Robot Xian'er is placed in the main building of Longquan Buddhist temple for photographs by the temple's staff, on the outskirts of Beijing, April 20, 2016. (Photo by Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters)

In this Saturday, Oct. 24, 2015 photo, a Lebanese Shiite supporter of Hezbollah with a tattoo on his head that reads in Arabic, “Oh Ali”, beats his chest during the holy day of Ashoura, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon. A growing number of Shiite Muslims in Lebanon are getting tattoos with religious and other Shiite symbols since the civil war in neighboring Syria broke out five years ago, fanning sectarian flames across the region. (Photo by Hassan Ammar/AP Photo)

Sixty-eight year old cross-country runner Rosie Swale-Pope is interviewed while sitting in her cart, “The Icebird”, in Upperville, Virginia March 13, 2015. Swale-Pope, who is from Great Britain and once ran an unsupported 20,000 mile run around the globe, is currently running across the United States from New York City to San Francisco in support of cancer research. (Photo by Gary Cameron/Reuters)

Russian artist Maria Gazanova (L) works on her "The Alive Painting" art work during the Art Krasnoyarsk annual festival in Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk, Russia November 4, 2015. (Photo by Ilya Naymushin/Reuters)

Children try to walk through a flooded street at Kampung Melayu residential area in Jakarta, December 23, 2014. Torrential rains that have continued in Indonesia in recent days have widened the number of flooded areas that include Jakarta and Bandung, a local newspaper said on Tuesday. (Photo by Reuters/Beawiharta)

People immerse themselves in an ice hole in the Chulym river, with the air temperature at about minus 12 degrees Celsius (10.4 degrees Fahrenheit), during celebrations for the Russian Orthodox Epiphany outside of the town of Nazarovo, Krasnoyarsk region January 19, 2015. (Photo by Ilya Naymushin/Reuters)

Despite any political differences between the United States and Russia, the space agencies of the two countries continue their cooperative work in Earth's orbit, aboard the International Space Station. Apart from the research being done in microgravity, ISS crew members continue to send back amazing images of our home world, photographed from low Earth orbit. Gathered here are recent images of Earth from aboard the ISS, and from a handful of other NASA satellites.

Throughout the course of the long war in Afghanistan, Coalition troops have relied on thousands of military working dogs to help keep them safe, and make their jobs easier. The dogs are trained to detect explosives, to find illegal drugs, to search for missing comrades, or target enemy combatants. Not only are they active on the front lines, but behind the lines they serve as therapy dogs, service dogs, and loyal companions. They also share the same risks as the ground troops, suffering injuries and sometimes death on the battlefields. Gathered here are images of these dogs and their handlers in Afghanistan and back home, from over the past several years, part of the ongoing series here on Afghanistan.