Michaeleen Doucleff
Michaeleen Doucleff, PhD, is a correspondent for NPR's Science Desk. For nearly a decade, she has been reporting for the radio and the web for NPR's global health outlet, Goats and Soda. Doucleff focuses on disease outbreaks, cross-cultural parenting, and women and children's health.
In 2014, Doucleff was part of the team that earned a George Foster Peabody award for its coverage of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. For the series, Doucleff reported on how the epidemic ravaged maternal health and how the virus spreads through the air. In 2019, Doucleff and Senior Producer Jane Greenhalgh produced a story about how Inuit parents teach children to control their anger. That story was the most popular one on NPR.org for the year; altogether readers have spent more than 16 years worth of time reading it.
In 2021, Doucleff published a book, called Hunt, Gather, Parent, stemming from her reporting at NPR. That book became a New York Times bestseller.
Before coming to NPR in 2012, Doucleff was an editor at the journal Cell, where she wrote about the science behind pop culture. Doucleff has a bachelor degree in biology from Caltech, a doctorate in physical chemistry from the University of Berkeley, California, and a master's degree in viticulture and enology from the University of California, Davis.
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Experiments on mice have given scientists an understanding of how the virus causes severe brain malformations. -
The money was part of the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. It went to sex ed classes and public health messages in Africa. Effective or not? A new study offers a clear verdict. -
A country is declared Ebola-free. Then the virus flares up again. Doctors now know why.
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Using a battery of advance tests, doctors at Johns Hopkins were able to see signs of brain damage in a fetus that standard tests had missed. -
Scientists now have evidence the Zika virus was spreading in South America long before health officials detected it. The findings suggest Zika could be hiding out in other corners of the world, and Southeast Asia may be the next region to see a big outbreak.
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In 1893, a German scientist made a striking discovery: Cells from a fetus hide out in a mother's body after birth. Scientists say these cells alter the risk of breast cancer and autoimmune diseases. -
Although an increasing number of U.S. hospitals and other birthing centers now encourage women to breast-feed and teach them how, other common practices by staff can hinder moms from sticking with it. -
A large study confirms that a test doctors have been using for a decade works well for low-risk patients. More work is needed to draw conclusions about chemotherapy for women with riskier tumors. -
Scientists have found that working in one's 60s and 70s is associated with better physical and mental health. Even part-time work may be enough to reap the benefits. -
The Heartland virus was considered rare. Scientists now say they've found signs of it circulating in animals across the Midwest, New England and the South. They think human cases have been missed.