Janet Raloff

Janet Raloff

Editor, Digital, Science News Explores

Editor Janet Raloff has been a part of the Science News Media Group since 1977. While a staff writer at Science News, she covered the environment, toxicology, energy, science policy, agriculture and nutrition. She was among the first to give national visibility to such issues as electromagnetic pulse weaponry and hormone-mimicking pollutants, and was the first anywhere to report on the widespread tainting of streams and groundwater sources with pharmaceuticals. A founding board member of the Society of Environmental Journalists, her writing has won awards from groups including the National Association of Science Writers. In July 2007, while still writing for Science News, Janet took over Science News Explores (then known as Science News for Kids) as a part-time responsibility. Over the next six years, she expanded the magazine's depth, breadth and publication cycle. Since 2013, she also oversaw an expansion of its staffing from three part-timers to a full-time staff of four and a freelance staff of some 35 other writers and editors. Before joining Science News, Janet was managing editor of Energy Research Reports (outside Boston), a staff writer at Chemistry (an American Chemical Society magazine) and a writer/editor for Chicago's Adler Planetarium. Initially an astronomy major, she earned undergraduate and graduate degrees from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University (with an elective major in physics).

All Stories by Janet Raloff

  1. Health & Medicine

    Got Diabetes? Try Ditching Caffeine

    New studies indicate that caffeine impairs the body's ability to use insulin and regulate blood sugar—potentially serious problems for people with diabetes.

  2. Humans

    Where Ph.D.s pay off

    Salaries for full-time scientists and engineers in the United States have generally outpaced inflation, but academic researchers tend to earn substantially less than their counterparts in industry and government.

  3. Humans

    Title IX: Women are catching up, but . . .

    Though a federal law prohibiting sex discrimination in academic settings has fostered women's participation in science, they still lag behind men in salaries and research opportunities.

  4. Health & Medicine

    Better Labeling of Major Food Allergens

    A bill awaiting the President's signature would require that all U.S. food products identify in plain English the presence of major food allergens—and foster federal research on the incidence and impacts of food allergies.

  5. Earth

    PCBs can taint building caulk

    Long-banned, toxic polychlorinated biphenyls in some building caulk applied in the 1960s and 1970s may still pose an exposure risk.

  6. Health & Medicine

    Seeing Red and Finding Fraudulent Fish

    The sale of falsely labeled fish has implications for health, nutrition, and the environment.

  7. Earth

    Skin proves poor portal for arsenic in treated wood

    Direct contact with old-style pressure-treated lumber should pose little risk that arsenic will penetrate the skin.

  8. Humans

    The high cost of staying current

    Reading peer-reviewed journals remains a primary means by which researchers stay on top of developments in their fields, but the annual costs for these periodicals are steep.

  9. Earth

    Treaty enacted to preserve crop biodiversity

    The United Nations enacted a new international treaty to halt the erosion of genetic diversity of crops.

  10. Health & Medicine

    Counting Carbs

    Although low-carbohydrate diets can be powerful weight-loss tools, many physicians now conclude they aren't for anyone who isn't under a doctor's watchful eye.

  11. Health & Medicine

    Don’t Expect Too Much of Soy

    Two new studies find soy isn't an effective hormone-replacement alternative for postmenopausal women.

  12. Health & Medicine

    Caloric threats from sugarfree drinks?

    Regularly downing sweet drinks or sugar substitutes may foster overeating by reprogramming an individual's ability to judge a snack's caloric impact.