Meghan Rosen headhsot

Meghan Rosen

Staff Writer, Biological Sciences

Meghan Rosen is a staff writer who reports on the life sciences for Science News. She earned a Ph.D. in biochemistry and molecular biology with an emphasis in biotechnology from the University of California, Davis, and later graduated from the science communication program at UC Santa Cruz. Prior to joining Science News in 2022, she was a media relations manager at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Her work has appeared in Wired, Science, and The Washington Post, among other outlets. Once for McSweeney’s, she wrote about her kids’ habit of handing her trash, a story that still makes her (and them) laugh.

All Stories by Meghan Rosen

  1. Paleontology

    Ancient armored fish revises early history of jaws

    The fossil of a 423-million-year-old armored fish from China suggests that the jaws of all modern land vertebrates and bony fish originated in a bizarre group of animals called placoderms.

  2. Paleontology

    Birds’ honks filled Late Cretaceous air

    Oldest avian voice box fossil yet discovered belonged to a ducklike bird that lived during the age of the dinosaurs.

  3. Tech

    XPRIZE launched new kind of space race, book recounts

    'How to Make a Spaceship' chronicles the XPRIZE challenge that helped ignite the private space industry.

  4. Health & Medicine

    Deciphering cell’s recycling machinery earns Nobel

    The 2016 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine was awarded to Yoshinori Ohsumi for his work on autophagy, a process that cells use to break down old parts for future use.

  5. Health & Medicine

    Zika virus infects cells that make bone, muscle in lab tests

    Zika virus infects embryonic cranial cells in lab-grown minibrains, potentially altering face and skull shape and brain development, and maybe even contributing to microcephaly.

  6. Health & Medicine

    Concern expands over Zika birth defects

    Infection with Zika virus in utero can trigger a spectrum of birth defects beyond microcephaly, and could potentially cause long-term health problems as well.

  7. Health & Medicine

    Measles has been eliminated in the Americas, WHO says

    Thanks to wide-spread vaccination against the viral disease, measles has officially been declared eliminated from the Americas.

  8. Materials Science

    Qian Chen makes matter come alive

    Materials scientist Qian Chen is coaxing nanomaterials to self-assemble in new and unexpected ways.

  9. Paleontology

    Pterosaurs weren’t all super-sized in the Late Cretaceous

    A 77-million-year-old flying reptile may be the smallest pterosaur of the Late Cretaceous.

  10. Paleontology

    Jurassic ichthyosaur dubbed ‘Storr Lochs Monster’ unveiled

    A rare, 170-year-old skeleton discovered in Scotland is one of the best-preserved ichthyosaur fossils from the Middle Jurassic.

  11. Materials Science

    High-tech cloth could make summer days a breeze

    A plastic material like kitchen cling wrap may be the next big thing in high-tech clothing. The fabric lets heat pass through, but blocks visible light, making it opaque enough to wear.

  12. Health & Medicine

    Clean inside those bagpipes — and trumpets and clarinets

    Bagpipes’ moist interiors may be the perfect breeding ground for yeasts and molds.