Laura Helmuth


Laura Helmuth is an American science journalist and the Editor in Chief of Scientific American. She was formerly the Health and Science editor at The Washington Post. From 2016 to 2018, she served as the President of the National Association of Science Writers.

Education and early career

Helmuth attended Eckerd College, where she received her Bachelor of Science in Biology and Psychology in 1991. She then attended the University of California, Berkeley, where she received her PhD in cognitive neuroscience in 1997. She performed her doctoral work in the laboratory of Richard Ivry. Her research centered on the underlying neuroscience of Parkinson's disease and resulted in a thesis entitled Sequence Learning in Patients with Parkinson's Disease. Her thesis research included understanding the role of the cerebellum in verbal function, learning, and attention, as well as studying how the brain coordinates and executes cyclic movements.
In 1998, she earned a certificate in science communication from University of California, Santa Cruz. She began her science writing career as an intern at Science News.

Career

Helmuth began her writing career as a staff reporter and editor for Science Magazine, from 1999 to 2004. She then became a Science Editor at Smithsonian Magazine, where she remained from 2004 to 2012 before becoming the Science and Health editor at the online magazine Slate. During her four-year tenure, she became known for Slate's imaginative science coverage, which included a series that explored the science of longevity about why humans are living longer than they have before. On April 28, 2016, Helmuth became The Washington Post's editor of Health, Science and Environment, overseeing a team of 13 journalists. On April 13, 2020, Helmuth succeeded Mariette DiChristina as the ninth Editor-in-Chief of Scientific American.
Throughout the course of her career, Helmuth has developed a reputation for bringing rigor to coverage of science. She has written about and lectured on combatting misinformation through science journalism. While at the Washington Post, she oversaw the development of a video series called "The Vaccine Project," written by Anna Rothschild and Brian Monroe, to address vaccine hesitancy. She has also taken advantage of the mystery format to draw readers into rigorous medical coverage with a Post series called "Medical Mysteries." Most recently, she developed a tip sheet for journalists covering the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic, noting that "repetition makes misinformation feel more true."

Leadership and service

Helmuth serves as a member of a Standing Committee on Advancing Science Communication Research and Practice in the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. She has also given lectures at institutions like the American Institute of Physics, the National Academy of Sciences, and the University of Wisconsin–Madison about how science journalists can counter misinformation and address uncertainty in their reporting.
From 2016 to 2018, Helmuth served as the President of the National Association of Science Writers. She serves on the boards of Society for Science and the Public, High Country News, the Geological Society of Washington, Spectrum magazine, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science's service SciLine.

Selected Writing