About the Short Wave team

Team Short Wave is a dynamic cast of producers, hosts and an editor. Some of us started out as scientists, some as journalists — all of us are insatiably curious. We value bringing our authentic selves and identities to our work.

Launched on October 15, 2019, Short Wave has guided listeners through some of the biggest stories of our time – the pandemic and climate change – in collaboration with the NPR Science Desk. Every day for us is a highly collaborative endeavor. Our reporting approach emphasizes inclusivity, curiosity and data-driven reporting. In 2021, Short Wave won the first-ever Ambie® Award for Best Knowledge, Science or Tech Podcast.

Here are some series we've made as a team:

• Space Camp: The oddities of the universe
• Road Trip! Short Wave Explores U.S. Public Lands
• Taste Buddies: The science of flavor
• Black Excellence in STEM
• Latino Excellence in STEM

Meet our team of science journalists

Regina G. Barber

Regina G. Barber (she/ella/她) is a reporter and co-host for the show.

As an astrophysicist, Regina brings a lot of physics and astronomy reporting to the show. Before Short Wave, Regina taught the subjects at Western Washington University, in addition to working as the STEM Inclusion and Outreach Specialist. She is an active member of the Society for the Advancement of Chicanos/Hispanics & Native Americans in Science and was a 2019 Jackson Wild Media Fellow.

Regina is pop culture obsessed and has spent the last decade combining racial and gender equity, science and media. You can hear some of her musings on NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast, where she is a regular panelist.

Regina's path to podcasting was an accident, but now it seems she is exactly where she belongs.

You can follow her on Twitter at @ScienceRegina.

Emily Kwong

Emily Kwong (she/her) is the founding reporter and a co-host of the show. Her first homework assignment in kindergarten was to bring in a leaf to class. She's been looking at trees ever since.

Before joining NPR, Emily was a reporter and host at KCAW-Sitka, a community radio station in Sitka, Alaska. Her work earned multiple awards from the Alaska Press Club and Alaska Broadcasters Association. Prior to that, Emily taught and produced youth media with WNYC's Radio Rookies and The Modern Story in Hyderabad, India. She learned the finer points of cutting tape at the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies in 2013.

Emily won the Best New Artist award in 2013 from the Third Coast/Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Competition for a story about learning to speak with an electrolarynx. She was NPR's 2018 Above the Fray Fellow and reported a three-part series on climate change and internal migration in Mongolia. Emily is also co-president of the board for the Association for Independents in Radio.

You can follow her on Instagram @kwongsong and on Twitter at @emilykwong1234.

Rebecca Ramirez

Rebecca Ramirez (she/her) is the founding producer and show runner of Short Wave. It's a meditation on how to be a Swiss Army Knife in that it involves a little of everything — background research, finding and booking sources, interviewing guests, writing, cutting the tape, editing, scoring ... you get the idea.

Rebecca's journey to radio producer was a happy accident. At the University of Southern California, she pursued a double major in history and neuroscience. It was fun and engaging, but with no obvious career path. While there, she answered an ad for an NPR internship she heard, and got hired!

After graduation, she began an internship for Invisibilia, NPR's podcast about the unseeable forces that control human behavior. From there, she dove head-first into a completely different job: Producing daily news on Morning Edition, NPR's daily morning news magazine. After a year, she jumped at the chance to help start a new NPR podcast — that would eventually become Short Wave.

Aside from the joy of hard work, Rebecca also desperately loves being outside.

Rachel Carlson

Rachel Carlson (she/her) is a production assistant for Short Wave. She gets to do a bit of everything: Researching, sourcing, writing, fact-checking and cutting episodes.

Carlson has also worked as a live event producer, production assistant and web producer at shows like Truth Be Told with Tonya Mosley, WBUR's Endless Thread and The Mortified Podcast.

As a double major in cognitive neuroscience and English at Brown University, she studied the intersections between storytelling and the human brain. She's fascinated by all the ways stories shape our minds and inner lives, and how these inner lives shape the stories we tell.

When she takes off her headphones, you can find her rock climbing, reading and hiking. She also harbors a love for reality TV and some of the worst best horror and science fiction films ever made.

Hannah Chinn

Hannah Chinn (they/them) is a producer for Short Wave.

Prior to joining Short Wave, they produced Good Luck Media's inaugural "climate thriller" podcast. Before that, they worked on Spotify & Gimlet Media shows such as Conviction, How to Save a Planetand Reply All. Previous pit stops also include WHYY, as well as Willamette Week and The Philadelphia Inquirer. In between, they've worked a number of non-journalism gigs at various vintage stores, coffee shops and haunted houses.

Chinn hails from the Pacific Northwest and is currently based in Brooklyn. In their free time, you can find them throwing pots, cooking with friends or reading horror movie plot summaries on Wikipedia.

Berly McCoy

Kimberly "Berly" McCoy (she/her) is a producer for the show. Berly started working with NPR as the program coordinator of the NPR Scicommers, a group founded by Joe Palca and Maddie Sofia to teach scientists and engineers how to better communicate and find community.

After lending a fact-checking hand to the Short Wave team on and off, they graciously taught Berly the production ropes.

In another life, Berly earned her PhD in biochemistry transforming viruses into nanoreactors. She's also dug through garbage, counted rattlesnake tongue flicks and caught endangered butterflies on mountain tops...all for research. She lives just outside of Glacier National Park and enjoys rock climbing, ice fishing and making food magically appear from dirt.

You can follow her on Twitter at @travlinscientst.

More from Short Wave

We love listener input. You can always reach the show by emailing shortwave@npr.org.

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