and how to stop it.

©2025 Los Angeles Times. Visit latimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.