Writing

Here are some articles I’ve published, or edited, elsewhere on the Internet, in no particular order.

Asimov Press

Most of my writing has appeared in Asimov Press, a magazine that I founded in late 2023. Please see the website for a full list of my work.

Works in Progress

Animals as Chemical Factories (with Xander Balwit) / Every Grain of Rice / Good drug news / What’s new in biology /

New Science

Molecular Missionaries (as Editor) / The Laws of Science / New Science’s Report on the NIH (as Editor) / Research Papers Used to Have Style. What Happened? (as Editor)

By the Numbers, a data-driven newsletter for Spectrum

By the Numbers: Unequal ABA access, autism incidence by insurance type, criminal charges counts | January 20, 2022By the Numbers: Autism in translation, rising prevalence figures, intelligence quotients | December 21, 2021 By the Numbers: Black neuroscience speakers, mildly effective CBT, autism’s diagnostic odyssey | November 19, 2021 By the Numbers: Preschool antipsychotics, COVID-19 vaccinations, delayed autism diagnoses | October 20, 2021 By the Numbers: Machine learning, dementia link, antipsychotics while pregnant | September 16, 2021 By the Numbers: Coronavirus infection odds, Medicaid waivers, correlating conditions | August 19, 2021 By the Numbers: Polypharmacy, outpatient autism care, pandemic behaviors | July 1, 2021

Spectrum

Introducing Spectrum’s Autism Drug Trial Tracker | January 12, 2022 ‘Pay-to-participate’ autism stem-cells paper retracted | December 2, 2021 Age at autism diagnosis, first intervention drops to under 3 years | November 19, 2021Cognitive behavioral therapy may be only mildly effective for anxious, autistic children | November 16, 2021 Society for Neuroscience cancels in-person meeting | October 8, 2021 Missed check-ups, delayed autism diagnoses among low-income children | October 6, 2021 Few autism researchers plan to attend conferences in person this year: Survey | October 4, 2021 Q&A with W. David Lohr: Antipsychotics, polypharmacy among autistic preschoolers | September 21, 2021Autism mouse models cluster by brain activity pattern | September 10, 2021 Autism study earns ‘expression of concern’ over unavailable data | September 3, 2021 Protein atlas doubles number of known interactions in mice | August 26, 2021Sex, age of diagnosis correlate with autism comorbidities | July 30, 2021 Ultra-rare variants point to new autism candidate genes | July 26, 2021 Beyond the Bench: A conversation with Ofer Yizhar | July 26, 2021 Method tracks neuron paths, gene expression simultaneously | July 21, 2021 Q&A with Richard Bethlehem: What goes into a Brainhack | July 9, 2021New optogenetics technique minimizes thermal damage to neurons | July 8, 2021 Polypharmacy, shifting prescriptions common for autism comorbidities | July 1, 2021 Disrupted cell skeletons may explain brain wiring changes in autism-linked condition | June 28, 2021 Wireless optogenetic devices sync neurons among mice | June 17, 2021 Copyright claim prompts retraction of study on alexithymia in autism | June 9, 2021

Scientific American

Newly Studied Proteins Expand CRISPR’s Editing Range | Feb. 2021 issue

The Counter

Foodborne diseases kill thousands of Americans each year. Tracing food with genetically engineered spores could help | Jan. 19, 2021

Earth Island Journal

Illinois Wind Farm Project Threatens Rare Frog Species | Apr. 12, 2021

Retraction Watch

Clinical trial paper that made anemia drug look safer than it is will be retracted | May 11, 2021 Prominent Chinese scientist failed to disclose company ties in COVID-19 clinical trial paper | May 4, 2021 Ecologist who lost thesis awards earns expressions of concern after laptop stolen | May 3, 2021 Editor declines to correct paper with duplicated image after earlier study disappears | Apr. 26, 2021 University in Japan revokes doctorate for plagiarism of text, image | Apr. 14, 2021The rector who resigned after plagiarizing a student’s PhD thesis | Apr. 12, 2021 An author asked for multiple corrections to a paper. PLOS ONE decided to retract it. | Apr. 6, 2021 Seven barred from research after plagiarism, duplications in eleven papers | Apr. 5, 2021 Paper claiming Muslim patients are “particularly sensitive” retracted | March 29, 2021 Editor who opined on author excuses has paper subjected to an expression of concern | March 25, 2021 “Riddled with errors”: Study of cell phones and breast cancer retracted | March 22, 2021 University clears scientist of logging industry’s misconduct allegations | March 18, 2021 After grad student suicide, misconduct findings, university suspends professor | March 16, 2021 Bad blood at a lab leads to retraction after postdoc publishes study without supervisor’s permission | March 15, 2021 University of Tennessee investigation finds manipulated images in Science paper | March 4, 2021 Meet the postdoc who says he’s been trying to retract his own paper since 2016 | Feb. 26, 2021 Eleven papers corrected after nutrition prof fails to disclose patent, company ties | Feb. 12, 2021 Leading evidence-based group blames pandemic for 9-month delay pulling flawed cancer review | Feb. 11, 2021 Mathematician ranked as Clarivate “highly cited researcher” has third paper retracted | Feb. 3, 2021 Journal pulls two studies that listed an author without his permission | Feb. 1, 2021What is a figure about budgies doing in four different plant papers? | Jan. 29, 2021 “The whole thing is yucky:” When you’re surprised to find yourself as an author on a paper | Jan. 26, 2021 (Later covered in WIRED) “I don’t think I slept for a day and a half:” Bad news for study about bad news | Jan. 25, 2021

