NPR News

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Despite Assurances, Civil Libertarians Blast NSA Programs
In a speech Friday, President Obama tried to assure the public that the National Security Agency surveillance programs that recently came to light are all legal and have proper oversight. That assurance is not putting everyone at ease. Robert Siegel speaks with Cindy Cohn, the legal director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Peter Dinklage stars as the cunning, charismatic Tyrion Lannister in HBO's h...
A Lannister Always Pays His Debts — But Do Too Many Of His Fans Watch For Free?
Watching Netflix, Hulu Plus and HBO Go with a friend or family member's password? You're not nearly alone — and that may spell trouble for providers.
Comet Shines Light on Sun Dynamics
In 2011, Comet Lovejoy traveled through the sun's corona and lived to tell the tale. But its tail was the most telling. Reporting in the journal Science, Cooper Downs, an astrophysicist at Predictive Science Inc., says that the wiggly path of the comet's tail helps explain the sun's magnetic field.
Promising Results In Early Trial of Novel MS Treatment
Reporting in the journal Science Translational Medicine researchers say a new method for essentially resetting the immune systems of patients with multiple sclerosis appears to be safe. Study co-author Stephen D. Miller of Northwestern University, describes the novel approach tested in this small, phase 1 clinical trial and explains how it might one day also be used to treat other autoimmune diseases such as type 1 diabetes.
How To Survive A Mass Extinction
In her new book Scatter, Adapt, and Remember: How Humans Will Survive a Mass Extinction writer Annalee Newitz looks back at Earth's previous mass extinctions to see what lessons might be learned, and how earthlings might prepare themselves to survive a future planet-wide catastrophe.
Tracing The Origins Of French Winemaking
Many people associate France today with the production of great wines. But winemaking isn't native to the French. Patrick McGovern, an archaeologist of fermented beverages, has dated the beginning of viniculture in France to around 500 B.C. and contact with the Etruscans.