Edmund Soon-Weng Yong was born on December 17, 1981, in
Malaysia.[1][2][3] At the age of 13, Yong immigrated to the UK in 1994. He became a British citizen in 2005.[4]
Yong's approach to
popular science writing has been described as "the future of science news",[7] and he has received numerous awards for his work. Earlier in his career, Yong created and wrote the now-defunct
blogNot Exactly Rocket Science, which was published as part of the
National Geographic Phenomena blog network. Yong received the
National Academies Communication Award from the
National Academy of Sciences in 2010 in recognition of his online journalism; in the same year, he received three awards from ResearchBlogging.org, which supports online science journalism focused on covering research that has already been published in
peer-reviewedscientific journals that can be adapted for a wider public audience.[8] In 2012 he received the
National Union of Journalists (NUJ) Stephen White Award.[9] His blog received the first Best Science Blog award from the
Association of British Science Writers in 2014.[10] Yong's interactions with other science bloggers and engagement with those who have commented on his blog have served as case studies for academic work in
media studies.[11]
In September 2015, Yong joined The Atlantic as a science reporter.[21] In August 2020, he received the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing's Victor Cohn Prize for Excellence in Medical Science Reporting, citing his reporting on the
COVID-19 pandemic and his commitment to including marginalized and underrepresented voices in his writing.[22] In June 2021, he received a
Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting for a series on the COVID-19 pandemic.[23] Yong left The Atlantic in July 2023.
Munger, David (2010).
"Exactly, Ed Yong". SEED Magazine. Archived from the original on 29 March 2010. Retrieved 31 July 2015.{{
cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (
link)
Shanahan, M.-C. (8 September 2011). "Science blogs as boundary layers: Creating and understanding new writer and reader interactions through science blogging". Journalism. 12 (7): 903–919.
doi:
10.1177/1464884911412844.
S2CID144586150.
Fahy, D.; Nisbet, M. C. (8 September 2011). "The science journalist online: Shifting roles and emerging practices". Journalism. 12 (7): 778–793.
doi:
10.1177/1464884911412697.
S2CID145363279.
Elmer, Greg (2015). Elmer, Greg; Langlois, Ganaele; Redden, Joanna (eds.). Compromised Data: From Social Media to Big Data. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. pp. 251–63.
ISBN9781501306501.
^* Yong, Ed (2011). "Friendly bacteria move in mysterious ways". Nature.
doi:
10.1038/news.2011.614.