About me

Welcome. I write, teach, speak, and think about science and society and how they intersect and interact.

I've written books about genitalia 🍆, brains 🧠 🧠, biology 🧬, and parenting 👥, all of which are related despite the apparent distinctions. You can find my writing at Scientific American, where I am a regular contributor, and other delightful places about the web. My writing portfolio, curated under a Google News search, is here, or you can find more at Muck Rack.

As a co-recipient of the John Maddox Prize for "showing courage and integrity in standing up for sound science," I received recognition in part because of a lawsuit threat from none other than Andrew Wakefield. Speaking of famous men who got mad at me, Neil deGrasse Tyson didn't care for my expert-level correctives of some comments he made about sex and biology, and when interviewed about it, attempted to dismiss me as "a woman who has a blog." He kind of skipped over the more salient fact that I am a woman who has doctorate in such matters. [My students liked this tidbit so much that they made a t-shirt for me with this quote on it. I love them.] I've also repeatedly made RFK Jr mad at me because, well, to put it as generously as possible, he's wrong.