2026 Young Science Writer Award Judges
With gratitude to our 2026 judges, researchers, clinicians, writers, and communicators, whose expertise and generosity made this Award possible.
Behind every entry to the Young Science Writer Award 2026 is a young person who has chosen, often for the first time, to write about science for an audience beyond their classroom. Honouring that act of intellectual courage, and assessing it fairly, is the work of our judging panel, and it is work they have undertaken this year with characteristic generosity and care.
Each judge has read entries closely, weighed them against one another, and contributed to discussions that prize not only factual accuracy and clear argument but also the imagination, voice, and narrative skill that mark out the best science writing. Their feedback, threaded through the deliberations, is itself part of what the Award offers to those who enter.
The 2026 panel brings together researchers, engineers, clinicians, educators, authors, journalists, and science communicators: a constellation of disciplines and perspectives that mirrors the wider ecosystem young writers will one day enter. We are grateful, in equal measure, for the expertise they have lent and the time they have given.
We are pleased to introduce them below.
Jana Bazeed
KCL Student/Roar News Science Editor
Fourth-year MSci Physics and Philosophy student at King's College London and award-winning student journalist with a keen interest in science communication, and the intersection of science, philosophy, and society.
Specialist Writer of the Year, KCLSU Student Media Awards 2024/25
Highly Commended for Best Science or Tech Piece, Student Publication Association National Awards 2025
Highly Commended for Outstanding Commitment in London, Student Publication Association Regional Awards 2025
Jules Howard
Zoology correspondent and author
Jules appears on BBC Radio 4 on shows including Nature Table (with Sue Perkins), Evil Animals (with Russell Kane), Inside Science and The Ultimate Choice. You also might know Jules from occasional slots on BBC Breakfast, BBC Five Live and Sunday Brunch.
Jules's books include Infinite Life (BBC Wildlife / Telegraph Books of the Year, ZSL Clarivate Award runner-up), Wonderdog (winner of the Barker Book Prize) and MEGA! (on the Wainwright Award Shortlist in 2025). Jules regularly for The Guardian, Science Focus Magazine and BBC Wildlife Magazine.
Deborah Cohen
ABSW Board Secretary
Deborah was the Editor of the BBC Radio Science Unit for many years, where she was responsible for programmes on Radio 4 and the World Service such as The Infinite Monkey Cage, The Life Scientific, Inside Science, All in the Mind, Health Check and Discovery. She has lectured on science broadcasting to a variety of audiences, judged book and essay prizes and awarded grants for public engagement with science. She studied Physics a long time ago, is a Life Member of the ABSW and received an MBE for services to science and media in 2009.
Andy Ridgeway
Board member (co-opted)
Andy Ridgway is a former Deputy Editor of BBC Science Focus and he continues to write, his work appearing in Focus, New Scientist, The Economist and Men's Health. He is a Senior Lecturer in Science Communication at the University of the West of England in Bristol and programme leader of their internationally renowned MSc in Science Communication. He was UWE's Principal Investigator on the Europe-wide online science communication research project RETHINK, which considered current challenges such as misinformation and trust. Andy has spent several years as a member of the judging team of the Max Perutz Science Writing Award run by the Medical Research Council.
Anne Rooney
Children's author, science author
Mun Keat Loon
International News & Features Editor, The BMJ
Mun Keat Looi is a Features Editor and journalist with 15 years experience in science writing, digital content, longform features, narrative storytelling, growth/audience engagement and social media. He is International Features Editor at The BMJ, lectures on journalism at Imperial College London and is an author on two books, ‘Big Questions in Science: The quest to solve the great unknowns‘ (2013) and the Geek Guide to Life (2016).
Mun-Keat was awarded the silver Rising Star Award at the 2015 British Media Awards and has written and produced news, features, podcasts, and videos for Quartz, The Guardian, BBC Focus, Chemistry World and others. Features he has edited have been critically acclaimed, including three squee moments when recommended in the New Yorker. He was the science editor and fact-checker for acclaimed book Spike (2021) by Jeremy Farrar and Anjana Ahuja, and the author of the Association of British Science Writers’ ‘How to become a science writer‘ guide.
Tom Whipple
Tom Whipple is the science editor at The Times. He covers everything from archaeology to zoology. He writes news, features, reviews and commentary across the paper, as well as appearing regularly on Times Radio. He joined the paper in 2006, shortly after graduating with a degree in mathematics.
During the course of his job he has visited the tunnels below Cern and the top of Mont Blanc above it. He has seen the inside of the world's hottest sauna and the world's most irradiated nature reserve. He has interviewed Stephen Hawking and Jedward. He has been arrested in three different countries. As well as The Times, he has written for the Guardian and The Economist. He was named science journalist of the year for his coverage of the Covid-19 pandemic. Find out more about Tom's latest book.
Dr Michael Leach
Dr. Michael Leach is a full time wildlife author and photographer. He has travelled to all 7 continents and worked with many of the world's most charismatic animals - polar bears in the Arctic, gorillas in central Africa, lemurs in Madagascar, sperm whales in the mid-Atlantic, monkeys in the Amazon, penguins in the Antarctic and elephants in Kenya. He is the author of 50+ books and has given more than 4000 illustrated talks.
Aisling Irwin
ABSW Board member
She freelances, mostly about science, the environment and development. Her work appears in publications such as New Scientist, Nature and SciDev.Net.
She has lived in and freelanced from various countries in Asia and Africa and is the author of a couple of books -- a travel guide to Cape Verde and the story of an African journey she did with her husband.
In the distant past, she was a science correspondent on The Daily Telegraph. She has won a couple of awards for her writing and has been on the ABSW Board for four years.
Isabel Thomas
Science Writer and Children's Author
Find out more about Isabel and her most recent work.
Richard Fisher
Senior Editor, Aeon & Honorary Professor, UCL
Richard Fisher is a senior science and audience editor at Aeon magazine, an honorary professor in science communication at University College London, and the author of a non-fiction book called The Long View. As an editor, he commissions academics and experienced writers to produce long-form essays for Aeon, as well as guiding the magazine's audience strategy. As a lecturer, he teaches postgraduate students at UCL about science journalism and digital skills. As a writer, he freelances for several international publications, with articles published by the BBC, the New York Times, The Observer, MIT Technology Review, Vox, and New Scientist. He has also written and presented a series of short films for the BBC.
Dr Kathryn Boast
Senior Outreach Manager, Faculty of Natural, Mathematical & Engineering Sciences, King’s College London
Kathryn is an award-winning science communicator who enjoys splitting her time between projects that bring science to people and people to science.
Kathryn has a background in physics, and enjoys using any tools she can get her hands on to explore and explain the science of our world, from art installations to colouring books.
Find out more about Kathryn's work.
Alex O'Brien
ABSW Vice-Chair
Alex O'Brien is a science writer based in London, UK. Her work has been published by The Times, BBC, Scientific American, New Scientist, The Guardian and others.
In her first non-fiction science book ‘The Truth Detective’ she calls on all of us to regularly interrogate the narratives and information we are given. It’s a book on critical thinking.
She is particularly passionate about teaching critical thinking skills to young people. She spearheaded the UK Young Science Writer Award, which is aimed at students from state-funded schools to help encourage them into a career in STEM.
When she doesn’t write she competes on the global poker circuit.
