Nicola Jones is a tenacious and resourceful journalist with extensive experience in finding and reporting must-read science stories. Her award-winning news article on how rising fossil fuel emissions could threaten carbon dating techniques provided Nature readers with a perspective on a lesser-known effect of increased atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) levels.

Nicola was able to find this story thanks to her great news sense and excellent contacts within the scientific community. The issue of fossil fuel emissions reducing the proportion of radioactive carbon-14 in atmospheric CO2 was something academics had been aware of for a while. But it took skillful reporting to tell the story in a way that highlighted its importance for different avenues of research, for example, detecting counterfeit materials and pinpointing the age of human remains.

Nicola has a scientific background in chemistry and oceanography and more than 20 years of experience as a science journalist. Her writing has appeared in globally recognized publications, including Nature, Time, New Scientist and Scientific American, and has won several awards.

Her knowledge on a wide range of scientific areas and ability to create entertaining, informative stories that are thorough and rigorously reported help to ensure that groundbreaking research is communicated in a way that is accessible to all.

— Emma Stoye
Nature
London, United Kingdom

I am deeply honored by this recognition for news reporting from AGU and by editor Emma Stoye’s kind words. My career in science journalism started with geophysical science: as an undergraduate in chemistry and oceanography at the University of British Columbia I was shipped off to sea to help track, capture and try to identify the source of the methane in ocean floor clathrate deposits. I must thank my undergraduate thesis co-supervisor Dr. Michael Whiticar of the University of Victoria for being the first to suggest I “go write about it”; this advice eventually led to my first major science-writing publication — and award — with Chemistry and Industry. Thanks, too, to the University of British Columbia’s journalism school for letting me carve my own path into science reporting; to esteemed editor Peter Aldhous for first hinting there might be a job for me at Nature; and to all the many first-class journalists and editors at New Scientist, Nature and more, too numerous to count, for helping me to grow as a science reporter, writer and editor. Thanks to AGU for hosting so many amazing meetings packed with so many fascinating stories, to all my sources for staying in touch and being patient with their explanations, and to my family for their support. I will use the award money to continue writing about science with a renewed focus on representing evermore diverse topics and voices.— Nicola Jones, Freelance journalist