Saudi Arabia's biggest experiment in higher education, the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, has just opened its doors to an international student body, as we reported earlier this month. The King has gambled billions of dollars on raising a university out of the desert that he hopes will compete against other top-notch institutions worldwide. Intellectual freedom isn't exactly the first thing that jumps to mind when one thinks of Saudi Arabia, and for a country whose technological contributions basically begin and end with oil, the hurdle is significant.

Runoff from agriculture is the biggest polluter of the country's river and stream water, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and it has been fingered for hypoxic dead zones and toxic red tide algae blooms. But how much of that runoff makes it into people's drinking water closer to home?

Water is such a basic human need that it takes real ingenuity to find new ways to control, retrieve, and share this critical resource. We meet some of the wizards of water—the engineers who are helping communities handle acute water challenges and plan for the future. Click on the link below to listen to the individual segments, which are now airing on public radio stations across the United States, and check this page frequently to see if and when a show will air on a public radio station in your area.

Contamination of China's fresh water resources from industrial pollution and inadequate sewage treatment is seen by Chinese residents as the nation's most critical environmental priority, according to a new public opinion survey. The survey by Circle of Blue, an American multi-media news and science organization, and GlobeScan, a global public opinion polling firm, also found that people are hungry for more information.