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

    No Hiding Most Trans Fats

    The current federal food-labeling law requires that manufacturers identify the major nutrients in processed foods, including total fat. Moreover, the law mandates that the “Nutrition Facts” section of each label separately list nutrients that can pose significant health risks, such as saturated fats. Last week, the Food and Drug Administration announced that beginning in 2006, […]

  2. Health & Medicine

    Cholesterol Medicine for Eggs?

    Five years ago, a small natural-products company made waves when it marketed Cholestin, a cholesterol-lowering herbal product. The capsules contained a material made from rice fermented by a certain type of yeast. Though new to U.S. consumers, this dried version of so-called red-yeast rice has for centuries been a Chinese food coloring and herbal remedy […]

  3. Humans

    Udder Beauty

    Sophisticated screening of livestock championship winners may become as common as urine tests of Olympic athletes.

  4. Humans

    Tobacco treaty penned

    Just one day after the World Health Organization drafted a tobacco-control treaty, more than 28 nations signed on.

  5. Physics

    Monitoring radiation with Britney Spears?

    Compact disks can serve as home radon detectors.

  6. Earth

    Second cancer type linked to shift work

    Women who have worked at least a few nights a month for many years appear to face a somewhat increased risk of colorectal cancer.

  7. Health & Medicine

    Soy Greens—The Coming Health Food?

    Soybeans have gained renown for offering a host of health benefits. Not only do diets rich in products made from this legume appear to protect against heart disease and some cancers, but they also help to preserve bones in aging bodies. Yum? Diets augmented with leaves of the soybean plant might help diners control their […]

  8. Earth

    Girls may face risks from phthalates

    The high incidence of premature breast development in Puerto Rican girls has been linked with phthalates, a family of ubiquitous pollutants found in plastics, lubricants, and solvents.

  9. Earth

    Germs Begone: New technology cleans dangerous water

    For a penny per liter, people in the developing world should be able to remove most pathogens and toxic pollutants from their home drinking water.

  10. Earth

    Lead delays puberty

    Even low concentrations of lead in a girl's body may delay her reproductive maturation.

  11. Earth

    Treaty is Imminent for Genetically Engineered Foods

    The Republic of Palau–a 9-year-old confederation of some 300 Pacific islands–has fewer than 20,000 inhabitants and a land area only about 2.5 times the size of Washington, D.C. Yet this tiny nation southeast of the Philippines made big history last week when its government became the 50th to ratify the United Nations’ Cartagena Protocol, a […]

  12. Earth

    New Concerns about Phthalates

    Boys may face an eventual reproductive risk from exposure to some of the ingredients that go into many common plastics, cosmetics, and medical supplies.