Michaeleen Doucleff
Michaeleen Doucleff, PhD, is a correspondent for NPR's Science Desk. For nearly a decade, she has been reporting for the radio and the web for NPR's global health outlet, Goats and Soda. Doucleff focuses on disease outbreaks, cross-cultural parenting, and women and children's health.
In 2014, Doucleff was part of the team that earned a George Foster Peabody award for its coverage of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. For the series, Doucleff reported on how the epidemic ravaged maternal health and how the virus spreads through the air. In 2019, Doucleff and Senior Producer Jane Greenhalgh produced a story about how Inuit parents teach children to control their anger. That story was the most popular one on NPR.org for the year; altogether readers have spent more than 16 years worth of time reading it.
In 2021, Doucleff published a book, called Hunt, Gather, Parent, stemming from her reporting at NPR. That book became a New York Times bestseller.
Before coming to NPR in 2012, Doucleff was an editor at the journal Cell, where she wrote about the science behind pop culture. Doucleff has a bachelor degree in biology from Caltech, a doctorate in physical chemistry from the University of Berkeley, California, and a master's degree in viticulture and enology from the University of California, Davis.
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The term is a reference to two particular mutations in SARS-CoV-2. But the variant in India could carry additional mutations. -
For decades, the U.S. has spent many millions hunting down viruses in hope of stopping a pandemic. Yet the efforts failed. A group of researchers thinks there's a better strategy for the future. -
There is a lot of information packed into the 300-page report on the origins of the pandemic released this week. Here are three key points that haven't received a great deal of media attention. -
The report states that the coronavirus most likely did not originate at the wet market in Wuhan and that a lab leak was "an extremely unlikely pathway." -
Researchers worry another coronavirus will spill over from a bat or some other creature. They're hunting for sources — and finding evidence that a new pandemic could be around the corner. -
Peter Daszak of the investigative team sent to Wuhan says the farms were probably where the coronavirus first jumped from bats to another animal before infecting humans. -
In some cultures, kids roll their eyes when asked to do chores. In others, they'll pitch in without even being asked. Researchers have identified two key practices to raise helpful children. -
The World Health Organization says scientists need to find out whether the coronavirus can be transmitted through frozen meat shipments — a theory the Chinese government has promoted heavily.
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Scientists are looking at a possible link between the mutations in the U.K. and South Africa — and those in a patient in Boston who had living, growing virus in his body for five months. -
One day you're worrying about the regular old coronavirus. Then — seemingly out of the blue — there are variants. Worrisome variants! How did they come to be? And why are they likely more contagious?
