Christopher Joyce
Christopher Joyce is a correspondent on the science desk at NPR. His stories can be heard on all of NPR's news programs, including NPR's Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and Weekend Edition.
Joyce seeks out stories in some of the world's most inaccessible places. He has reported from remote villages in the Amazon and Central American rainforests, Tibetan outposts in the mountains of western China, and the bottom of an abandoned copper mine in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Over the course of his career, Joyce has written stories about volcanoes, hurricanes, human evolution, tagging giant blue-fin tuna, climate change, wars in Kosovo and Iraq, and the artificial insemination of an African elephant.
For several years, Joyce was an editor and correspondent for NPR's Radio Expeditions, a documentary program on natural history and disappearing cultures produced in collaboration with the National Geographic Society that was heard frequently on Morning Edition.
Joyce came to NPR in 1993 as a part-time editor while finishing a book about tropical rainforests and, as he says, "I just fell in love with radio." For two years, Joyce worked on NPR's national desk and was responsible for NPR's Western coverage. But his interest in science and technology soon launched him into parallel work on NPR's science desk.
In addition, Joyce has written two non-fiction books on scientific topics for the popular market: Witnesses from the Grave: The Stories Bones Tell (with co-author Eric Stover); and Earthly Goods: Medicine-Hunting in the Rainforest.
Before coming to NPR, Joyce worked for ten years as the U.S. correspondent and editor for the British weekly magazine New Scientist.
Joyce's stories on forensic investigations into the massacres in Kosovo and Bosnia were part of NPR's war coverage that won a 1999 Overseas Press Club award. He was part of the Radio Expeditions reporting and editing team that won the 2001 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University journalism award and the 2001 Sigma Delta Chi award from the Society of Professional Journalists. Joyce won the 2001 American Association for the Advancement of Science excellence in journalism award as well as the 2016 Communication Award from the National Academies of Sciences.
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Most of the seafood Americans eat is imported; a lot of that is illegally caught. Now, environmentalists are using satellites to track pirate vessels on the high seas and help crack down on the trade. -
The rules are mostly voluntary, which disappoints environmental groups, but they should ratchet down the amount of leaked methane from new or modified oil and gas operations, which contributes to climate change.
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President Obama in September set a formidable goal for American industry and agriculture — reduce greenhouse gases by a quarter in 10 years. But several states are ahead of the game.
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An expedition to the Pacific's Mariana Trench has found evidence that life exists miles below the surface. But it's not life as we know it.
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Marine scientists plumbing the deepest part of the ocean sent microphones and collection probes baited with chicken to the bottom of a trench near Guam. Now they watch, wait ... and listen. -
Polar bears continue to take a hit in regions with the greatest loss of snow and ice, the latest report card on the Arctic shows. Meanwhile, plankton are thriving as the sea heats up. -
In Lima, Peru, almost all of the world's governments agreed on a document meant to galvanize efforts to curb climate change. While the outcome was modest, it did establish some important principles.
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Americans eat more seafood than just about anyone, but a big portion of imports are caught illegally. One expert calls this "the single greatest threat to sustainable fisheries in the world today." -
Faulty gear and attempts to clear liquid from wells can release enough gas to power hundreds of homes, new research reveals. Scientists say finding the leaks is a first step to plugging them.
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Unlike the 1997 Kyoto treaty, the plan on the negotiating table in Lima this week asks every country, developed and developing, to limit carbon emissions. Each nation would set its own target.
