Knight Science Journalism at MIT Announces 2026-27 Fellowship Class An elite group of science journalists from around the globe will join KSJ at MIT this August to embark on a year of research and study.

Daniel Ackerman is an award-winning journalist focused on how science and technology influence the economy. Most recently, he reported for Marketplace, a nationally syndicated public radio show. Previously, he covered offshore wind and the fishing industry in New Bedford, Massachusetts, for GBH News. His work has been featured on NPR, Planet Money, 99% Invisible, The Washington Post, National Geographic, and Scientific American. He won first place in Audio Scripting from the Public Media Journalists Association for his reporting on the history of industrial lubricants. Ackerman holds a Ph.D. in arctic ecology.

Sam Fellman is the deputy editor for defense at Business Insider, where he leads coverage of military affairs and works with journalists based around the world. A US Navy veteran who served in Iraq, he earned a master’s degree on the GI Bill at Columbia’s Graduate School of Journalism and has worked at Harper’s Magazine, BuzzFeed News, and Military Times. His journalism has changed biased military rules, spurred the discarding of a dangerous uniform and the fast-tracking of a safer replacement, and examined the modern battlefield in ways that gave voice to troops and their loved ones.

Smriti Mallapaty is a senior reporter for Nature magazine based in Sydney, Australia. She covers the Asia-Pacific region and reports on infectious diseases, biological sciences, and the environment, among other issues. Before joining Nature, she worked as a freelancer in Kathmandu, Nepal. Mallapaty won the inaugural Best Science Journalist award at the Samsung Australian IT Journalism Awards in 2025. She has an M.Sc. with a focus on environmental technology from Imperial College London.

Karem Monzer is a Lebanese journalist and filmmaker, and Managing Editor at Beirut Today. His work focuses on climate change, environmental systems, and migration, with an emphasis on translating scientific research and data into accessible public reporting. He has produced documentaries and explanatory reporting on water resources, wastewater systems, waste management, and food systems, examining how environmental conditions shape public health and affect vulnerable communities. He has covered United Nations climate conferences (COP) and reported on labor and migration, including domestic workers and displaced communities. He holds a B.A. in Communication Arts and an M.A. in Migration Studies from the Lebanese American University. As a Knight Science Journalism Fellow at MIT, he will develop a documentary on wastewater surveillance as a public health early warning system.

Eman Mounir is an award-winning Egyptian freelance investigative and data journalist specializing in climate change and environmental justice across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Her work blends rigorous data analysis with human-centered storytelling to expose the social, economic, and political impacts of ecological degradation. A 2023 Pulitzer Center Ocean Reporting Fellow, 2024 National Geographic Explorer, and 2025 Bertha Challenge Fellow, she has dedicated these fellowships to cross-border investigations into the environmental impacts of desalination plants in the GCC, phosphate extraction, and large-scale land reclamation projects. Her reporting has earned international honors, including being named Emerging Journalist of the Year by Covering Climate Now in 2024, the New Media Award, and the Nile Media Award. Her work has also been nominated for the True Story Award, One World Media, and the Fetisov Journalism Awards.

Matt O’Brien is a technology reporter who writes about artificial intelligence for The Associated Press. He’s been tracking AI and robotics research and entrepreneurship for the AP since 2017. His reporting has explored the implications of AI development on work, culture, privacy, society and the environment, with a focus on the people building and shaping these technologies or having their lives altered by them. Prior to joining the AP’s Rhode Island bureau, he was a tech reporter at the San Jose Mercury News. He spent more than a decade reporting for California newspapers, including the Oakland Tribune and the Contra Costa Times, producing award-winning stories on immigration, government accountability and other topics.

Helen Pearson is a journalist and editor for Nature, based in London. She has more than 20 years’ experience in science journalism, including five years as Nature’s Chief Magazine Editor, leading the journalism and opinion team. She is an Honorary Professor at University College London, where she teaches science writing and journalism. Her first book, “The Life Project,” was a book of the year for The Economist and was longlisted for the Orwell Prize. Her second book, “Beyond Belief: How Evidence Shows What Really Works,” will be published in April 2026. She has a Ph.D. in genetics from the University of Edinburgh, and her awards include Editor of the Year 2022 from the Association of British Science Writers and European Science Journalist of the Year 2025.

Fletcher Reveley is an award-winning freelance journalist whose work has appeared in Scientific American, Undark, Slate, Mother Jones, Longreads, and elsewhere, and has been anthologized in Best American Science and Nature Writing 2023. He won a National Academies Eric and Wendy Schmidt Award for Excellence in Science Communication in 2024, and he has received support from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting and The Water Desk at the University of Colorado. His work explores the human impact of scientific, technological, medical, and environmental phenomena.

Lucia Torres is a Spanish science and environmental journalist and producer. She is the Video Managing Editor at Mongabay, where she spearheads multimedia storytelling on climate solutions, biodiversity, and environmental justice, and also serves on the board of the Spanish Association of Science Journalists. She holds a B.Sc. in Biology from the University of Bordeaux, France, and an M.Sc. in Science Journalism & Communication from Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, Spain. Her accolades include the 2025 European Media Leaders Climate Solutions Fellowship from the Solutions Journalism Network and the European Journalism Center, as well as the Poynter Institute’s Leadership Academy for Women in Media in 2024.

Myriam Vidal Valero is an award-winning bilingual science journalist from Mexico covering the life sciences, mental health, policy, diversity, and disability, with a special interest in the environment and health. She holds an M.A. in Journalism from the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY in New York City. Her work has appeared in Nature, Science, C&EN, El País, The New York Times, Slate, and The Xylom, among others. She received the Rosalynn Carter Fellowship for Mental Health Journalism in 2019 and the European School for Oncology’s Cancer Journalism Award in 2020. In 2022, she also received a Diversity Summer Fellowship from the NASW. Since 2021, she has been coordinating, alongside a team, the Mentorship Program for early-career journalists at the Mexican Network of Science Journalists.

Mohammed El-Said is a science journalist and researcher in human geography. He is the science editor of The Daily News Egypt. His work spans international, regional, and local media platforms, including Scientific American Arabic Edition, Nature Middle East, Nature Africa, Al Jazeera, Al Araby Al Jadeed, and SciDev. He covers various scientific topics, including water, climate change, the environment, and geoscience. He holds a master’s degree in human geography from Mansoura University and a professional diploma in media translation from the American University in Cairo. He is currently a Ph.D. candidate in human geography at Cairo University.

El-Said is the third recipient of the Africa and Middle East Fellowship, which honors pioneering Egyptian science journalist Mohammed Yahia and launched in 2024.