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Eva Amsen

@evaamsen.com
1.4K followers 693 following 1.7K posts

Science writer. 🇳🇱🇪🇺in🇬🇧 I write about science in magazines, in a newsletter, in books, on social media and on loose scraps of paper. Also a violinist. 🔬🧬👩‍💻🎨🎻 🐈 Fun newsletter: mixture.substack.com Portfolio: evaamsen.com/writing

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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 29/09/2026
2 of 4 deadlines met and it's only Tuesday morning. (But the other two are more work so this is all still according to plan and I don't actually have a lot of time left)
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 28/09/2026
I cannot even begin to imagine what it's like to have an "uncluttered mind". My mind is filled to the brim with clutter! www.nature.com/articles/d41...
nature.com
Stephen Hawking biography explores an ‘exceptionally clear, uncluttered mind’
An elegant account of the physicist’s unusual life story highlights the relationships that inspired him.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 28/09/2026
You have to arrange your own trip to Manchester, so this will be particularly interesting for writers there or in nearby cities. We heard that too many ABSW events are in London - this one is purposely NOT! (But if you are in London and want to come, you can join me on the early train there)
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 28/09/2026
I'm organising this institute visit for science writers in the UK. Come with @absw.bsky.social to the University of Manchester on November 13! www.absw.org.uk/events/insti...
absw.org.uk
Institute visit - University of Manchester
This trip aims to inspire you, show you what research is out there, and give you a chance to talk to researchers in person. No obligation to report.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 26/09/2026
Every time I accidentally type "podcats" instead of "podcast"...
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 25/09/2026
Was Darwin a nepo baby?, I wondered while wandering through his large house and in his expansive gardens earlier this week. Maybe kinda, I decided here: mixture.substack.com/p/was-darwin...
mixture.substack.com
Was Darwin a nepo baby?
Plus: interesting science links from across the web
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 25/09/2026
This, but it's the last 5 strawberries shrivelling up in the fridge.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 25/09/2026
My most successful TikTok content were videos of the foxes that lived in our garden last year, so just posting animals (sharks or otherwise) will probably do well!
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 23/09/2026
How are you supposed to answer if your climate research is about climate research?
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 21/09/2026
I’m so glad you had fun in London and it sounds like you found the perfect itinerary!
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 20/09/2026
I don't have a dryer so my alternative is for the clothes rack to just sit in the living room or office next to a dehumidifier.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 20/09/2026
Although some of my neighbours *always* dry their laundry outside, even when outside is not even dry. Their clothes will just be out there in the rain, resetting the whole procedure.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 20/09/2026
Taking advantage of climate change by drying laundry outside in late September.
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Reposted by Eva Amsen
Jennifer Ouellette @jenlucpiquant.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Why AI is speeding up scientific research but not lab experiments www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-...
scientificamerican.com
Why AI is speeding up scientific research but not lab experiments
A new report from Google, Google DeepMind and M.I.T. finds that researchers are using AI—a lot. It’s just not helping as much in the lab
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 18/09/2026
Could you control things? I can only avoid things by walking away (or waking up completely) but not do much else beyond realising that I'm having a dream and sometimes making a mental note to do something when I wake up.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 18/09/2026
This is cool! I get lucid dreams but my control is limited. I can wake myself up if I don’t like the dream, though, which is helpful.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 18/09/2026
Anyway, this whole reimagined data-centric publishing world is in the future (as it has been for a while...), but if you think along those lines, it's only a short step from there to "oh, and we could use AI to help with some of that analysis and synthesis".
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 18/09/2026
You'd still have text-based papers for reviews, meta-analyses, discussions and such, but in a model like that it would become much easier to sort through published data and to re-analyse data.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 18/09/2026
A lot of the ideas are something to the extent of: what if instead of rewarding scientists for publishing their data in papers, we rewarded them for depositing the actual data (annotated). Credit would change, and papers would change.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 18/09/2026
So at various meetings, like last year's symposium on the Future of publishing at the Royal Society (for which I wrote the meeting summary note, available at the link), researchers/publishers have been thinking about ways to change this entire system. royalsociety.org/science-even...
royalsociety.org
Future of Scientific Publishing | Royal Society
A conference on the future of scientific publishing
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 18/09/2026
Right now, research papers are still based on the archaic system of paper journals. They are PDFs, with paragraphs of text (that researchers have often had to write in their second or third language). But the actual relevance is in the *data* and the text is just there to explain.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 18/09/2026
If you can get past the initial gut "ick" reaction when you see the mention of AI, this idea is actually in line with what many publishers and research management experts are looking at as future of publishing. Forget the AI part of it for a minute... www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
Reimagining research papers as interactive and reliable AI agents - Nature
Paper2Agent converts research papers into interactive artificial intelligence agents by turning manuscripts, code and data into model context protocol-based tool-invoking systems that reproduce origin...
