About Sharon Begley
Sharon Begley has been the science columnist of Newsweek since March 2007. In addition to a bi-weekly column covering genetics, neuroscience, astronomy, physics, cosmology, climate and other sciences, she writes feature stories as well as the magazine’s online Lab Notes blog. From 2002 to 2007, she was the science columnist at The Wall Street Journal, writing “Science Journal.”
Begley has received numerous awards for her work. In 2009, she won a first place award from the New York Association of Black Journalists for her column “How Your Brain Looks at Race,” and The Genesis Award for Outstanding Written Word for “The Extinction Trade,” from the Humane Society of the United States. In 2006, she won the American Aging Association Media Award for a series of columns on Alzheimer’s disease; in 2005, she won the Public Understanding of Science Award from the Exploratorium, the science museum in San Francisco and a Clarion Award from the Association for Women in Communications for her “Science Journal” column. In 2004, Begley received a Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters for Contributions to the public understanding of science from the University of North Carolina and she won the 2002 and 2000 Front Page Award from the Newswomen’s Club of New York for (respectively) best newspaper column and best feature reporting in a magazine and the 2002 Outstanding Media Award from the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill.
Begley earned a B.A. from Yale University. She is the co-author of the 2002 book, “The Mind and the Brain,” and the author of the 2007 book “Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain.”