Search results for

Saturday in Argentina, the International Olympic Committee will announce the host of the 2020 Summer Games. The committee is choosing from among Istanbul, Madrid and Tokyo. The contenders all have strong selling points, but each also has serious issues clouding its bid.

The chemistry of dozens of streams and rivers across the U.S. is changing. Waters are becoming more alkaline — the opposite of acidic. And the reason is counterintuitive — researchers believe that acid rain is to blame.

Layers of wax in the marine mammals' ears can be read like tree rings, scientists say, recording a whale's age and also information about pollutants in the water the whale swam through.

About 233,000 gallons of the sticky substance were spilled into part of Honolulu Harbor on Monday. Thousands of ocean creatures were killed as the molasses sinks to the bottom. "Everything down there is dead," a diver says.

The Costa Concordia is lying on its side in shallow waters off the west coast of Italy. It struck a reef 20 months ago when the captain steered too close to land. Thirty-two people died. On Monday, the task is to begin to slowly rotate the ship to an upright position, using a complex system of chains and underwater platforms and cables.

Two years ago Pakistan's Punjab province was hit with one of the world's worst dengue outbreaks. This year the number of recorded cases has plummeted. Many leaders credit a mobile phone app that tracks mosquito populations and city workers' efforts to contain them.

The months-long federal trial is examining how much fault should be placed on BP and its contractors for the 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion. The accident killed 11 rig workers and released almost 5 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. Host Scott Simon speaks with NPR's Debbie Elliott to preview the civil trial.

In addition to shutdowns of national parks (including Alcatraz and Yosemite) and the supplemental nutrition program for women, infants and children, the mandatory furloughs are affecting a wide range of government science and health agencies.

A tireless campaigner for his own vision of a utopia marked by peace and togetherness, Pete Seeger's tools were his songs, his voice, his enthusiasm and his musical instruments.

One of the nation's most remote places is now awash in oil money. We sent a photographer to North Dakota to capture not just what it looks like but how it feels.