Sarah Zielinski

Sarah Zielinski

Editor, Print at Science News Explores

Sarah Zielinski wanted to be a marine biologist when she was growing up, but after graduating from Cornell University with a B.A. in biology, and a stint at the National Science Foundation, she realized that she didn’t want to spend her life studying just one area of science — she wanted to learn about it all and share that knowledge with the public. In 2004, she received an M.A. in journalism from New York University’s Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program and began a career in science journalism. She worked as a science writer and editor at the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, the American Geophysical Union’s newspaper Eos and Smithsonian magazine before becoming a freelancer. During that time, she started her blog, Wild Things, and moved it to Science News magazine, and then became an editor for and frequent contributor to Science News Explores. Her work has also appeared in Slate, Science, Scientific American, Discover and National Geographic News. She is the winner of the DCSWA 2010 Science News Brief Award and editor of the winner of the Gold Award for Children’s Science News in the 2015 AAAS Kavli Science Journalism Awards, “Where will lightning strike?” published in Science News Explores. In 2005, she was a Marine Biological Laboratory Science Journalism Fellow.

All Stories by Sarah Zielinski

  1. Animals

    Ecotourism could bring new dangers to animals

    The presence of kindly tourists could make animals more vulnerable to predation and poaching, a new study warns.

  2. Animals

    How the giraffe got its long neck

    A new study of fossils suggests that the giraffe’s defining feature may have started evolving long before modern giraffes came on the scene.

  3. Animals

    What happens to animals in a hurricane?

    Hurricanes can be devastating to animals on land and in the sea, but they can also provide opportunities.

  4. Animals

    Some seabirds will be hit hard by sea level rise

    Seabird species that nest on low-lying islands in stormy winter months could see huge losses as sea levels rise, a new study finds.

  5. Animals

    Life in the polar ocean is surprisingly active in the dark winter

    The Arctic polar winter may leave marine ecosystems dark for weeks on end, but life doesn’t shut down, a new study finds.

  6. Animals

    How to see sea turtles — without bothering them

    Sea turtles come out of the water to lay eggs on beaches. It’s a great time to see the reptiles — if you know what you are doing.

  7. Animals

    Blue-footed boobies dirty their eggs to hide them from predators

    Blue-footed boobies lay bright white eggs on the ground. Dirtying the eggs camouflages them against gulls, a new study finds.

  8. Animals

    Why we need predators

    It might be easy to say that we should wipe out species that can kill us. But the effects of such action would be far ranging.

  9. Animals

    Shipwreck provides window into Tudor-era cod fishing

    In the 1500s, England was feeding its navy with fish caught far from home, a new study finds.

  10. Animals

    How a seahorse dad is like a pregnant woman

    Live birth has evolved at least 150 times in vertebrates, including in seahorses and humans. And there are some surprising similarities between the species.

  11. Animals

    Rabbits leave a mark on soil long after they are gone

    Twenty years after rabbits were removed from a sub-Antarctic island, soil fungus has yet to return to normal, a study finds.

  12. Astronomy

    Go to Green Bank to listen to the stars

    Visitors to the Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia get a close-up with the world’s largest movable land object.