Tina Hesman Saey

Tina Hesman Saey

Senior Writer, Molecular Biology

Senior writer Tina Hesman Saey is a geneticist-turned-science writer who covers all things microscopic and a few too big to be viewed under a microscope. She is an honors graduate of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln where she did research on tobacco plants and ethanol-producing bacteria. She spent a year as a Fulbright scholar at the Georg-August University in Göttingen, Germany, studying microbiology and traveling.  Her work on how yeast turn on and off one gene earned her a Ph.D. in molecular genetics at Washington University in St. Louis. Tina then rounded out her degree collection with a master’s in science journalism from Boston University. She interned at the Dallas Morning News and Science News before returning to St. Louis to cover biotechnology, genetics and medical science for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. After a seven year stint as a newspaper reporter, she returned to Science News. Her work has been honored by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, the Endocrine Society, the Genetics Society of America and by journalism organizations.

All Stories by Tina Hesman Saey

  1. Life

    News in brief: Fins to limbs with flip of genetic switch

    Boost of gene activity may help explain how arms and legs evolved in vertebrates.

  2. Life

    Genes & Cells

    Healing broken hearts, tracing Romani migration using genes, and how insulin irregularities may be linked to obesity.

  3. Life

    Gut bacteria may affect cardiovascular risk

    An abundance of antioxidant-producing microbes seems to keep plaques from breaking free and causing heart attacks and stroke.

  4. Humans

    Genetic diversity exploded in recent millennia

    Among hundreds of thousands of DNA variants identified in a study, a large majority arose in the past 5,000 years.

  5. Life

    Chromosome ends hold clues to a bird’s longevity

    Short telomeres are tied to higher mortality in Indian Ocean warblers.

  6. Life

    Ebola may go airborne

    Infected pigs can transmit virus to primates without contact, a new study finds.

  7. Anthropology

    Highlights from the American Society of Human Genetics annual meeting

    Iceman’s origins, DNA fingerprinting, microRNAs and cancer risk, and growth genes and obesity risk.

  8. Life

    Telomere length linked to risk of dying

    Large study examines association between protective caps at end of chromosomes and health.

  9. Life

    Rare genetic tweaks may not be behind common diseases

    Variants thought to be behind inherited conditions prove difficult to pin down.

  10. Buzzword bingo

    Game brings entertainment to genetics meeting.

  11. Life

    A little radiation is good for mice

    Low doses of radioactivity led to healthier pups.

  12. Life

    Cancer cells self-destruct in blind mole rats

    Underground rodents evolved a way to zap mutating tissue.