Sarah Kearns is a biochemist by formal training, and a writer at heart. She started doing science communication between undergrad and graduate school and hasn’t stopped writing since (though the topics and scope about which she writes has evolved and changed over the years). By constantly asking questions and never really stopping at any answer for long, Sarah learns through writing and loves to find and expand upon particular details and root them in the bigger context. Additionally, she’s an advocate for open scholarship and invested in building infrastructure and communities around making data, methods, and publications accessible. Outside a work context, Sarah’s also an amateur baker and photographer, becoming an avid hiker, and probably reading at least three books at a given time.
Currently, Sarah works at the Knowledge Futures Group as the acquisitions editor for their publication called Commonplace. There, she curates and edits content that discusses digital infrastructure, policies, and cultures needed to distribute, constellate, and amplify knowledge for the public good. Sometimes, she produces her own content there too!
5 Greybles to Think About: Newsletter contribution
Toward Equal Footing: Building community with rurality in mind: podcast about communicating amongst communities
Community and culture-centered code: podcast about maintaining code and open access as liturgy.
At least one of her three books is for The New Books Network podcast. With this group, she reads recent books and interviews the author about their work. It’s an amazing program that saves her so much money on buying the books herself, and a really fun way to learn new things and have the opportunity to talk with the authors!
See all of the NBN podcasts she’s hosted here!
Sarah also obtained her Ph.D. in Chemical Biology from the University of Michigan in December of 2020, making her an official plague doctor. Her work looked at the cellular highways of cells (aka microtubules) and how different road signs (aka post-translational modifications) can impact cell division.
While at the University of Michigan, she was very active in science communication working with Michigan Science Writers as a writer, editor, and editor-in-chief; chairing ComSciCon-Michigan; and editor-in-chief of EquilibriUM, a STEAMM (science, tech, engineering, art, math, and medicine) print magazine. She also wrote some feature pieces as a freelancer with the university.
Contact Me
If you’re interested in hiring me as a writer or editor, please feel free to reach out to me via Twitter or email using the form below! You can also find me on LinkedIn, but like most people I’m rarely over there and much more likely to respond to a Twitter DM.