\n<\/p>\n
August 19, 2025<\/p>\n
4 min read<\/p>\n
Contributors to Scientific American\u2019s September 2025 Issue<\/p>\n
Writers, artists, photographers and researchers share the stories behind the stories<\/p>\n
David Cheney
Brain Washing<\/p>\n
David Cheney is no mere artist\u2014he\u2019s a board-certified medical illustrator. In the Johns Hopkins University program where Cheney got his master\u2019s degree, the artists study right alongside the medical students. So when Scientific American asked Cheney to render cerebrospinal fluid entering and exiting the brain for a feature by journalist Lydia Denworth on how the organ cleans waste during sleep, he already had a strong understanding of the anatomy.<\/p>\n
Cheney filled stacks of sketchbooks as a kid but assumed he\u2019d end up premed in college. He experimented with different paths (for a time, he was a musical theater major) until he learned about a career in medical illustration. It was an instant and lasting fit. \u201cThe field might be niche,\u201d he says, \u201cbut it\u2019s so varied in terms of what you can do with the training.\u201d<\/p>\n
If you’re enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s worked for medical clinics, academic institutions, and even a tech startup where he\u2019s designing \u201can entire race of aliens\u201d for a cryptocurrency game. Cheney would like to do more sculpture, specifically reconstructing \u201csome extinct type of creature\u201d for a natural history museum. \u201cI wish more young artists who love science knew about this field where you can truly use both sides of your brain.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dava Sobel
Meter<\/p>\n
When writer Dava Sobel learned that the earliest issues of Scientific American included poetry, she wanted to bring that tradition back to the magazine. Her pitch was to publish existing poems about science; instead the editors tasked her with soliciting original work. Sobel first approached poets she knew\u2014Diane Ackerman was the inaugural contributor to the Meter column in January 2020\u2014and then \u201cthe flood began,\u201d she says. \u201cThe backlog of submissions is now yearslong.\u201d Sobel doesn\u2019t write poetry herself, but her long career as a science journalist and author has often involved \u201cunearthing people\u2019s letters, showing scientists as the real people they are.\u201d Her first big success, she says, was her 1995 book Longitude, \u201cwhich allowed me to write all the others.\u201d One of the best fun facts about Sobel is she served on the Planet Definition Committee that redefined the term in 2006\u2014an endeavor that ultimately led to Pluto losing its status as a planet. That move \u201cwas not our recommendation!\u201d<\/p>\n
As the Meter editor, Sobel looks for poems that \u201ccause an emotional leap in me.\u201d Other times she\u2019ll choose a poem because \u201cit attempts a tremendous challenge\u2014and works.\u201d Meter hopefuls take note: Sobel has a limit on limericks but likes to publish at least one humorous poem every year. \u201cI\u2019m the first to admit it\u2019s totally subjective, and contributors are totally at my mercy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Charles C. Mann
Research in Reverse<\/p>\n
When we asked author Charles C. Mann to write an essay about dramatic twists and turns in science, Mann, fortuitously, was already mulling the subject. \u201cI write to try to figure out what I think,\u201d he says. He teased apart genuine 180s\u2014 \u201cwhen assumptions baked into a discipline turn out not to be right after someone gives them a hard look\u201d\u2014from a fraught kind of pivot, \u201cwhen the normal back-and-forth of science gets pinned by people who make definitive proclamations based on exaggerated evidence.\u201d<\/p>\n
For someone who wrote a book (entitled 1491) that rethinks the environmental history of an entire continent, Mann isn\u2019t sure he\u2019s any better at coping with uncertainty than the rest of us. \u201cBut I would say I\u2019m comfortable admitting that chance plays a huge role in what happens to me.\u201d Sometimes, while working on a project, he gets \u201cdistracted by worrying about if I actually know what I\u2019m talking about.\u201d The research discursions that follow often lead to satisfying revelations. \u201cIt\u2019s good to be aware of one\u2019s own fallibility,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
Mann has seemingly lost track of how many books he\u2019s written (\u201cI don\u2019t know, nine?\u201d), but his next one, about the North American West, will be published in 2026.<\/p>\n
Andrew B. Myers
Peanut Proof<\/p>\n
Photographer Andrew B. Myers (above), who shot this month\u2019s cover story on peanut allergies by writer Maryn McKenna, likes the constraint of creating big worlds at small scale. What did Myers seek in the ideal peanut model? \u201cYou look for the very basic quality of a peanut, this eight shape with an hourglass curve,\u201d he says. \u201cBut the curve can\u2019t be so basic it looks fake. You want 90 percent perfect peanut and 10 percent little quirk. Just like human attractiveness.\u201d By giving his subject a halolike light, Myers sought to make a singular, tiny peanut \u201cfeel ridiculously heroic.\u201d Manipulating peanut butter for the shoot was less satisfying. \u201cIt\u2019s kind of a gross, difficult substance to work with.\u201d<\/p>\n
Myers takes a layered and \u201czany\u201d approach to making still-life images and describes himself as more of a sculptor and designer than a photographer. \u201cI care a lot about building the frame and mixing processes,\u201d he says. \u201cI make things in a controlled, quiet setting with a camera on a tripod. I can\u2019t remember the last time I held a camera in my hands.\u201d<\/p>\n
Myers, who has worked for a range of editorial and commercial clients, has an affinity for shooting scientific concepts in a clever, unexpected way. He\u2019s inspired by the imagery that comes out of the lab of his spouse, who is a computational neuroscientist. \u201cI like when scientists and artists get together,\u201d he says. \u201cScientists are much more humble than your average artist, but both look outward and have a rock of curiosity.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
August 19, 2025 4 min read Contributors to Scientific American\u2019s September 2025 Issue Writers, artists, photographers and researchers share the stories behind the stories By Jen Schwartz David CheneyBrain Washing David Cheney is no mere artist\u2014he\u2019s a board-certified medical illustrator. In the Johns Hopkins University program where Cheney got his master\u2019s degree, the artists study<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16919,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[540,10144,580,2477,3163],"class_list":{"0":"post-16918","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-americans","9":"tag-contributors","10":"tag-issue","11":"tag-scientific","12":"tag-september"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16918","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16918"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16918\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16919"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}