Melissa Block

Simone Biles led the star-studded U.S. women's gymnastics team Sunday night in qualifiers at the Summer Olympic games. Biles and teammate Aly Raisman will advance to the all-around competition.

Fireworks have lit up the night sky in Rio de Janeiro with the start of the Olympic opening ceremony. The pageant is celebrating Brazil's history and culture, which will include music and dance.

Friday night's Olympic opening ceremony in Rio de Janeiro provides the official start to 16 days of competition that will see the world's best athletes competing for the gold. Athletes from 206 countries plus, for the first time, a team of refugees will parade through legendary Maracana Stadium for the opening pageant.

When Brazil hosted the World Cup two years ago, the men's national team suffered an epic 7-1 loss to Germany in the semifinals. Now "7-1 wasn't enough" has entered the lexicon as a slang phrase to represent Brazil's many misfortunes.

American Haley Anderson has prepared for all the challenges she can expect in the open-water swim. The goal: improve on her 2012 performance, where she missed out on gold by four-tenths of a second.

Athletes from around the world are arriving at the Olympic Village set up just for them. It's a huge place offering a chance to grab a burger or have your nails adorned with your home country's flag.

Kosovo, which declared independence in 2008, and South Sudan, which followed three years later, are both sending athletes to the Olympics for the first time.

Kosovo is making its first appearance in the Olympics, sending eight athletes to the games. They are admittedly a small team but optimism and pride are strong. They have a good shot at a medal in women's judo, too.

Howard Shu, the sole U.S. men's singles player in badminton, is hoping to make an impact in a sport that's largely dominated by Asian countries.

American women are expected to dominate team sports at the Olympics. That includes water polo, where they are defending champions and have medaled every time since the sport was introduced in 2000.

She's already been to the Olympics twice and been a U.S. champion several times over. But at 31, Day-Monroe knows this may be her last shot at an Olympic medal.

Lots of Olympic hopes are riding on 18-year-old, 6-foot-1-inch high jumper Vashti Cunningham. She just graduated from high school and went pro, signing a deal with Nike. She's coached by her father, former star NFL quarterback Randall Cunningham.

Vashti Cunningham, 18, is on a roll. She set a world junior record and won the world indoor championship in March, while still in high school. She has now turned pro and has her eyes set on Rio.

He never dared imagine he could make it to the Olympics, but 28-year-old fencer Jason Pryor will be competing at this summer's games in Rio de Janeiro. He's ranked No. 1 in the U.S. in men's epee fencing.

The smash Broadway hit Hamilton is bringing legions of new fans to the grave sites of Alexander Hamilton and his wife, Eliza, both at Trinity Church in Lower Manhattan.

Russia is dismissing as "slander" allegations of a widespread state-run doping program at the 2014 Sochi Olympics. The IOC says it will take "swift action" based on the outcome of an investigation.

Guy Clark, one of Nashville's most renowned singer-songwriters, has died at the age of 74. This profile of Clark originally aired on July 23, 2013, on All Things Considered.

Soon after the terrorist attacks in Belgium, people created a makeshift shrine to the victims in a Brussels square. The city's archivists are documenting all the messages.

The attacks in Brussels were followed by appeals for national unity. But Belgium is a country long driven by sectarian divide, and nationalist politicians say the attacks support their cause.

The European capital hasn't had any flights in or out since the March 22 suicide bombing. And authorities still aren't saying when the Zaventem Airport might reopen.