Felyx Fayth Tan (they/them) is an independent science writer and researcher based in Pasadena, CA. If they could be an animal, they’d be a lungfish because they like waking up to the sound of rain.

They write about the stories we tell ourselves about science— how we construct them, who gets to tell them, how our fears, anxieties, hopes and passions inexorably bleed into it. They’ve been recognized by the National Academy of Sciences for two essays, winning the Schmidt Award for Excellence in Science Communication in 2022. The rest of their writing can be found here.

They were a developmental biologist at Caltech, and graduated with a Ph.D. in Biology in June 2023. Their thesis research was in animal regeneration from an evolutionary-developmental perspective, studying how animals make and re-make themselves.

Evergreen interests:

Weird animals and/or the weird things animals can do, obscure science history, queerness/transness, neurodivergence and disability, social impacts of science and technology, environment and climate

Other types of work:

Scientific manuscript/grant editing, research, factchecking, data analysis and visualization