Not all that long ago, many Americans thought of Chinese food as fried rice, chow mein and orange chicken. And one reliable place to find it was at the mall, at places like Panda Express.

But food court mainstay Panda Express is now in the midst of a major transformation. That means moving from mall basements to stand-alone restaurants and keeping pace with an increasingly sophisticated American palate.

Wednesday marks the traditional Tibetan New Year, but many Tibetans won't be celebrating. They'll be mourning the almost two-dozen people who set themselves on fire in the past year as a protest against Chinese rule. Eyewitnesses say the town of Aba, site of many of the self-immolations, resembles a Chinese military camp, with soldiers and riot police every few feet. NPR's Louisa Lim traveled elsewhere on the Tibetan plateau to cover the story and sent this dispatch.

A team of United Nations nuclear experts has returned from Iran empty handed. In a statement today, the International Atomic Energy Agency said that Iran refused the team access to a military site at Parchin.

The statement read in part:

President Obama spoke Wednesday at the formal groundbreaking for the Smithsonian's newest museum, the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C. The museum, Obama said, has been "a long time coming" and will serve "not just as a record of tragedy, but as a celebration of life."

Oakland Chinatown’s Pacific Renaissance Plaza opened in 1993. It was a real victory for Chinatown and signaled its change from a Chinese-centric neighborhood to a multicultural and pan-Asian identity.

Former Louisiana Gov. Buddy Roemer seems to have finally hit on how to get noticed in his bid for the Republican presidential nomination: drop out of the race.

Or, more specifically, redouble his efforts to get to the White House by switching to the nascent "Americans Elect" movement while at the same time seeking the nomination of the Reform Party.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is making some waves, today, after expressing some harsh words about billionaire Warren Buffett in an interview with CNN's Piers Morgan last night.

If you happen to notice sometime later this year that you're suddenly paying a lot more for orange juice, you can blame America's food safety authorities. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, after several weeks of deliberation, has blocked imports of frozen, concentrated orange juice from Brazil, probably for the next 18 months or so, even though the agency says the juice is perfectly safe.