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 18/09/2026
This includes the UK! (Thanks to Horizon association, I think)
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 18/09/2026
Someone in Westminster does their job for once and it immediately makes the news.... uk.news.yahoo.com/larry-cat-ca...
uk.news.yahoo.com
Larry the Cat catches a mouse
Chief Mouser is seen catching a rodent before casually returning to 10 Downing Street. .
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 17/09/2026
Except here the science was real but it was a pseudojournalist!
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 17/09/2026
It sounds like there was at least a round of editing on this piece and some back and forth emails, and they had sent several other pitches as well and collected somewhat relevant clips. Even without the actual writing it seems like a lot of work!
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 17/09/2026
Other questions we're musing about are more about the weirdness and unfairness of it all: -How did a not-that-great pitch by a fraud get into a magazine that regularly rejects real writers? -Why go through all that effort for just a little bit of money (and no actual recognition) in return?
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 17/09/2026
Right now my science writer forums and groups are all buzzing over this story, and we have many questions. Some are big questions, like: -Is this happening to other writers? -How can new writers prove to editors that they're real? -How do we protect our identities?
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 17/09/2026
An impostor managed to get a news article published in Science under someone else's byline, by pretending to be her in the pitch to the editor. They pitched other publications as well, but editors who were familiar with the REAL Caroline noticed something was off. www.linkedin.com/feed/update/...
linkedin.com
Fake Caroline update: The person who was impersonating me managed to get an article published in Science, under my by-line. And they got paid for it! I've seen the pitches (bad), and the email…...
Fake Caroline update: The person who was impersonating me managed to get an article published in Science, under my by-line. And they got paid for it! I've seen the pitches (bad), and the email chai...
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 17/09/2026
I just counted and I have about 20 projects on the go of which only about 10 are work. (But the others have deadlines and responsibilities as well. Most of them committee work.)
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 17/09/2026
Coworking sessions usually on Thursdays 2-4PM UK time, and YES that is in 2 minutes.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 17/09/2026
I'm starting my weekly Discord coworking sessions again! Open to science writers and #scicomm people who need some focused time to work on their own projects, but be motivated by other people doing the same. We're mostly on mute! discord.gg/pZu3YFH6j
discord.gg
Join the SciComm Coworking Discord Server!
This is a place for science communicators, science writers and scientists to work on scicomm projects and share tips. | 553 members
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 15/09/2026
This week I’m finally setting aside some time to look at the story analyses in this book. It’s been on or near my desk for months now! www.theopennotebook.com/the-best-sci... #scicomm
Hand holding a copy of “The Best Science Stories and How They Work” in front of a bookcase
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 14/09/2026
He would be unstoppable on Twitch!
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 14/09/2026
I also don't understand this. Why don't AI CEOs *do* something to *start* the regulation process? When biologists in the 1970s realised that genetic engineering could be dangerous, they collectively stopped their work and started working on guidelines that have since become regulations. Do that!
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 14/09/2026
I bet the scam is "to secure your spot, transfer us a bunch of money"
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Reposted by Eva Amsen
The Guardian @theguardian.com · 13/09/2026
Warning: our democracy won’t survive the death of reading. Read on if you still can | John Harris
theguardian.com
Warning: our democracy won’t survive the death of reading. Read on if you still can | John Harris
While fascists protest in UK ports and purvey nonsense and poison online, ever fewer people have the perspective or analytical tools to challenge them, says Guardian columnist John Harris
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Reposted by Eva Amsen
David Bradley @sciencebase.com · 08/09/2026
If you're after a science writer, the Association of British Science Writers (ABSW) has a Bluesky starter pack just for you go.bsky.app/F6bdkUY
go.bsky.app
Association of British Science Writers members
Join the conversation
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Reposted by Eva Amsen
Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 09/09/2026
I have an article in the current issue of Earth Island Journal, about the impact that climate change has on schools. Some are prone to flooding, others to heat or wildfires, and it's only getting worse. Find out what's being done and studied about it: www.earthisland.org/journal/inde... #scicomm
earthisland.org
Class Interrupted
From Kenya to California, increasingly severe weather is keeping kids out of school.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 09/09/2026
I have an article in the current issue of Earth Island Journal, about the impact that climate change has on schools. Some are prone to flooding, others to heat or wildfires, and it's only getting worse. Find out what's being done and studied about it: www.earthisland.org/journal/inde... #scicomm
earthisland.org
Class Interrupted
From Kenya to California, increasingly severe weather is keeping kids out of school.
