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On anglerfish, scrub jays, and the menageries of childhood
The anglerfish was the iconic animal of my childhood. This eerie creature lives miles under the ocean’s surface and – as you probably know, if you were ever an animal-obsessed kid like me – dangles a...
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My mother, on the bleeding edge of health care reform
Among my fondest childhood memories are the hours my family spent discussing B cells and T cells while cruising the highways on our family car camping trips. My mother, Irene Check, is a scientist;...
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A botched battle in the vaccine safety wars
Doctors and scientists have lost yet another battle in the war over vaccines. On 25 August, the US Institute of Medicine released a report on the “adverse events” of eight childhood vaccines. The...
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Avoiding “Contagion”
The box office smash hit “Contagion” features heroic (women!) scientists battling a deadly threat. Its advisers included esteemed researchers who helped keep the film true to science. And public health...
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Steve Jobs and the Limits of Sequencing
The death of Steve Jobs is unfolding as a morality play between mainstream and alternative medicine, with doctors and bloggers blaming Jobs’ untimely demise on his decision to delay surgery while he...
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Lung Cancer: Replacing the Blunderbuss with a Stiletto
Van VanderMeer is about to celebrate an anniversary that he’d probably rather forget. In December 2009, VanderMeer thought he had caught his annual winter cough; for a few years in a row, he’d...
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Synthetic biology and weapons of war
A few years ago, Eric Klavins found himself starting at the ceiling of his room in the Athenaeum, a private lodging on the grounds of the California Institute of Technology, in the middle of the night....
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2011: The Science Quiz
2011 is drawing to a close, and what a big year it was…for science! Many interesting and important scientific things occurred, and we hope you were paying attention, because here’s your chance to test...
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The Seven Deadly Sins: Sloth
When is a sin a virtue? When the sinner is an assasin, and the sin is laziness. In cancer, however, it’s diffiult to know which tumors will be slothful and which will be aggressive. This is the dilemma...
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Internal monologue: Mike Daisey and the predictability of lies
A lie told for good purposes is not inherently wrong. And besides, Mike Daisey didn’t lie. That’s been Daisey’s defense in the fallout of revelations that he fabricated key details of a now-retracted...
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Does the world really need more science journalism? Matter says yes, and...
Last month, two journalists launched a new science and technology journalism project called Matter. Using the crowd-funding Web site Kickstarter, Jim Giles and Bobbie Johnson asked donors to help them...
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What the ‘limits of DNA’ story reveals about the challenges of science...
As a science journalist, I sympathize with book reviewers who wrestle with the question of whether to write negative reviews. It seems a waste of time to write about a dog of a book when there are so...
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Trust no one, and other lessons I learned from physics reporters
As I’ve been thinking about the challenges facing science journalism, a little voice in my head has been murmuring, “Yes, but isn’t all this navel-gazing a bit biology-centric?” Number one on my list...
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Uninformed consent
“I understand that my tissues, fluids, cells and other specimens….” Last year, after years of writing about research studies, I agreed to become a research subject myself. I agreed to allow a local...
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Name that UFO (Unidentified Floating Object)
In which we ask our enlightened readers to solve a household mystery. Scene: The Check-Hayden kitchen. Erika (opens the refrigerator): Hm, this apple juice has been in here for a while. I should...
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Uninformed consent, revisited
Early in my pregnancy, a research assistant sat down next to me in the waiting room of my doctor’s office, where I was scheduled to undergo a routine checkup. She asked me if I wanted to take part in a...
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What happens when we can’t afford to be prepared?
The emergence of the H7N9 bird flu virus has rekindled memories of our last flu pandemic – just as the United States is debating whether it can afford to prepare for the next one. Remember the H1N1...
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Playdate with Eeyore: Why Big Data science means big challenges for reporters
We often lament hype in science journalism. But seldom do we worry about underhype – of downplaying the significance of a study. In March, I had reason to worry about this. Just after Nature published...
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On Henry VIII and the mystery of the missing male heirs
“There are so many women in the world, so many fresh and young and virtuous women, so many good and kind women. Why have I been cursed with women who destroy the children in their own wombs?” So...
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A half-million-year-old horse? Yawn. Show me a warm summer day in San Francisco.
San Francisco is in the midst of a heat wave this week, and the ability to walk the summer streets without a parka is having a regrettable effect on our workforce. For once, the shorts-sporting...
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