A tasseled wobbegong shark (top) lies on the seafloor with the head of a brown-banded bamboo shark in its mouth on the fringing reef of Great Keppel Island on Australia's Great Barrier Reef in August 2011. Reuters/Landov hide caption
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Investigative officers look inside a container carrying a Russian-made MIG-21 fighter jet aboard the Chong Chon Gang, in the port city of Colon, Panama, in July. Arnulfo Franco/AP hide caption
Fireworks explode in a Shanghai street on Thursday, the eve of the Lunar New Year. Setting off firecrackers is meant to ward off evil spirits and bring good luck. But many Chinese say they won't buy firecrackers this year, owing to growing worries about air quality. Peter Parks/AFP/Getty Images hide caption
Ying Compestine's green tea-steamed shrimp dumplings. Lucy Schaeffer/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt hide caption
Shoppers check out vodka in a street kiosk in Moscow in 2008. Alexander Nemenov/Getty Images hide caption
Gigi Chao (right) daughter of Hong Kong property tycoon Cecil Chao, poses with her partner, Sean Eav, at an event in Hong Kong. AP hide caption
East Timor will have its first Winter Olympics team next month thanks to Yohan Goutt Goncalves, who has a French father and Timorese mother. Yohan Goutt Goncalves hide caption
The Chinese flag is seen in front of a view of the moon at Beijing's Tiananmen Square in December, when China's first moon rover touched the lunar surface. That feat was widely celebrated — but observers believe the rover has now run into serious trouble. Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images hide caption
Electronic music producer Dave Liang and jazz singer Zhang Le collaborated on a new album of Shanghai jazz standards from the 1930s and 1940s. Zhuang Yan/Courtesy of the artists hide caption
Wuhan, in central China, is in debt to the tune of a reported $33 billion — nearly twice the city's GDP. This 17-mile highway sat dormant for two years after banks cut off funding as Wuhan's debt ballooned. Work on the road resumed last year, but the construction company still hasn't been paid. Frank Langfitt/NPR hide caption
The motion-capture team at Next Media Animation. The actor (in the leotard) is wearing sensors that the 40 cameras mounted in the studio will capture to help animators render his movements digitally. Elise Hu/NPR hide caption