Talk of the Nation

When doctors autopsied tuberculosis patients, they described finding round, white swellings, especially in and around the lungs. Medical historian Howard Markel describes how those potato-like growths led to the disease being called tuberculosis, from the Latin tuber.

Photographer and videographer Edward Aites, of Seattle, submitted this time-lapse video to Science Friday. He looked at ice through a macro lens and cross-polarizing filters, and found a colorful, surprising landscape. This is ice like you've never seen it before.

Flu season usually peaks around February. But this year it's missing in action, with the CDC reporting the slowest start to the flu season on record. Peter Palese, a microbiologist at Mount Sinai Medical Center, discusses whether unseasonably warm winter weather may be to thank.

Web browser manufactures often market their products to consumers with an emphasis on privacy, assuring users that their products can better control how personal information is used online. Carnegie Mellon privacy researcher Lorrie Cranor explains that many companies have developed quiet ways to step around some of that privacy-protecting code.

The standard picture of the moon is of a long-dead object, geologically speaking. But using observations from cameras on board the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, Thomas Watters and colleagues say in the journal Nature Geosciencesthat there are signs of more recent tectonic activity on the moon, within the last 50 million years.

Director Wim Wenders created the 3-D documentary "Pina," in tribute to German choreographer Pina Bausch. When the two met over 20 years ago, they started planning a film that would capture her unique style of modern dance. Bausch died of lunch cancer just days before filming started.

Transcript

NEAL CONAN, HOST:

This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan, in Washington. A little more than a year ago, NPR started to follow six people in St. Louis who started 2011 out of work. Among them, Casaundra Bronner, who joins us now on the phone. Casaundra Bronner, nice to have you on TALK OF THE NATION.

CASAUNDRA BRONNER: Hi. Thank you very much.

CONAN: And you're speaking with us from work?

BRONNER: Yes.

CONAN: Congratulations. How long have you had a job?

BRONNER: I believe it was March of 2011. March of last year.

A bill that could legalize same-sex marriage has cleared the Maryland House and is expected to pass in the Senate. A majority of black clergy in the state argue that same-sex marriage conflicts with the teachings of the Bible, but some pastors have spoken out in support of the bill.

Two movies about movies — The Artist and Hugo — are up for the 2012 Academy Award for best picture. Hollywood has a unique way of making films that depict life in Tinseltown. Film buff Murray Horwitz discusses Hollywood films that deal with the glitz, glamor and harsh realities of Hollywood.

All throughout the school's 110-year history, the Manassas High School football team in Memphis, Tenn., was known as a losing team. In 2009, volunteer coach Bill Courtney led the struggling Manassas Tigers to the playoffs.

Filmmakers Dan Lindsay and T.J. Martin chronicle the challenges of the team — on and off the field — in the documentary Undefeated.

Lindsay and Martin talk with NPR's Neal Conan about the film, nominated for an Academy Award in the documentary feature category.