Christopher Joyce
Christopher Joyce is a correspondent on the science desk at NPR. His stories can be heard on all of NPR's news programs, including NPR's Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and Weekend Edition.
Joyce seeks out stories in some of the world's most inaccessible places. He has reported from remote villages in the Amazon and Central American rainforests, Tibetan outposts in the mountains of western China, and the bottom of an abandoned copper mine in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Over the course of his career, Joyce has written stories about volcanoes, hurricanes, human evolution, tagging giant blue-fin tuna, climate change, wars in Kosovo and Iraq, and the artificial insemination of an African elephant.
For several years, Joyce was an editor and correspondent for NPR's Radio Expeditions, a documentary program on natural history and disappearing cultures produced in collaboration with the National Geographic Society that was heard frequently on Morning Edition.
Joyce came to NPR in 1993 as a part-time editor while finishing a book about tropical rainforests and, as he says, "I just fell in love with radio." For two years, Joyce worked on NPR's national desk and was responsible for NPR's Western coverage. But his interest in science and technology soon launched him into parallel work on NPR's science desk.
In addition, Joyce has written two non-fiction books on scientific topics for the popular market: Witnesses from the Grave: The Stories Bones Tell (with co-author Eric Stover); and Earthly Goods: Medicine-Hunting in the Rainforest.
Before coming to NPR, Joyce worked for ten years as the U.S. correspondent and editor for the British weekly magazine New Scientist.
Joyce's stories on forensic investigations into the massacres in Kosovo and Bosnia were part of NPR's war coverage that won a 1999 Overseas Press Club award. He was part of the Radio Expeditions reporting and editing team that won the 2001 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University journalism award and the 2001 Sigma Delta Chi award from the Society of Professional Journalists. Joyce won the 2001 American Association for the Advancement of Science excellence in journalism award as well as the 2016 Communication Award from the National Academies of Sciences.
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Climate change is exaggerating the normal swings in weather. For the American Southwest, that means more intense waves of heat, drought and fire that could wipe out trees that have stood for centuries. It's already revamping the ecology of the landscape. -
Woodland forest fires are burning with such power and size, no one can remember anything like it. The problem with fires of this intensity is that the forests can't recover — they are completely destroyed. -
Huge wildfires are burning in the West — setting new records for damage this summer. These megafires are burning bigger and hotter than ever before. Scientists say climate change and a century-long policy of fire prevention — which inadvertently turned forests into giant tinderboxes — are to blame.
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As the world's population tops 7 billion people, population experts are worried about inevitable increases in cars, computers, bigger homes and a drain on resources. In an effort to combat this, one California company is producing small, energy-efficient homes — some as tiny as 300 square feet. -
As the world's population tops 7 billion people, population experts are worried about inevitable increases in cars, computers, bigger homes and a drain on resources. In an effort to combat this, one California company is producing small, energy-efficient homes — some as tiny as 300 square feet.
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Imagine the U.S. government saying to the people living around Yellowstone, "You know what? All those wild animals in the park — the grizzlies, the bison, the wolves — they belong to you." This is exactly what the government of Namibia has done in a radical experiment to save wildlife — and the people who share their land.
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Imagine the U.S. government saying to the people living around Yellowstone, "You know what? All those wild animals in the park — the grizzlies, the bison, the wolves — they belong to you." This is exactly what the government of Namibia has done in a radical experiment to save wildlife — and the people who share their land.
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Humans aren't the only brainiacs around — most mammals have large brains for their body size. But how did we get so darn cerebral? Turns out mammalian brain evolution went hand in hand with developing an excellent sense of smell. -
The crisis in the northwestern part of Haiti seems to have stabilized, but many more people may be carrying the cholera bacteria without showing symptoms. Doctors and aid groups are rushing to quell the outbreak. -
The crisis in the northwestern part of Haiti seems to have stabilized, but many more people may be carrying the cholera bacteria without showing symptoms. Doctors and aid groups are rushing to quell the outbreak.
