#DeepTechReporting – Science Writers 2021

Please join me and my colleagues for a thought-provoking panel on deep tech reporting at this year’s Science Writers Conference, NASW’s annual event. Here’s the writeup:

Although all scientific fields suffer communication challenges, some offer writers natural lifelines. Health, medicine, climate, and even space all manifest themselves in our daily lives. Readers see them, feel them, and experience them, which gives writers a common ground for their stories. Technology, however, especially deep technology, deals with the invisible side of engineering — with machinery and equipment, software and hardware, and the industrial application of math and science — making it much less accessible.

Yet deep tech is changing our world, like it or not. It’s present in the blockchain that transforms supply chains and drives cryptocurrency markets; the mRNA engineering that yielded COVID-19 vaccines in record time and may soon promise cancer cures; the qubits that power quantum computers and challenge modern encryption; and the tiny, sustainable sensors embedded in almost everything. So what can we do to develop a healthy, critical perspective toward deep tech?

Join us as we explore this question and address the challenges of and strategies for writing about deep tech through a discussion with experts in the field.