MBL, Woods Hole, MA--Twelve science writers and editors have been awarded prestigious Science Journalism Fellowships at the MBL (Marine Biological Laboratory), an internationally known biomedical and environmental research center located in the village of Woods Hole, on Cape Cod. The program will provide the journalists hands-on science training during the MBL's famed summer research season, when hundreds of biologists gather at the institution from around the world to conduct research and to teach and learn advanced-level science and research techniques.
This year's MBL Science Journalism Fellows are:
Biomedical Course:
Allan Coukell, WBUR-FM
Susan Kruglinski, Discover magazine
Natasha Mitchell, Australian Broadcasting Corp.
Gary Robbins, Orange County Register
Susanne Rust, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Corinna Wu, AAAS Science Update
Environment Course:
Marc Airhart, Earth & Sky
Anton Caputo, San Antonio Express News
Mary Engel, Los Angeles Times
Richard Hollingham, BBC
Jim Metzner, Pulse of the Planet
Molly Murray, The News Journal
Now in its 21st year, the MBL's Science Journalism Program allows promising science journalists from around the globe to "step into the shoes of the scientists they cover," by awarding them fellowships to live and study at the Woods Hole, MA, laboratory. During their residencies at the MBL, fellows learn what science is like from the inside out--as students and researchers in the MBL's cutting-edge summer courses and laboratories. In August, five fellows will also travel with MBL scientists to the North Slope of Alaska's Brooks Range to learn more about climate change research and other environmental studies being conducted at a field site located on Toolik Lake.
All fellows will arrive in early June to participate in one of two hands-on mini laboratory courses--each designed specifically for the non-scientist. One course will explore techniques used in biomedical research--sequencing DNA, cloning, and PCR (polymerase chain reaction), for example--and the other will feature research techniques currently in use by ecosystems ecologists both in the field and in the laboratory.
To date, the Science Journalism Program has granted fellowships to more than 250 journalists from a wide range of news organizations, including The New York Times, Science, National Public Radio, The Washington Post, CNN, and Scientific American. It is also gaining cachet with journalists overseas, and includes alumni from such far-reaching places as Africa, Brazil, Sweden, India, Japan, and the United Kingdom.
MBL visiting investigator and Northwestern University professor Robert D. Goldman, and Knight Science Journalism Program director and former Washington Post science editor, Boyce Rensberger, direct the Science Journalism Program. The Biomedical Hands-On Laboratory course is co-directed by Dr. Kerry Bloom of the University of North Carolina and Dr. Sally Kornbluth of Duke University Medical Center. The Environment Hands-On Laboratory course is co-directed by Drs. Kenneth Foreman and Christopher Neill, both of the MBL's Ecosystems Center.
The 2006 MBL Science Journalism Program is supported in part by the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, the American Society for Cell Biology, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, FASEB, the National Science Foundation--Office of Polar Programs, NASA, the New York Times Company Foundation, and the Waksman Foundation for Microbiology.
The MBL is an international, independent, nonprofit institution dedicated to improving the human condition through creative research and education in the biological, biomedical and environmental sciences. Founded in 1888 as the Marine Biological Laboratory, the MBL is the oldest private marine laboratory in the Western Hemisphere. For more information about the MBL's Science Journalism Program, visit www.mbl.edu/sjp.