Mark Memmott

Her murder conviction overturned by an Italian appeals court, American Amanda Knox has left Italy and is making her way home to Seattle, The Associated Press reports.

Now, the BCC writes:

Three U.S.-born scientists whose work indicates that the universe is expanding at an accelerating rate have been awarded the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics.

American Saul Perlmutter will share the $1.5 million award with U.S.-Australian Brian Schmidt and U.S. scientist Adam Riess, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced this morning.

In its statement announcing the honors, the academy writes that

"Public radio needs to do a better job of making the case" for public funding as one of its revenue sources, the incoming CEO and president of NPR said this afternoon.

"E-Mails Reveal Early White House Worries Over Solyndra," reads the headline on the lead story at NYTimes.com this hour.

"Donor, Officials Warned Obama Not To Visit Solyndra After Financial Warnings," says WashingtonPost.com.

SpaceWeather.com says most solar physicists would likely say that a "puny comet" couldn't set off a "coronal mass ejection" of solar particles.

But check out this video from over the weekend, when a comet struck the sun. The images were animated by Helioviewer.org, "an open-source project for the visualization of solar and heliospheric data" that is funded by the European Space Agency and NASA.

"General Motors Co. and Chrysler Group LLC posted double-digit sales increases in September, defying the prevailing malaise in the economy," The Detroit News reports. "GM reported U.S. sales of 207,145 vehicles last month, a 20 percent increase over September 2010. Chrysler's domestic sales were up 27 percent."

Neither reports signals a sharp turnaround for the sluggish economy, but:

-- The manufacturing sector "expanded in September for the 26th consecutive month," the Institute for Supply Management says. An index it calculates that measures such things as orders, production and employment stood at 51.6 in September vs. 50.6 in August. A reading above 50 is supposed to signal an expanding factory sector. The index has been at 50 or above for those 26 months.

Linda Holmes over at Monkey See will be looking at the pluses, minuses and other issues related to the news that Yahoo and ABC News are launching "a strategic online news alliance."

"Work produced by a person since deceased shall not be considered for an award. If, however, a prizewinner dies before he has received the prize, then the prize may be presented."

That's one of the rules in the Statues of the Nobel Foundation, and it's suddenly pertinent because it's just been announced that Rockefeller University scientist Ralph Steinman died on Friday.

Good morning.

The news we've already posted about:

-- Three Scientists Share Nobel Prize In Medicine

-- Rapid Response From Perry Campaign To Story About Offensive Word

-- 'Occupy Wall Street' Spreads

The "Occupy Wall Street" protests "appears to be settling in for the long term," NPR's Jeff Brady reports.

And as Jeff said on Weekend Edition Sunday:

Note: This report contains an offensive racial epithet. It is an essential part of the story, however.

"Gov. Rick Perry's presidential campaign pushed back quickly and forcefully Sunday against a Washington Post story that linked Perry to a hunting camp known to some by a racially insensitive name," the Austin American-Statesman reports.

The Nobel Prize in medicine has been awarded to three scientists whose discoveries about the human immune system "opened up new avenues for the development of prevention and therapy against infections, cancer, and inflammatory diseases," the Nobel committee announced earlier today.

Gary Knell, president and CEO of Sesame Workshop – producers of the Sesame Street educational children's TV show — has been named the new CEO and president of NPR. The news was broken this hour on Weekend All Things Considered. Knell will take the positions on Dec. 1.

Long before U.S. officials said he was one of the world's most-wanted terrorists, Anwar al-Awlaki was a Muslim cleric who U.S. media outlets would turn to during discussions about the post-Sept. 11 world.

There's no doubt how the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate feels about Bank of America's plan to charge most of its debit card users $5 a month if they use the cards to make purchases. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) has issued a statement that reads, in part:

"The Boston Red Sox and manager Terry Francona "have decided to part ways after eight seasons and two World Series titles," Sports Illustrated is reporting.

There was a 0.1 percent dip in personal income in August vs. July, the Bureau of Economic Analysis just reported. The Associated Press says that's the "poorest showing since a similar 0.1 percent drop in October 2009."

In addition, "disposable personal income" actually fell 0.3 percent after inflation.

If hoops fans need any more evidence that the NBA lockout means there likely won't be any games anytime soon, here it is:

Good morning.

The top story so far, as we've been reporting, is that authorities in Yemen say U.S.-born anti-American al-Qaida cleric Anwar al-Awlaki is dead. We'll keep following that story as it develops.

Other top stories:

"Yemen's Defense Ministry said Friday that the U.S.-born al-Qaida cleric Anwar al-Awlaki has been killed," The Associated Press reports. It adds that "the Yemeni ministry provided no details in the statement, which appeared on one of its websites."

It's being reported he may have been killed by a missile fired from a U.S. aircraft at a convoy of vehicles.

With a nighttime liftoff from a launch pad on the edge of the Gobi Desert, China today put its unmanned Tiangong-1 ("Heavenly Palace-1") module into orbit and started a decade-long project aimed at constructing its own space station.

The module will "conduct surveys of Chinese farmland using special cameras, along with experiments involving growing crystals in zero gravity," The Associated Press says. Then, in coming years:

Bank of America is next year going to start charging most holders of its debit cards $5 a month if they use them to make purchases. It's the biggest sign so far of how new bank regulations are going to mean big changes for the millions of customers who have come to rely on cards that are tied to their checking accounts — and don't rack up potentially huge interest bills.

Word that Germany's parliament today "approved a plan to expand the power of a European bailout fund for troubled countries that use the euro," doesn't mean the crisis across the Atlantic is over, our colleague Jacob Goldstein writes over at the Planet Money blog.

A fake story and a series of tweets this morning by the satirical folks at The Onion "reported" that members of Congress had taken schoolchildren hostage inside the Capitol Building.

Officials at the U.S. Capitol Police don't find any of it funny.

More details are emerging about the alleged plot and the alleged would-be terrorist who the FBI says planned to attack the Pentagon and Capitol Building with explosives-laden small aircraft and thought he had given devices to al-Qaida operatives that could be used to kill U.S. soldiers stationed overseas.

"Pakistan has freed a senior al-Qaeda commander, who served as a bodyguard to Osama bin Laden," Britain's The Telegraph reports, citing a "senior security source."

CBS News says it has been told the same thing by "two senior Pakistani police officials."

The nation's economy grew at a slow 1.3 percent annual rate in the second quarter, the Bureau of Economic Analysis just reported. That's a slight upward revision from the agency's previous estimate of 1 percent growth vs. first-quarter 2011.

Good morning.

Earlier, we passed along word about:

-- Reports: Saudi King Cancels Lashing Sentence Against Woman Who Drove

-- Baseball Stunners: Red Sox, Braves Suffer 'Big, Historic' Collapses

Other stories making headlines this morning include:

"African-Americans have been brainwashed into not being open minded, not even considering a conservative point of view," Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain said Wednesday on CNN's The Situation Room. "I have received some of that same vitriol simply because I am running for the Republican nomination as a conservative. So it's just brainwashing and people not being open minded, pure and simple."