Kacey Musgraves' Same Trailer, Different Park is one of several country music albums released by women this year. Kristin Barlowe/Courtesy of the artist hide caption

Unlike the smoky, eardrum-damaging factories of yesterday, today's manufacturing is going high-tech. That can mean more robots and automated machines than workers. But companies like Machine Inc. in Stoughton, Mass., are still growing and hiring. Chris Arnold/NPR hide caption

A Bangladeshi worker participates in a protest outside a garment factory in Dhaka. A.M. Ahad/AP hide caption

A staff member at the clinic in southern Turkey works on a prosthetic leg that will be given to a victim of Syria's civil war. Deborah Amos/NPR hide caption

Aunt Ida and Uncle Julie in Winthrop Beach, Mass., in the 1940s. Courtesy of the Brass Sisters hide caption

Workers in Oakland, Calif., check the damage to Interstate 880 on Oct. 19, 1989; this portion of the freeway had collapsed during the Loma Prieta earthquake two days earlier. Paul Sakuma/AP hide caption

Zachary Phillips sets up the gigapixel camera at a nature reserve in Virginia. Morgan Walker/NPR hide caption

The U.S. Capitol dome provides a view down the National Mall, an area vulnerable to flooding. Karen Bleier/AFP/Getty Images hide caption

A technique called optogenetics is being used in the laboratory to observe and control what brain circuits are doing in real time. Henning Dalhoff/Getty Images/Science Photo Library RM hide caption

At the official rate, 1 U.S. dollar is worth 6.3 Venezuelan bolivars. But in a country with runaway inflation, the black market rate is about 60 bolivars to the dollar. This has made airfares extremely cheap for those using currency acquired on the black market. Juan Barreto/AFP/Getty Images hide caption