Talk of the Nation: Science Friday (Science-Technology)

An ancient turtle, looking at food preferences and culture, and the search for a tastier tomato.

Upcoming solar eclipse, controlling a robot arm via thought, rewiring damaged nerve connections, and an upcoming private launch to the ISS.

A new study shows hidden racial attitudes are playing a role in the 2012 presidential vote. Plus, a grassroots group is calling for a presidential debate based on science and technology issues.

Apple and Amazon want to store your music in 'the cloud,' while companies from Google to Microsoft to Zoho offer ways to wrangle your office documents there. But what exactly is the cloud, and is the time right to start using it? Technology experts Tony Bradley and Nicholas Carr look at the switch away from traditional desktop computing.

As the search for cheap, safe and non-carbon emitting sources of energy continues, a band of scientists say the answer may be nuclear reactors fueled by thorium. Others caution that thorium reactors pose waste and proliferation risks. Ira Flatow and guests discuss the pros and cons of thorium reactors.

Fans of The Big Bang Theory may know her as Sheldon's sort-of-girlfriend Amy Farrah Fowler, but actor Mayim Bialik is also a writer, a proponent of "attachment parenting" and holds a PhD in neuroscience. Bialik discusses her career, and why she left academia to return to acting.

Mechanical engineer Maurizio Porfiri, of the Polytechnic Institute of New York University, designs robot fish. A few years ago, he found that real fish would mill about his aquatic robot, and now he's trying to understand why. His research suggests that it has less to do with how the robot looks, than how it makes fish feel.

A private company has unveiled plans to mine precious metals and water from nearby asteroids. Planetary Resources co-founder Eric Anderson discusses the various stages of the mining process and how the excavated minerals could impact future space exploration and innovation on Earth.

In The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation, Jon Gertner writes of the legendary innovations developed at AT&T's Bell Labs, from lasers and transistors to solar cells and cell phones, and discusses how the lab became a hotbed for new ideas.

Very few people will ever visit the ocean's depths. This hour, Ira Flatow talks with a few who have, like divers Sylvia Earle and John McCosker, who've discovered flashing fish and spotted sharks in the deep. And filmmaker James Cameron joins to discuss his dive to the bottom of the Mariana Trench.

Kelly Ward, senior software engineer for Walt Disney Animation Studios, was tasked with bringing Rapunzel's locks to life in Disney's Tangled. The hair had to look realistic, but not too real — otherwise Rapunzel would be towing 80 pounds of hair behind her.

In a new book, Relics: Travels in Nature's Time Machine, Harvard entomologist and photographer Piotr Naskrecki documents his travels, from New Guinea to New Zealand and beyond, looking for organisms whose genes can tell us something about conditions on Earth millions of years ago.

From farting fish, to the laws of stupidity, Marc Abrahams (editor and co-founder of The Annals of Improbable Research) has a knack for finding science that "makes you laugh, and then makes you think." Abrahams discusses some improbable research, and why science that might at first seem absurd, matters.

How do astronauts take a bath in space? What happens to their sense of smell in a weightless environment? Two NASA astronauts aboard the International Space Station discuss the challenges of life in low Earth orbit and how their research is a stepping stone for future space exploration.

New York City has been referred to as a concrete jungle. But researchers say it is more 'jungle' than you might think. A panel of experts discuss the plant and animal life found in city waters and green spaces. They also discuss the impact of urbanization and climate change on a city's biodiversity.