Siri Carpenter (Executive director and editor-in-chief) is a co-founder of The Open Notebook and is an award-winning science journalist and editor work has appeared in The New York Times, Science, Scientific American, and other publications. She is a past president of the National Association of Science Writers, serves on the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine Standing Committee on Advancing Science Communication, and was the 2023 winner of the Online News Association’s Community Award. She has a PhD in social psychology from Yale University and lives in Madison, Wisconsin.
Rachel Zamzow (Deputy executive director) is an award-winning science journalist and editor. At The Open Notebook, Rachel commissions and edits stories, manages editorial production, and oversees development of training and mentoring programs to equip local journalists with the skills they need to bring scientific evidence into their stories. As an independent journalist, she reports stories about neuroscience and ethics in science for several publications, including Science, Science News, and The Transmitter. Rachel has a PhD in Neuroscience from the University of Missouri, and she got her start in journalism thanks to a 2014 AAAS Mass Media Fellowship. She lives in Waco, Texas with her two sons.
Saugat Bolakhe (Program assistant) is a Nepalese science journalist. He studied zoology as an undergraduate in Nepal and has a master’s degree from the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY. His work has appeared in Scientific American, Nature, Quanta Magazine, New Scientist, Discover, Knowable, and other publications.
Aaron Brooks (Senior editor) handles The Open Notebook’s copyediting and production. He has done freelance editing work for Sapiens, Science News, bioGraphic, and Knowable Magazine, among other publications. He lives with his family in Traverse City, Michigan.
Inés Gutiérrez Jaber (Translator) is a freelance science journalist. Her work focuses on anything from octopus biology, life sciences, environmental science, to science policy in Mexico and has appeared in Science, Science News, Newsweek, and other outlets. She is bilingual and her work has been published both in English and Spanish. She is a member of the Mexican Network of Science Journalists (RedMPC) and does work as a freelance translator, copy editor, and fact checker. She lives in Mexico City.
Emily Laber-Warren (Project manager) is co-creator of TON‘s Science Journalism Master Classes. She is a professor at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY, where she heads the Health and Science Reporting program. She writes about autism, climate change, circadian rhythms, and other topics for The New York Times, The Washington Post, Newsweek, Spectrum, Sapiens, Undark, and other publications. She has twin boys and lives on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River, where the views are better. She is the author of a nature book for young children, A Walk in the Woods: Into the Field Guide.
Sarah Luft (Program assistant) is a digital storyteller, science reporter and community engagement strategist. She manages marketing and communications at SeriousFun Children’s Network. Her reporting on chronic conditions and mental health has appeared in publications like The City and Lady Gaga’s Channel Kindness. She has an M.A. in engagement journalism from the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY.
Rodrigo Pérez Ortega (TON en Español editorial director) is a staff writer at Science, and his work has also appeared in Nature, The New York Times, Quanta, and other outlets. He’s a former early-career fellow at The Open Notebook and he works continuously to raise awareness about science and science journalism in Latin America. He won a 2022 Schmidt Award for Excellence in Science Communication. He’s a founding member of the Mexican Network of Science Journalists and is on the board of the National Association of Science Writers. He lives in Mexico City.
Debbie Ponchner (Translations editor) is an award-winning science journalist based in Costa Rica and the editor of Knowable en español. She worked as a science reporter, editor and managing editor for La Nación, the newspaper of record for this Central American country. In 2014 she moved to New York to create and lead the Spanish language website of Scientific American, a project that ran until 2017. She was a 2003–04 Knight Science Journalism Fellow, and is a board member of the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing.
Sandeep Ravindran (Project manager) is a freelance science writer based in Bethesda, Maryland. He manages TON‘s Sharon Dunwoody Science Journalism Mentoring Program for science journalists from underrepresented communities and co-manages our peer-mentoring community for local journalists who cover science. He has written about life sciences and technology for publications such as Time, The New York Times, Smithsonian, National Geographic News, The Scientist, Nature, and Wired. He is President of the National Association of Science Writers. He holds a PhD in microbiology and immunology from Stanford University and studied science communication at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He is originally from South India, and enjoys finding new Indian dishes to cook for his young daughter.
