NPR News

Taxes, foreclosures, rich-poor discrepancies, recession. Sound familiar? Sure it does. But it also describes an earlier economic period in this country — and the unlikely subject of an exhibition of artwork at the Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens in San Marino, Calif.

For going on 30 years, scientists have been trying to grow replacement parts for diseased, defective or damaged tissues and organs. They've had more disappointments than successes. But now and again, they come up with results that rekindle the flame.

The latest involves five Mexican boys between 10 and 14 who suffered terrible damage to their urinary tracts from auto accidents. They were unable to urinate normally.

Raj Rajaratnam, the billionaire founder of the Galleon Group hedge fund company, goes on trial in New York on Tuesday, accused of participating in one of the largest insider trading cases in years.

U.S. officials say Rajaratnam made millions of dollars trading stocks based on information he received from a network of friends and associates at major companies including Intel, IBM and Goldman Sachs.

Some 10 million people suffer from corneal blindness. It's relatively rare in the U.S., and if you have it, you're likely to have a corneal transplant and your vision will be restored. But in the developing world, where most corneal blindness occurs, it's a different matter.

Now, a Seattle-based nonprofit is applying lessons learned in the coffee business in its efforts to bring sight to as many people as it can.

With the U.S. and other first-world economies deep in debt and growing sluggishly, most of the world's economic expansion is now coming from developing nations.

Investors, meanwhile, have been pouring money into emerging markets, pumping up their stock prices and currency exchange rates.

Nearly a decade and a half ago, a similar flood of money caused Asian economies to tank and governments to crumble. This time, governments in Southeast Asia may have learned lessons to avert an economic meltdown similar to what took place then.