Forbes

New this ski season: A jacket brewed like spider’s silk (with John Cumbers) | Aug. 28, 2019 Meet eight tech titans investing in synthetic biology (with John Cumbers) | Sep. 14, 2019

Scienceline

A light switch for cutting DNA | Apr. 12, 2021 How a Minnesota town cut back on salt | Apr. 9, 2021 What does the coronavirus sound like? (Audio) | Jan. 21, 2021 AI can’t color old photos accurately. Here’s why | Jan. 13, 2021 AI can make music. But will it replace your favorite musician? | Jan. 8, 2021 Hackers set their sights on 3D printers | Dec. 22, 2020 Black veterans more likely to test positive for coronavirus than white veterans | Nov. 20, 2020 Viral genome built in a test tube | Nov. 17, 2020

Caltech Letters

Decoding the language of genomes (with Suzy Beeler) | Nov. 3, 2020 How synthetic biologists could save the Cavendish banana from the brink of collapse | Nov. 19, 2019

SynBioBeta

Automated biology is now an affordable reality | Aug. 14, 2020 How aquaculture innovation can save seafood | Jan. 12, 2020 How automation and machine learning help explore the dark corners of the genome | Oct. 22, 2019 Spiber’s biomaterials stack: From new production facility to fashion runway | Sep. 4, 2019 One lab in Germany is using robots to advance computer-aided synthetic biology | Aug. 3, 2019 Synthetic biology gets a makeover with Evonetix’s DNA synthesis technology | July 8, 2019 How synthetic biology is dyeing the future of fashion | July 2, 2019 Synthetic biology for sustainable cities (with John Cumbers) | June 25, 2019 Why carbon recycling could be synthetic biology’s crowning achievement | June 25, 2019 Biology unlocked: Emerging applications of cell-free systems | April 30, 2019Biotechnology meets fashion and sports performance: Trends in the apparel industry | March 26, 2019 Find a needle in the cancer haystack | March 5, 2019 Living medicines: Engineering the microbiome | Feb. 19, 2019 Synthetic biology and reproducibility meet on the internet (of things) | Jan. 7, 2019 Synthetic life: Made from scratch | Nov. 22, 2018 Scientists are engineering organisms to create new materials | May 25, 2018

Massive Science

A proposal to use CRISPR to prevent opioid overdoses is a useless approach to healthcare | Sep. 17, 2020 Here’s why many CRISPR/Cas9 experiments could be wrong – and how to fix them | Dec. 13, 2019 New parasitic interaction discovered in Antarctic lakes | July 30, 2019 Fighting cancer with exploding antibody-filled bacteria | July 27, 2019

Little Village Magazine

Iowa’s dwindling bee population is part of a larger, frightening trend (cover story) | Sep. 19, 2017 UI students are rewiring genes to create biodegradable plastic | Oct. 31, 2017 By ‘poking’ cells, a University of Iowa lab studies the science of healing | Aug. 23, 2018 Six groundbreaking research projects at the University of Iowa | Aug. 2, 2018 The best and worst of 2017 (science) | Dec. 5, 2017

The Official PLOS Blog

Science Behind-the-Scenes: Multiplexed CRISPR and sgRNA arrays with the Howard Salis lab | Nov. 13, 2019 Science Behind-the-Scenes: CRISPR for metabolic engineering with Dr. Raphael Ferreira | Nov. 4, 2019 Science Behind-the-Scenes: Engineering microbial consortia with Dr. Marika Ziesack | Oct. 11, 2019 Science Behind-the-Scenes: Tethered ribosomes with Dr. Erik Carlson | Oct. 25, 2019 Science Behind-the-Scenes: Do-It-Yourself OD measurements with Dr. Chinna Devarapu and Vamsi Yallapgragada | Oct. 18, 2019

The Key Reporter

Iowa City, UNESCO City of Literature

Faces of the City of Literature: John Kenyon | 2017 Faces of the City of Literature: Andrea Wilson | 2017 Faces of the City of Literature: Nialle Sylvan | 2017

Random Stuff on Medium: https://nikomccarty.medium.com/