Joe Palca
Joe Palca is a science correspondent for NPR. Since joining NPR in 1992, Palca has covered a range of science topics — everything from biomedical research to astronomy. He is currently focused on the eponymous series, "Joe's Big Idea." Stories in the series explore the minds and motivations of scientists and inventors. Palca is also the founder of NPR Scicommers – A science communication collective.
Palca began his journalism career in television in 1982, working as a health producer for the CBS affiliate in Washington, DC. In 1986, he left television for a seven-year stint as a print journalist, first as the Washington news editor for Nature, and then as a senior correspondent for Science Magazine.
In October 2009, Palca took a six-month leave from NPR to become science writer in residence at The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens.
Palca has won numerous awards, including the National Academies Communications Award, the Science-in-Society Award of the National Association of Science Writers, the American Chemical Society's James T. Grady-James H. Stack Award for Interpreting Chemistry for the Public, the American Association for the Advancement of Science Journalism Prize, and the Victor Cohn Prize for Excellence in Medical Writing. In 2019, Palca was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences for outstanding achievement in journalism.
With Flora Lichtman, Palca is the co-author of Annoying: The Science of What Bugs Us (Wiley, 2011).
He comes to journalism from a science background, having received a Ph.D. in psychology from the University of California at Santa Cruz, where he worked on human sleep physiology.
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Start with paper; add Shrinky Dinks, a microprocessor, heat, and voila! It's not quite that easy. But this engineering project might one day lead to a printable, flat spacecraft that folds itself.
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The traditional Japanese art of folding paper is now adding grace and ease to the deployment of fragile solar panels, seismometers and other vital instruments in outer space.
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The parents of a young boy made a terrible discovery while looking through photographs they had taken of him as a baby. They noticed a white dot where a black pupil should have been. -
Cut a tumor from a child's brain and you may save a life. But surgery can hurt the child if healthy brain cells are removed. A Seattle doctor is working on a substance that might help. It binds tightly to cancer cells and makes them glow, so they're easier to distinguish from healthy tissue. -
This doesn't look like your trusty potato battery: a prototype device made by scientists at the University of Maryland uses wood fibers coated with carbon nanotubes to create an electric current. -
This enterprising technologist is designing for a future where computers are intuitive and anticipate our every need. We're not there yet, but she has started a company that aims to imagine, build and test tomorrow's gadgets today. -
What do you do when you're a scientist and you have no job and no money for your research? If you're Ethan Perlstein, you try crowd funding. He raised $25,000 to investigate where the drug methamphetamine is stored in the brain.
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Doctors treating Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have provided more details about her condition. Clinton was admitted to New York Presbyterian Hospital on Sunday. The doctors say a brain scan revealed a blood clot that was situated in the space between the brain and skull behind her right ear. According to her doctors, the condition is not life threatening.
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Experts are taking a close look at the country's levees after the failure of one caused massive flooding in New Jersey during Superstorm Sandy. Some argue that rebuilding levees may only set the stage for the next flooding disaster. -
What causes the bright streaks in the night sky when we see shooting stars? Science correspondent Joe Palca ventured down to Venice Beach to demonstrate how meteor showers work.
