# Not a Straight Line: Stories about becoming a science journalist

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-story-collider-511167/not-a-straight-line-stories-about-becoming-a-science-journalist
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-story-collider-511167/not-a-straight-line-stories-about-becoming-a-science-journalist.md
Podcast: [The Story Collider](https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-story-collider-511167)
Published: 2026-07-24T04:00:00+00:00
Episode link: https://mgln.ai/e/211/rss.art19.com/episodes/575191ea-e0cb-4c5e-916b-fc93b211fe14.mp3?rss_browser=BAhJIg90cmFuc2NyaWJyBjoGRVQ%3D--952c5701c84ad333c69d5faa668f8177091704f0
Audio file: https://mgln.ai/e/211/rss.art19.com/episodes/575191ea-e0cb-4c5e-916b-fc93b211fe14.mp3?rss_browser=BAhJIg90cmFuc2NyaWJyBjoGRVQ%3D--952c5701c84ad333c69d5faa668f8177091704f0
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JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-story-collider-511167/episodes/not-a-straight-line-stories-about-becoming-a-science-journalist
Duration seconds: 1699

## Resource

In this week’s episode, both of our storytellers share the unconventional paths that led them into science journalism. Part 1: Keren Landman always wanted to be a writer, but her family didn’t see it as a practical career — so instead, she went to medical school. Part 2: When Adithi Ramakrishnan gets to college, she only sees two career paths ahead of her: medical school or scientific research. Keren Landman, M.D., is an independent health reporter and author of the newsletter Landmansplained. Her freelance writing has appeared in a range of publications, including The Guardian, The Atlantic, National Geographic, NPR, and the New York Times, and she has also worked as a staff reporter at Vox. She is trained as an infectious disease physician and epidemiologist, with experience serving as a disease detective at the CDC and conducting HIV and malaria research in resource-poor countries. Adithi Ramakrishnan is a science reporter with The Associated Press and covers space, dinosaurs and the occasional tadpole. She told this story while she was a science reporting fellow with The Dallas Morning News where she wrote about solar eclipses, sweltering Texas summers and the science of spicy food. Adithi has a degree in neuroscience from The College of William and Mary and was a 2021 AAAS Mass Media Fellow at North Carolina Public Radio-WUNC. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

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## Transcript

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