Jill Sakai (Senior editor) is a science writer and editor in Madison, Wisconsin. She is the assistant managing editor at Science News Explores and a freelance writer and editor. She is a former AAAS Mass Media Fellow and was a board member of the National Association of Science Writers from 2014–2022. When not writing, she enjoys hiking, climbing, and playing ultimate frisbee, violin and piano (though not simultaneously).
Kelly Tyrrell (Engagement editor) is an award-winning science and health writer. By day, she oversees research communications and content strategy at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and she is a former staff reporter at The News Journal in Wilmington, Delaware. Her work has also appeared in The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Chicago Tribune, where she was a AAAS Mass Media Fellow in 2011. She recently co-authored the book Chasing the Stars, about the history and international importance of the astronomy done at the University of Wisconsin’s Washburn Observatory.
Giuliana Viglione (Senior editor) Giuliana Viglione is a climate and environmental journalist based in Washington, DC. Giuliana is an editor at Carbon Brief covering food, land, and nature, and their work has also appeared in bioGraphic, Nature, Chemical & Engineering News, and other publications. Giuliana was a AAAS Mass Media Fellow at King 5 News in 2018 and was an early-career fellow at The Open Notebook in 2023.
Katherine J. Wu (Senior editor) is a staff writer for The Atlantic. Before that, she was a science reporter for The New York Times, an early-career fellow at The Open Notebook, and a AAAS Mass Media Fellow at Smithsonian in 2018. She holds a PhD in microbiology and immunobiology from Harvard University. She won a 2022 Schmidt Award for Excellence in Science Communication, a 2021 Science in Society Award, and the 2020 Evert Clark/Seth Payne Award for Young Science Journalists.
2025 Early-Career Fellows
Lucila Pinto is a journalist from Argentina. She writes about AI, trust in science, biodiversity, and public policy, among other topics. Her work has appeared in Science, Rest of World, Columbia Journalism Review, La Nación, and other outlets. She began her career in Buenos Aires, where she worked in magazines and newspapers for over a decade. She was an intern at Clarín, a staff writer at Para Ti, and a regular contributor and columnist at La Nación. She has also led projects on the ethical integration of artificial intelligence in newsrooms and was a fellow in the JournalismAI program at the London School of Economics (LSE). In 2023, she moved to New York to pursue a Master of Arts in Science Journalism at Columbia University. She is currently based between Canada and Argentina, working as a freelance journalist.
William von Herff can’t remember a time when he wasn’t fascinated by the natural world. He received his B.S. in biology from McGill University and his M.Sc in science writing from the Graduate Program in Science Writing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Since graduating, he has been reporting on local science on outer Cape Cod at the Provincetown Independent, a locally-owned newspaper. His freelance work has appeared in The Atlantic, WIRED, Smithsonian, Hakai, and Popular Science, among others. His writing focuses on conservation, the environment, natural history, and the politics of science. When he’s not writing, he can typically be found tromping through a forest or gazing out at the nearest body of water in search of birds.
Skyler Ware is a freelance journalist covering physical and earth sciences. She earned a PhD in chemistry from Caltech in 2023. Her work has appeared in Eos, SciShow, Live Science, and other outlets, and she was the 2023 AAAS Mass Media Fellow at Science News. Skyler also organizes the annual ComSciCon-SciWri workshop on science journalism for graduate students and postdocs in STEM fields. When she’s not writing, she’s probably running, digging in her garden, or reading the latest science fiction bestseller.
Latin American Advisory Group
The Open Notebook‘s Latin American Advisory Group is a group of journalists who have made themselves available to offer guidance to our writers, upon request, when they are seeking Latin American sources and angles for TON stories. Members of this paid advisory group currently include:
Federico Kukso (Argentina)
Mariana Lenharo (Brazil)
Andrea Obaid (Chile)
María de los Ángeles Orfila (Uruguay)
Angela Posada-Swafford (Colombia and USA)
Emiliano Rodríguez Mega (Mexico)
Valeria Román (Argentina)
Michelle Soto (Costa Rica)