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Reposted by Eva Amsen
Earth Island Journal @earthislandjournal.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
UNICEF estimates that climate events disrupted the schooling of 242 million students across 85 countries in 2024. How educators, administrators, and policymakers address this urgent threat will determine whether today’s youth receive the education — and preparation — that they deserve.
earthisland.org
Class Interrupted
From Kenya to California, increasingly severe weather is keeping kids out of school.
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Reposted by Eva Amsen
Mark @njdoc.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
www.wsj.com/tech/ai/anth...
wsj.com
Exclusive | Anthropic Researcher Quits Over ‘Out-of-Control’ AI Fears
Concerns are rising inside AI labs that competition is pushing tech companies to race toward self-improving models that risk spiraling out of human control.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 07/09/2026
@bethanyblack.bsky.social I hope you’ve seen this! The first line is one of your posts :) vm.tiktok.com/ZN82Nd9R8/
vm.tiktok.com
TikTok - Make Your Day
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 07/09/2026
Whatever happened to flying cars? Well, apparently a Dutch company plans to have them in the air by 2028. That's...soon! nltimes.nl/2026/09/07/d...
nltimes.nl
Dutch PAL-V gets green light to start producing flying car; Could hit the sky in 2028
Dutch company PAL-V is a significant step closer to selling its flying car, the PAL-V Liberty. The European aviation authority EASA has given the company the green light to start production. If all go...
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 07/09/2026
Also a science-themed photo. This plaque outside insulin co-discoverer Charles Best's former apartment was not yet there when I passed this corner at least daily between 2003 and 2009! And that Tim Horton's was not yet there when Best lived in the apartment above it...
Blue plaque that reads "The co-discoverer of insulin Charles Best (1899-1978) lived here in a third-floor apartment from 1924 to 1925."Photo showing the location of the blue plaque, just ouside a nondescript Tim Horton's.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 07/09/2026
I am back from my holiday! Enjoy four random photos of my first trip back to Canada since 2015. It had been waaaaay too long. (For context: I lived in Canada from 2002 to 2010 and in the winter of 2000/2001 so it's a second home. Third home? I don't know how to rank my countries.)
Maman sculpture in Ottawa. It's a huge metal spider, and people are walking underneath.Pedestrianised street in Montreal. People walking in the middle of the street past patios. Canoeing in the rain in Algonquin Park. A mural of Toronto's (no longer running) Spadina Bus. I only know this bus from the Shuffle Demons' song Spadina Bus. It was already no longer running when I moved to Toronto in 2002.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 05/09/2026
I got relatively lucky with my draw: a woman in 18th century China who lived to age 61! (And then died of dysentery...)
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The Japan Times @japantimes.co.jp · 04/09/2026
How best to blow one's nose? The late professor Tokuji Unno detailed some techniques in a 1977 paper, for which he was awarded the Ig Nobel Medicine Prize on Thursday.
ebx.sh
Late Japanese researcher wins Ig Nobel Prize for study on blowing one’s nose
Unno was awarded the prize for his 1977 paper, “How to Blow the Nose – An Aerodynamic Study of the Nose Blowing.”
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 31/08/2026
I’m briefly back in Toronto and the hotel room comes with a record player! If I know you and you’re in TO, message me for hangout details for Tuesday. Or email eva.amsen [at] gmail [dot] com
White brick wall with a wooden shelf on which is a record player and a stack of records. A Ramones record is on top.
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Eva Amsen @evaamsen.com · 30/08/2026
Hello from the middle of my holiday.
Fire pit and beerTea, book and chocolate on an outdoor table
Outside furniture on a wooden deck in a forest
Forest lake
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