• About
  • Portfolio
  • Contact
  • About
  • Portfolio
  • Contact
Sam Zlotnik
  • About
  • Portfolio
  • Contact
A white trans man with short brown hair, brown eyes, black glasses, and a maroon jacket, standing outside in a forest.

About Me:

​My name is Sam (he/they) and I'm an environmental and science journalist. As a recent editorial fellow at Sierra, I covered stories about environmental science, conservation, and animal behavior. And during the summer of 2022, I wrote for Smithsonian as a AAAS Mass Media Fellow. 

​Before becoming a journalist, 
I studied biology and psychology as an undergraduate student at the University of California Berkeley and then went on to get an M.S. in biology from Purdue University and a Ph.D. in ecology from the University of Florida. During graduate school, I studied the ecology and behavior of insects and amphibians.
You can check out a selection of my work below or browse my larger writing portfolio. And feel free to contact me with any questions.

A Dungeness crab in a tank.
Crabs’ Sense of Smell Gets Worse in Acidic Seawater
Antarctic krill.
Even in Antarctica, Krill Are Eating Plastic
A yellowish salamander with black dots and two black stripes down its back, sitting on top of moss.
Fungal Disease Poses Looming Threat to Salamanders
A peregrine falcon perched on a branch.
The Pandemic Diet (For Falcons)
A bumble bee on a flower.
The Mysterious Death of the Bumblebee Queens
A landscape view of a swamp with blue water and trees in the background.
Environmentalists Push to Protect the Okefenokee Swamp From Titanium Mining
Sea stars in jars within a tank of water.
Sea Stars Threatened by Intensifying Marine Heatwaves
Two lions lounging by a tree.
These Five Innovative Rovers Will Soon Explore the Moon
Two lions lounging by a tree.
How Animals Survive in a Savanna Full of Predators
Two baby sloths tucked in a blanket in a box.
Baby Sloths Are About as Cute As You Would Expect
Two donkeys in a grassy field.
Cougars Are Killing Feral Donkeys, and That's Good for Wetlands
A person holding a baby bird with an open mouth and a cotton swab with yellowish oil on it.
The Done-Up Bird Gets the Worm
A pit in the surface of the Moon.
Lunar Pits Maintain Surprisingly Comfy Temperatures
Ocean with blue sky.
First images of mysterious 'milky seas' captured
A cup of tea with herbs around it.
The DNA of hundreds of insect species is in your tea
A Manx shearwater sitting on the ground at night.
This seabird species dives deeper when the water is clearer
A mosquito feeding through cloth.
Dengue fever and Zika virus make humans more attractive to mosquitoes
A black-and-white cat rolling on the ground and chewing on a silver vine plant.
When cats chew catnip, it works as a bug spray
A honeybee flying up to a sunflower.
Honeybees experience withdrawal symptoms when deprived of alcohol​
A leatherback sea turtle hatchling sitting on the beach, facing the ocean.
Leatherback sea turtles struggle to find the ocean on moonless nights​
A child eating food at a table with other people nearby.
Access to free school lunch creates health benefits for a lifetime​
A domestic cat sitting in a cardboard box in a sunny room.
Domestic cats fall for the same visual illusions as we do
A chain-link fence with a sign that says
Living near a Superfund site shortens life expectancy for low-income residents​
An agricultural field with two trucks carrying produce.
Florida Farmworkers Have Lacked Access to Basic Health Care Resources Throughout the Pandemic
A fossil megalodon jaw.
Even megalodon babies needed nurseries to survive​
A little brown bat with the white nose symptom that is characteristic of the fungal disease called white nose syndrome.
An ecological trap exposes many bats to a deadly fungus
A bird nest with a large baby bird in it next to a much smaller baby bird.
Brood parasites are quite picky about who they offload their kids on, depending on the climate
A European viper.
A viper's zig-zag colors help blur their predators' vision
Yellow flowers on the stem of a plant.
Bumble bees cut holes in plants’ leaves to trigger flowering
An adult female common glow-worm with a glowing abdomen.
Glowing worms have less sex when the lights are on
Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.