Nadia Drake (born July 6, 1980) is an American science journalist and is the interim Physics Editor at Quanta Magazine.[1] Previously, she was a contributing writer at National Geographic.
By 2002 Drake had earned an A.B. in biology, psychology, and dance at Cornell University,[2]
She returned to Cornell for her Ph.D. in genetics and developmental biology in 2009.[2] Her Ph.D. thesis is entitled Phenotypic consequences of imprinting perturbations at Rasgrf1 in mouse.[3]
In 2011 she graduated from the University of California's Science Communication program at the Santa Cruz campus, with a Master of Science degree.[citation needed]
Drake worked in a clinical genetics lab at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine while she was studying her Ph.D. in genetics.[4]
During her residence at the UCSC's SciCom program, she was a reporting intern for the Santa Cruz Sentinel, San Jose's The Mercury News, and Nature.[citation needed]
Afterwards she moved to Washington, D.C. for an internship at Science News, which turned into a job as the magazine's astronomy reporter.[citation needed]
Drake then returned to the San Francisco Bay Area for a science reporting job at WIRED.[citation needed]
She has been a freelance contributor to The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, WIRED, and other publications. [citation needed]
In 2024 Drake joined the board of directors of the SETI Institute as observer.[5]
Drake is the author of Little Book of Wonders: Celebrating the Gifts of the Natural World (National Geographic Books, 2016).[citation needed]
Drake is daughter of SETI's pioneer Frank Drake and Amahl Drake (née Shakhashiri).[8]