Laura Helmuth is a senior editor for Smithsonian magazine where she selects and edits most of the stories about science, nature, and technology. Before that she worked for Science magazine's news department for five years, first as a writer covering neuroscience and then as an editor for life sciences stories. She has written for National Wildlife, California Wild, and Science News. She has a Ph.D. in cognitive neuroscience from the University of California, Berkeley.