Joe Palca
Joe Palca is a science correspondent for NPR. Since joining NPR in 1992, Palca has covered a range of science topics 鈥� 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 鈥� 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 (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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Getting a shot is a pain. But scientists are working on a way to inject a vaccine without the ouch. The solution: a patch that applies an array of microscopic needles and feels like Velcro.
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The FDA has said that the COVID-19 vaccine made by Pfizer can be used in children as young as 12, expanding the number of people in the U.S. who qualify for the vaccine.
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A large Chinese rocket will drop out of orbit on Saturday, but it will be what is uncontrolled re-entry. Or to put it another way, no one can say for certain exactly where it will land.
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Using two different COVID-19 vaccines is a bit like giving the immune system two pictures of the virus, maybe one face-on and one in profile. -
Researchers are exploring a mix-and-match strategy for vaccinating people against COVID-19. That means using two different kinds of vaccines instead of the same brand of vaccine twice.
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Researchers are trying to come up with tests that can be performed using a blood sample that will determine not only whether a COVID-19 vaccine will work but also for how long. -
Scientists are working on boosters to deal with the possibility that current COVID-19 vaccines may eventually wear off 鈥� or the virus will mutate in ways that will evade the vaccine's protections.
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Fresh off the first powered flight on another world, NASA's Mars 2020 mission has managed another key first that could pave the way for future astronauts. -
NASA announced that a small helicopter sent to Mars aboard the Perseverance rover took flight 鈥� the first controlled, powered flight on another planet. The helicopter took aerial photos of Mars.
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The tiny helicopter took off and hovered briefly 鈥� the first such flight on another planet. The Perseverance rover kept tabs on the mission from a viewing point about 60 yards away.
