麻豆社

It is just over two months since members of the militant Islamist group Boko Haram abducted over 200 schoolgirls from the town of Chibok in north-eastern Nigeria. The father of one of the missing girls told Matthew Bannister how he chased the militants on his motorbike, in a desperate attempt to retrieve his daughter.

When Greek concert pianist Panos Karan heard about the devastation caused by the 2011 tsunami and earthquake in Japan, he wanted to use music to help. Through his organisation Keys of Change, Panos travelled to the Fukushima area and worked with local schoolchildren to create the Fukushima Youth Sinfonietta.

American biologist Joyce Poole has devoted part of her life to the study of elephant communication. For over 20 years, she has been recording thousands of hours of elephants' voices. Helped by her Norwegian husband, she has now made the recordings available online.

For more than 40 years, Peter Gaspar cast light on Brazil's iconic buildings and monuments. Known simply as 'the Illuminator', his last project before his death earlier this year was to design the lighting for one of the stadiums being used in the football World Cup. Our reporter Gibby Zobel met him just a few days before his death at the age of 73.

(Photo: Group of girls kidnapped by Boko Haram. Credit: AP)