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Christian Elliott

@christianelliott.me

5.2K followers 1.6K following 590 posts

Science journalist & audio producer / Making podcasts at NASA / Other words in Nat Geo, The Atlantic, Science, Sci Am, Hakai, bioGraphic, Undark, etc. / Iowan 🌽 Views expressed here are my own. Portfolio: christianelliott.me

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Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · Jun 30

NASA just won an Emmy for our live broadcast of the total solar eclipse last year. We produced a documentary film about the James Webb Space Telescope that's out in theaters and on Netflix. We have podcasts, we write feature stories. People wear the agency logo on t-shirts. We're still getting cut.

Michael Hobbes @michaelhobbes.bsky.social · Jun 30

You hear this a lot on the left but it isn't true. USAID did not "fail to tell its story to Americans," the right targeted the agency with lies and misinformation.

Ultimately this narrative turns conservative attacks into even more calls for the left to reform.
www.nytimes.com/2025/06/29/o...

I Worked at U.S.A.I.D. for Over 8 Years. This Is Our Biggest Failure.

I worked for U.S.A.I.D. in East Africa over the past eight and a half years, selling the story of American foreign aid to people in Rwanda, Ethiopia and Kenya. Our inability to tell this same story to Americans is our great failure. It is what put the agency into the Department of Government Efficiency’s wood chipper first. It’s what allows Secretary of State Marco Rubio to get away with insisting that lifesaving humanitarian aid would continue while the administration drastically slashed its funding. And it’s what I fear will let this presidency cast the deaths from the next preventable catastrophe as unstoppable or inevitable.

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Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 5d

I need someone to explain to me who on earth wants this. And how its creators can convince me that it could possibly do anything other than harm.

Kiss reality goodbye: AI-generated social media has arrived

With the launch of Sora 2, OpenAI has opened a new chapter in addictive, and some worry dangerous, AI video content.

www.npr.org

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Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 7d

This is a really lovely museum. Now I want to go back and see the ship in its new digs 🛶

A more than 1,000-year-old Viking ship goes on a very short, final voyage

It took 10 years of work to prepare a Viking longship for a trip no longer than a football field. How it got to that spot goes back even further — over a millennium.

www.npr.org

Reposted by Christian Elliott

Science Friday @scifri.bsky.social · 7d

Scientists in the Bay Area have gotten corals to spawn in a lab at the same time they do in the wild in Australia. One of their tools: LED lights that simulate sunrises, sunsets, and even moonlight.

The High-Tech Lab Unlocking Secrets Of Coral Reproduction

At a lab in the heart of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, scientists are breeding corals to be more resilient to rising ocean temperatures.

buff.ly

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Reposted by Christian Elliott

Dan Vergano @danvergano.bsky.social · 15d

ScienceWriters2025 will take place in Chicago, November 7-9

sciencewriters2025.org

North America's largest gathering of science writers. An important coming together in a pivotal year for science.

Early bird registration ending Oct. 1

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Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 7d

I'm heading to Acadia in a week to visit my sister who works there. It's peak leaf season and the fee collection staff will be furloughed, but the park will stay open with (unpaid) essential staff cleaning bathrooms, etc. Seems crazy the park could lose out on $1.5 million in revenue to this...

Government Shutdown: Impacts for Acadia National Park - Friends of Acadia

"National parks remain as accessible as possible during the federal government shutdown. However, some services may be limited or unavailable."

friendsofacadia.org

Reposted by Christian Elliott

Krista Langlois @cestmoilanglois.bsky.social · 8d

And finally, this story from @christianelliott.me taught me everything I didn't know that I didn't know about the reproductive habits of cold-water corals. For months during the reporting and editing process, I talked about coral sex at parties.

The Secret Sex Lives of Deep, Dark Corals | Hakai Magazine

A unique fjord in Chilean Patagonia gives scientists a chance to unlock the reproductive secrets of cold-water corals that typically live thousands of meters below the ocean’s surface.

hakaimagazine.com

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Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 8d

It definitely says something about an editor to have four pieces by four different writers make the list! Congrats! (and thank you!)

Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 8d

Honored to have made it into this always fantastic anthology as a "Notable" for my piece in Hakai Magazine (one of the last features the magazine published) about cold-water coral research in Chile. @pulitzercenter.org @biographic.bsky.social

Jaime Green @jaimealyse.bsky.social · 9d

Wrote a bit about this year's edition of The Best American Science and Nature Writing - and posted the Notables jaimealyse.beehiiv.com/p/basnw25

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Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 9d

I made the "notables" list! The Best Science and Nature Writing of 2025 is available starting October 21. What a huge honor to be in the company of so many amazing journalists. 😊

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Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 10d

Egregious to leave out the worm

Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 21d

⛑️helmet dino⛑️

Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 21d

homeandcity.nasa.gov

Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 21d

You interact with technology created by NASA every day. You can check out how on this fun interactive site

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Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 23d

Speaking of, cool to see NASA listed as one of the Webby Awards most iconic companies in internet history today!

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Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · 24d

A little blast from the past... NASA's website has come a loooong way 🖱️

NASA's Home Page Through the Years - NASA

www.nasa.gov

Reposted by Christian Elliott

sasha @krassotkin.bsky.social · 29d

NASA’s Perseverance rover found potential biosignatures in a rock sample named Sapphire Canyon from Mars’ Jezero Crater. The rock shows minerals and organic molecules possibly linked to ancient microbial life collected in July 2024 from an ancient river valley. Further analysis is needed to confirm.

NASA Says Mars Rover Discovered Potential Biosignature Last Year - NASA

A sample collected by NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover from an ancient dry riverbed in Jezero Crater could preserve evidence of ancient microbial life. Taken

www.nasa.gov

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Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · Sep 9

Impossible instruction. If the force I apply is correct it by definition cannot be excessive, right??

Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · Sep 8

More in a timely Curious Universe episode featuring one of the scientists from that NYT story:

Webb's Exoplanet Research Sounds Like Sci-Fi—But It's Real

Some exoplanets sound like sci-fi, but they’re real. NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is revealing new details about planets orbiting distant stars.

www.nasa.gov

Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · Sep 8

I want to believe

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Reposted by Christian Elliott

Mark Armstrong @markarms.bsky.social · Sep 5

My Friday newsletter for @niemanstoryboard.org:

Featuring @jasonkpargin.bsky.social, @tromano.bsky.social, @christianelliott.me, @timherrera.bsky.social @rusty.todayintabs.com, @jiatolentino.bsky.social, @indiejournalists.bsky.social, @transjournalists.org

niemanstoryboard.org/2025/09/05/l...

The life of an author, on camera - Nieman Storyboard

Jason Pargin's second career pivoting to video. Plus: tools for organizing your reporting, and a database for freelance rates

niemanstoryboard.org

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Reposted by Christian Elliott

Gergely Orosz @gergely.pragmaticengineer.com · Sep 4

Amusing how 99% of people using LLMs forget how these things work:

They are advanced probability machines. They generate the next most likely token (word) based in the input and their training.

Under the hood, it’s a giant matrix multiplication that has eerily good output.

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Reposted by Christian Elliott

molly taft @mollytaft.com · Sep 4

wrote about really interesting new research about how technology that removes PFAS from drinking water also can remove other carcinogenic chemicals:

It’s Possible to Remove the Forever Chemicals in Drinking Water. Will It Happen?

New research shows that filtration systems that remove PFAS can also get rid of other harmful substances. Whether they’ll actually be introduced is a different matter entirely.

www.wired.com

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Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · Sep 4

Looking forward to seeing everyone in Chicago this fall!

National Association of Science Writers (NASW) @sciencewriters.org · Sep 4

REG IS OPEN! We are so excited to bring the science writing community together this fall for #SciWri25. Meet up with colleagues and make new friends online or in person. Early bird discount available until Oct 1.

REGISTRATION INFO: sciencewriters2025.o...
PROGRAM: sciencewriters2025.o...

Christian Elliott @christianelliott.me · Sep 4

Because it is the best

New Scientist @newscientist.com · Sep 4

The New Scientist Book Club is currently reading Ursula K. Le Guin's classic science fiction novel "The Dispossessed". Here, her son Theo Downes-Le Guin considers the artistic process behind it – and why it still resonates today

Ursula Le Guin's son on why The Dispossessed is (maybe) his favourite

www.newscientist.com

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Reposted by Christian Elliott

Merriam-Webster @merriam-webster.com · Sep 3

enshittification | noun | when a digital platform is made worse for users, in order to increase profits

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