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Nell Greenfieldboyce

Credit Doby Photography / NPR

Nell Greenfieldboyce is a NPR science correspondent.

With reporting focused on general science, NASA, and the intersection between technology and society, Greenfieldboyce has been on the science desk's technology beat since she joined NPR in 2005.

In that time Greenfieldboyce has reported on topics including the narwhals in Greenland, the ending of the space shuttle program, and the reasons why independent truckers don't want electronic tracking in their cabs.

Much of Greenfieldboyce's reporting reflects an interest in discovering how applied science and technology connects with people and culture. She has worked on stories spanning issues such as pet cloning, gene therapy, ballistics, and federal regulation of new technology.

Prior to NPR, Greenfieldboyce spent a decade working in print, mostly magazines including U.S. News & World Report and New Scientist.

A graduate of Johns Hopkins, earning her Bachelor's of Arts degree in social sciences and a Master's of Arts degree in science writing, Greenfieldboyce taught science writing for four years at the university. She was honored for her talents with the Evert Clark/Seth Payne Award for Young Science Journalists.

NIH To Revisit Debate On Controversial Bird Flu Research

Credit Prakash Mathema / AFP/Getty Images

A prefectural officer carries a chicken on a poultry farm on Oct. 15 on the outskirts of Kathmandu, Nepal, where chickens suspected of being infected with bird flu were found.

By Nell Greenfieldboyce

Originally published on Tue December 18, 2012 7:14 am

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On Tuesday, the National Institutes of Health in Maryland is holding a second day of talks about whether and how to continue funding some controversial scientific experiments.

Back in January, virologists agreed to temporarily stop research that was creating new forms of bird flu because critics argued that the work was too dangerous. NIH officials are now seeking input from scientists and the public about how to proceed.

4:26 pm

Fri December 14, 2012

50 Years After First Interplanetary Probe, NASA Looks To Future

Next image Previous image

Credit NASA/JPL/Caltech

The Mariner 2 probe at an assembly facility in Cape Canaveral, Fla., on Aug. 29, 1962.

Credit NASA/JPL/Caltech

Radio signals from the Mariner spacecraft were received on three 85-foot antennas like this one, which were built in California's Mojave desert, near Johannesburg in South Africa, and near Woomera in southern Australia.

Credit NASA/JPL/Caltech

In the California receiver control room, personnel await confirmation that Mariner has begun to scan the planet Venus.

Credit NASA/JPL/Caltech

Data from the receivers were teletyped in a coded format to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California.

Credit NASA/JPL/Caltech

There, the data was routed to the digital computer at JPL.

Credit NASA/JPL/Caltech

Printouts of the data were made available to the experimenters.

Credit NASA/JPL/Caltech

At the operations center at JPL, the spacecraft's status was posted on the wall.

Credit NASA/JPL/Caltech

A model of JPL's Mariner 2 spacecraft above a floral "Venus" moved down Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena, Calif., in the 1963 Tournament of Roses Parade on Jan. 1.

Credit NASA/JPL

Scientists show off reams of data collected by Mariner 2 as it passed by Venus. The probe flew by the planet on Dec. 14, 1962, and scanned the surface for 42 minutes.

Credit NASA/JPL/Caltech

A technician wears a hood and protective goggles while working with a full-scale model of the Mariner spacecraft in a space simulator chamber at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., in 1962.

By Nell Greenfieldboyce

Originally published on Mon December 17, 2012 9:27 am

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Fifty years ago, on Dec. 14, 1962, reporters gathered for a press briefing at NASA headquarters and heard an unearthly sound: radio signals being beamed back by a spacecraft flying within 22,000 miles of Venus.

The Mariner 2 mission to Venus was the first time any spacecraft had ever gone to another planet.

These days, vivid photographs showing scenes from all around the solar system are so ubiquitous that people might easily forget how mysterious our planetary neighbors used to be.

4:04 am

Fri November 30, 2012

Victory Or Defeat? Emotions Aren't All In The Face

Credit Hillel Aviezer / The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Can You Tell Emotion From Faces Alone? A new study suggests that when people evaluated just facial expressions — without cues from the rest of the body — they couldn't tell if the face was showing a positive or negative emotion. Enlarge this photo to see the answers.

By Nell Greenfieldboyce

Originally published on Fri November 30, 2012 7:20 pm

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Photos of athletes in their moment of victory or defeat usually show faces contorted with intense emotion. But a new study suggests that people actually don't use those kinds of extreme facial expressions to judge how a person is feeling.

Instead, surprisingly, people rely on body cues.

Hillel Aviezer, a psychology researcher at Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Israel, wanted to see how accurately people can read intense, real-world facial expressions — instead of the standardized, posed images of facial expressions that are usually used in lab tests.

3:04 pm

Fri November 23, 2012

Experiments That Keep Going And Going And Going

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Credit Michigan State University

William Beal, standing at center, started a long-term study on seed germination in 1879. He buried 20 bottles with seeds in them for later researchers to unearth and plant.

Credit G.L. Kohuth / Michigan State University

Richard Lenski examines the growth of bacteria on a plate on Jan. 12. He began an evolution experiment in 1988 with 12 identical flasks of bacteria to see if the populations would change over time in the same way.

Credit Kurt Stepnitz / Michigan State University

Bottles like this 90-year-old one were filled with seeds and sand, then buried by William Beal. Researchers periodically unearth a bottle and plant the seeds to see if they grow.

By Nell Greenfieldboyce

Originally published on Fri November 23, 2012 9:00 pm

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A biologist who has been watching a dozen bottles of bacteria evolve for nearly a quarter of a century is hoping he can find someone to keep his lab experiment going long after he dies.

Meanwhile, just by coincidence, a botanist who works across campus is carefully tending an experiment that started before he was born, all the way back in 1879.

These two researchers, both at Michigan State University in East Lansing, represent different sides of an unusual phenomenon in science: experiments that outlive the people who started them.

4:58 am

Thu November 22, 2012

Ingredients For A Homestyle Thanksgiving, 200 Miles Above The Earth

Credit courtesy NASA

Space food.

By Nell Greenfieldboyce

Originally published on Thu November 22, 2012 5:20 pm

For Thanksgiving, NASA's space food experts always try to make sure astronauts get to enjoy traditional holiday fare, even if its not exactly home cooking. And being so far from home, astronauts can get pretty attached to their comfort foods.

This year, Kevin Ford, the commander of Expedition 34 and currently working at the International Space Station, says he has the ingredients to make one favorite Thanksgiving dish the NASA nutritionists may not have anticipated: Candied yams with marshmallows.

The yams are thermostablized and come in a plastic pouch.

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2:18 am

Tue December 18, 2012