Former Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards announced his support of Sen. Barack Obama’s White House bid Wednesday, a nod both Obama and rival Sen. Hillary Clinton had sought to attain.

After a year of research and months of delays, the Interior Department finally declared the polar bear a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act.

As the official death toll in China’s massive earthquake neared 15,000 Wednesday, military helicopters dropped food and medicine to survivors in remote mountain villages. In a NewsHour interview, Zhou Wenzhong, the Chinese Ambassador to the U.S., discussed the devastation in central China.

We humans love water. According to United Nations estimates, we currently take 54 percent of the planet’s available freshwater and our share will rise to 90 percent in 25 years, if current trends continue. In America, water is the second-most popular beverage after soda, according to P.O.V.’s report “Bottle This.” But, contrary to popular belief, [...]

Can earthquakes be predicted? Many seismologists would probably answer, “Not yet, but eventually.” But to date, nobody has been able to predict earthquakes reliably enough and over short enough time scales to allow the evacuation of threatened cities. Some scientists have entirely lost faith in earthquake prediction.

Five thousand years ago the Minoans, Europe’s first great civilization, flourished on the island of Crete. Yet in their heyday, they mysteriously disappeared. Archaeologists are finding evidence of a massive tsunami that devastated the Minoans – and may have spawned the myth of Atlantis.

A pioneer in the field of painting and multimedia, Rauschenberg passed away Monday night at age 82. He’s been a prime subject for public television for years; only some of his interviews are available on the web:

Senator John McCain sought to distance himself from President Bush yesterday when he called for more action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and called for a mandatory cap-and-trade system to combat climate change.

Chinese officials say all 86 giant pandas at the Wolong Nature Reserve are safe following the 7.9 magnitude earthquake that struck central China on Monday.

On Mother’s Day, New York community members and bird watchers woke to some disturbing news. The body of one young red-tailed hawk that lived in Riverside Park was found lifeless, and people fear that the hawk’s two missing siblings likely suffered the same fate.