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New rules from the Affordable Care Act go into effect Wednesday, and coverage starts for millions of Americans who signed up for health insurance on state and federal exchanges.

New York City's first new mayor in a dozen years was sworn in by former president Bill Clinton Wednesday. Bill de Blasio's term running the largest city in the U.S. will be markedly different than that of outgoing billionaire mayor Michael Bloomberg — if he follows through on campaign promises. De Blasio's populist platform offered remedies for the city's growing economic inequality, but he'll need approval from state legislators in Albany if he's to implement some of the policies.

Archeologists who study the people who lived in the Arctic thousands of years ago are in a race against time. Coastal settlements are being washed away by erosion, storm surges and other climate changes related to global warming. Clues to the past that were frozen intact in permafrost for thousands of years are melting and being destroyed by the elements. Archeologists are looking to climate scientists to predict where the erosion will be the fastest so they can pinpoint their research on the places that will disappear the soonest. Until now the predictions have largely been too coarse to provide much guidance. But the National Park Service is trying to change this. It's funding research that supposed to forecast the threats that more than 100 coastal national parks face from sea level rise and storm surges due to climate change.

James Avery, the actor who played the Honorable Philip Banks — also known as Uncle Phil — on the TV show The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, has died.

The birth of a baby is a joyous occasion, and an increasingly rare one in Portugal, where the birthrate has dropped 14 percent since the economic crisis began. The poorest state in Western Europe faces a demographic time bomb as its population ages, the workforce shrinks and youth are unemployed or going abroad.

The Trillium Community Health Plan in Oregon gave 50 schools money to integrate the Good Behavior Game. It keeps kids plugged in and learning, and hopefully less likely later to pick up a dangerous habit like smoking.

In many prisons and jails across the U.S., a bland, brownish lump is served to inmates who misbehave. Law enforcement officials say it's not that bad, and it's a very effective deterrent. But the practice is starting to fade as more prisoners argue that the loaf is cruel and unusual punishment.

Order cod in a restaurant on Cape Cod, and you might assume you're buying local. But the fish that gave the Cape its name are now so depleted that restaurants are serving cod imported from Iceland. Some activists think it's time America developed a taste for the less popular fish still present in the waters off the Cape.

A growing number of educators and parents say they're worried about the tests being developed and tied to new, more rigorous standards in reading and math. The test results will be used to gauge students' progress and also evaluate teachers, rate schools and rank states.

A Harvard economist finds there are psychological connections between the bad financial planning of many poor people and the poor time management of busy professionals. In both cases, he finds the experience of scarcity causes biases in the mind that exacerbate problems.