\n<\/p>\n
October 14, 2025<\/p>\n
4 min read<\/p>\n
Contributors to Scientific American\u2019s November 2025 Issue<\/p>\n
Writers, artists, photographers and researchers share the stories behind the stories<\/p>\n
Lori Youmshajekian
Supplements That Fight Inflammation<\/p>\n
\u201cSo many of my story ideas come from a friend asking me, \u2018Did you see this thing on TikTok?\u2019\u201d says Lori Youmshajekian (above), who wrote this month\u2019s feature about dietary supplements and inflammation. \u201cI love investigating and debunking things that are trending on social media.\u201d As a former Scientific American intern, Youmshajekian has an affinity for reporting stories on consumer health that pique her personal curiosity: \u201cI think you ask better questions when you\u2019re in the shoes of your reader because you want the same questions answered. You want to get to the bottom of things.\u201d<\/p>\n
Youmshajekian grew up in Australia and majored in finance but \u201cfelt my mind going numb looking at spreadsheets all day.\u201d She got a university communications job and found that she loved interviewing academics about their research. Her first journalism gig was a two-year project about sexual assault that ended up changing a law in Australia. After that, she was hooked.<\/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
Youmshajekian headed to graduate school in New York City, and after a series of jobs and internships, she now works as a freelance science journalist based in Armenia, \u201cwhich is my ethnic background,\u201d she says. She leads workshops on science writing for other journalists and is considering teaching as well. \u201cI report quite a bit on local health issues,\u201d she says. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t have the impact of writing for an American publication, but it does have an impact.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bianca Brandner
Graphic Science<\/p>\n
For Bianca Brandner, becoming a graphic designer felt inevitable, \u201clike there was no other option,\u201d she says. Whether she\u2019s working for editorial or commercial clients, Brandner likes the challenge of diving into a completely new field and \u201cextracting its essence. I see it as a process of translation from a theoretical side to the visual, more perceptive side.\u201d<\/p>\n
For this month\u2019s Graphic Science column, written by associate editor Allison Parshall, Brandner redesigned a classic graphic from our archive: a 1973 chart about the efficiency of various forms of locomotion. To highlight clustered data points, she used texture and color to bring in warmth and tactility. \u201cInfographics should be simple and straightforward, but they don\u2019t have to be clinical,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
Brandner is part of DTAN Studio in Berlin (its name stands for \u201cDon\u2019t Try Anything New\u201d). To make digital animations, she and her colleagues start with physical materials. \u201cWe do paper cutting and do each frame by hand,\u201d she says. \u201cThe imperfections are what add character\u2014they create personality in the design.\u201d Brandner is also interested in typography and has spent the past few years creating her own font. \u201cIt\u2019s structured but also freeing because there\u2019s no client behind it, so I can follow my vision 100 percent,\u201d she says. \u201cOf course, the downside is that no one is pushing me to get it done. I\u2019ve revisited the same letter three or four times.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dan Vergano
Meteorite Heist<\/p>\n
In 2012 Dan Vergano, then a senior science reporter at USA TODAY, saw an article about a Nazi-acquired Buddhist god sculpted out of meteoritic iron. The story was getting lots of play. The finding had come from Meteoritics & Planetary Science, and Vergano felt his competitive instincts flare. \u201cI kicked myself because I should have been reading that journal,\u201d he says. \u201cI thought, I ain\u2019t gonna miss the next good article that comes out of there.\u201d Last summer Vergano spotted a potential \u201cIndiana Jones story\u201d in Meteoritics & Planetary Science, which led him to write this month\u2019s feature about how one of the largest meteorites ever found went missing from Somalia.<\/p>\n
Now a senior editor at Scientific American, Vergano studied aeronautical engineering and worked in communications for the U.S. Department of Defense before becoming a journalist. \u201cI realized it would be more fun to write Freedom of Information Act requests rather than suppressing them,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
Vergano had previously reported about artifacts looted during the Iraq War, and while working on this story, he was \u201cshocked that the field of meteoritics hasn\u2019t grappled with the provenance of meteorites the way the fields of antiquities and paleontology have.\u201d<\/p>\n
Deena So\u2018Oteh
Life\u2019s Big Bangs<\/p>\n
When Deena So\u2018Oteh first read a draft of Asher Elbein\u2019s article on the origins of complex multicellular life, the cover story she would be creating illustrations for, \u201cI wanted to know, on a molecular level, how these microorganisms had been visualized previously,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
So\u2018Oteh started from a literal place, imagining what a scientist digging through rocks would be seeing, and then researched the \u201cintricate, symmetrical drawings\u201d of Austrian artist Alfred Hagel, an early 20th-century modernist and impressionist. When she first sits down to sketch, \u201cI allow my hands to develop ideas without necessarily identifying them as such early on.\u201d For the magazine cover, she wanted to show the \u201cduality of something being both seen and unseen\u201d and how those concepts are interpreted in light of each other.<\/p>\n
So\u2018Oteh has a background in fine arts but gravitated toward work that \u201ccommunicates,\u201d she says. The bulk of her work involves illustrating book covers and editorial concepts, which allows for \u201ca process of constant learning and visualizing abstract concepts.\u201d She loves the reading and the research, but when it comes to making an image, her response is visceral: \u201cI ask myself, What do I want readers to feel?\u201d<\/p>\n
If you enjoyed this article, I\u2019d like to ask for your support. Scientific American<\/span> has served as an advocate for science and industry for 180 years, and right now may be the most critical moment in that two-century history.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve been a Scientific American<\/span> subscriber since I was 12 years old, and it helped shape the way I look at the world. SciAm <\/span>always educates and delights me, and inspires a sense of awe for our vast, beautiful universe. I hope it does that for you, too.<\/p>\n If you subscribe to Scientific American<\/span>, you help ensure that our coverage is centered on meaningful research and discovery; that we have the resources to report on the decisions that threaten labs across the U.S.; and that we support both budding and working scientists at a time when the value of science itself too often goes unrecognized.<\/p>\n In return, you get essential news, captivating podcasts, brilliant infographics, can’t-miss newsletters, must-watch videos, challenging games, and the science world’s best writing and reporting. You can even gift someone a subscription.<\/p>\n There has never been a more important time for us to stand up and show why science matters. I hope you\u2019ll support us in that mission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" October 14, 2025 4 min read Contributors to Scientific American\u2019s November 2025 Issue Writers, artists, photographers and researchers share the stories behind the stories By Jen Schwartz Lori YoumshajekianSupplements That Fight Inflammation \u201cSo many of my story ideas come from a friend asking me, \u2018Did you see this thing on TikTok?\u2019\u201d says Lori Youmshajekian (above),<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28334,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[540,10144,580,14591,2477],"class_list":{"0":"post-28333","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-americans","9":"tag-contributors","10":"tag-issue","11":"tag-november","12":"tag-scientific"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28333","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=28333"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28333\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/28334"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28333"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28333"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28333"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}