
Helen Thompson is the associate digital editor at Science News. She helps manage the website, makes videos, builds interactives, wrangles cats and occasionally writes about things like dandelion flight and whale evolution. She has undergraduate degrees in biology and English from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, a master’s degree in science writing from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, and strong opinions about tacos. Before Science News, she wrote for Smithsonian, NPR.org, National Geographic, Nature and others.

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All Stories by Helen Thompson
- Planetary Science
How a vaporized Earth might have cooked up the moon
A high-speed collision turned the early Earth into a hot, gooey space doughnut, and the moon formed within this synestia, a new simulation suggests.
- Paleontology
Fossil footprints may put lizards on two feet 110 million years ago
Fossilized footprints found in South Korea could be the earliest evidence of two-legged running in lizards.
- Earth
Robots map largest underwater volcanic eruption in 100 years
High-resolution mapping of a 2012 underwater volcanic eruption just goes to show there’s a lot we don’t know about deep-sea volcanism.
- Science & Society
Watch our most-viewed videos of 2017
Cassini’s demise, cuttlefish and the Curiosity rover topped our list of most popular videos of 2017.
- Health & Medicine
The man flu struggle might be real, says one researcher
A researcher reviews the evidence for gender bias among flu viruses in the BMJ’s lighthearted holiday edition.
- Animals
Once settled, immigrants play important guard roles in mongoose packs
Dwarf mongoose packs ultimately benefit from taking in immigrants, but there’s an assimilation period.
- Animals
Crested pigeons sound the alarm with their wings
Crested pigeons have specialized feathers that signal danger when they flee from an apparent threat.
- Paleontology
New dinosaur sported a curious set of chompers
Matheronodon provincialis, a newly described dinosaur, munched on tough plants with big scissors for teeth.
- Anthropology
Christina Warinner uncovers ancient tales in dental plaque
Molecular biologist Christina Warinner studies calculus, or fossilized dental plaque, which contains a trove of genetic clues to past human diet and disease.
- Paleontology
A baby ichthyosaur’s last meal revealed
A new look at an old fossil shows that some species of baby ichthyosaurs may have dined on squid.
- Paleontology
A baby ichthyosaur’s last meal revealed
A new look at an old fossil shows that some species of baby ichthyosaurs may have dined on squid.
- Animals
Bedbugs may be into dirty laundry
When humans aren’t around, bedbugs go for the next best thing: smelly human laundry.