Acclaimed Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko, whose work focused on war atrocities and denounced anti-Semitism and tyrannical dictators, has died. He was 84. Ginny Hensley, a spokeswoman for Hillcrest Medical Center in Tulsa, confirmed Yevtushenko’s death. Roger Blais, provost at the University of Tulsa, where Yevtushenko was a longtime faculty member, said he was told Yevtushenko had died Saturday morning. “He died a few minutes ago surrounded by relatives and close friends,” his widow, Maria Novikova, was quoted as saying by the Russian state news agency RIA Novosti. She said he’d …

Scientists working at Cambridge University in England have coaxed a collection of mouse stem cells to turn into a mouse embryo. This breakthrough could change the way scientists study early development and how it can go wrong early in a pregnancy. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports. … From: MeNeedIt

President Donald Trump doubled down on his tough talk on trade with a pair of executive orders Friday, which he says are designed to level the playing field and reduce the $500 billion US trade deficit, more than half of which is with China. As Mil Arcega reports, the issue of unfair trade is likely to come up when the U.S. president meets with Chinese leader Xi Jinping next week. … From: MeNeedIt

If you were a casual observer watching Argonne National Laboratory scientist Seth Darling work, it would be easy to miss the low-tech but groundbreaking invention he’s concocted in his brightly lit workspace.  It doesn’t have wires or circuitry, it doesn’t move, it doesn’t do much of anything. It is in fact, at least at first glance, simply a sponge. “It looks real simple when you demonstrate it, right?” Darling explained as he lowered the small, dark-colored foam sponges into a bowl of water mixed with blue oil. “I mean, you …

Hotels offer congee and other Chinese staples for room service. Casinos train staff members on Chinese etiquette. Restaurants, tourist sights and shopping malls translate signs, menus and information booklets into Mandarin. The American hospitality industry is stepping up efforts to make Chinese visitors feel more welcome, since they are projected to soon surpass travelers from the United Kingdom and Japan as the single largest overseas demographic. And it’s not just the typical tourist hubs of New York and Los Angeles, where such efforts have long been commonplace. Smaller cities like …

Rodney Crowell’s tender lyrics about a woman with “hair two shades of foxtail red” in a song that features ex-wife Rosanne Cash makes it an easy leap to assume that he’s singing about her. It’s not like the thought didn’t cross her mind.   “If I’m totally honest,” she said. “Yeah, a little bit.”   But Crowell, whose new album “Close Ties” is sure to be one of the year’s cornerstone releases in the Americana genre, insists he had others in mind while writing “It Ain’t Over Yet.” He was …