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Mayer is the fifth CEO to take the helm at the ailing company in five years.

Major retailers have agreed to stop carrying the "high-powered magnets."

The materials are plentiful and the process of twisting, shaping and lacquering makes for a frame that's strong and durable, inventor Izhar Gafni says. Mass production is supposed to start in the next few months. See video of a bike in action.

She's worth billions, she has her own theme park and her face graces thousands of products. At 30, Hello Kitty is one of the great marketing phenomenons of all time... and she's just so darn cute. NPR's Susan Stone reports.

Adults don't generate as many new neurons as children or teenagers, but some growth is still happening. Neuroscientist Sandrine Thuret explains how we can encourage the production of more nerve cells.

One of the nation's most dangerous drugs is increasingly found in the most unexpected places. In rural America, the production and use of methamphetamine -- an addictive stimulant also known as speed -- is exploding.

From the South African production of the opera Carmen, and Yiimimangaliso: The Mysteries, an opera based on the medieval Chester Mystery plays: Music Director Charles Hazlewood and Singers Sandile Kamle and Pauline Malefane. The operas were staged in Londons West End to rave reviews. They are currently making their American premiere at the Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina that runs May 24-June 9. (www.spoletousa.org). Hazlewood went to South Africa and auditioned over a thousand performers for Carmen. The Mysteries has a 34-member South African cast and is performed in four languages: Afrikaans, Xhosa, Zulu and English. The Mystery plays were popular medieval street theatre performed in the streets of towns all over Europe. They are dramatic versions of stories from the Bible.

Lt. Gen. John Vines, commander of U.S. and allied forces in Afghanistan since June 2003, speaks to NPR's Steve Inskeep about a resurgence of attacks by the Taliban against police and civilian officials. Vines says the enemy is most active in southern Afghanistan, near some of the nation's most productive opium fields.

"Ain't Got No/I Got Life" sounds like the product of an unearthly collaboration involving Simone, Sly Stone and the Stax Department of Horns. Originally loping and straightforward, it now shimmies and swings, a model of loopy, unrestrained exuberance its originators could never have imagined.

Massenet's Werther is thrilling, tuneful, and one of the saddest operas ever composed — it ends with a suicide on Christmas Eve. Tenor Neil Shicoff stars in the title role, in a recent production at the Vienna State Opera.

With a sound that combines dance, electronic and punk music, New York-based DJ and multi-instrumentalist James Murphy (a.k.a. LCD Soundsystem) helped found the much-lauded DFA label and production team. Hear Murphy give an interview and in-studio performance.

Stephen Harke's new opera The Greater Good portrays a clash between the classes — but it's hard to tell which class is which when high-brow aristrocrats resort to decidedly low-brow behavior. The provocative, world premiere production comes from Glimmerglass Opera.

Tenor Placido Domingo was born in Spain, to a family with deep roots in the uniquely Spanish form of musical theater, zarzuela. In a production from Washington, DC, he returns to those roots to star in Federico Moreno Torroba's Luisa Fernanda.

The bright and bouncy dance track adds a new color to the Maryland-born rapper's production palette — but the song's energy belies its lyrical content.

In Lighght, technique and experimentation collide in high-spirited, even disorienting ways. It's the product of a mind that always seems both hard at work and immersed in play.

The production of "Icarus" feels spacious yet simple, with a set of samples embedded organically amongst the tune's main ingredients. The result is the sort of reverie that can feed an appetite for wanderlust or make listeners ache for home, depending on the context.

The singer-songwriter went to eight different studios to make his latest album, A Wasteland Companion. Ward drew inspiration not only from the different locations, but also from a variety of older production styles.

Port O'Brien offers an unromantic but soulful look at the time its members have spent toiling in isolation with the wind at one's back. "Sour Milk / Salt Water" is the most literal interpretation of the musicians' hands-on experiences, even in its production: All the reverb and the backwards-guitar melodies are non-computerized and organic, made by playing tapes in reverse, and barely touched in final mastering.

The bottles of Starbucks' vanilla Frappuccinos may contain pieces of glass, the Food and Drug Administration said.

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is recalling about 204,000 of the children's weighted blankets, which were being exclusively sold at Target.