Science Writing / Editing

Credit: Dayi Zhu

Shanghai Astronomy Museum

In 2019 and 2020, Carolyn worked with exhibit development teams in Shanghai and the United States on the Shanghai Astronomy Museum, which bills itself as the world's largest planetarium. The facility boasts two planetarium theaters, plus an extensive set of exhibits focused on topics ranging from astronomy history, astronomical and astrophysical concepts, planetary science, education, and space exploration. For this project, Carolyn met in Shanghai with the content development committee and created the content plan. She also advised on specific topics to be covered, and worked with the team to create the English-language translations from Mandarin. The exhibitions are aimed at a very general public and very international audience, ranging from tourists and students, to political and civic dignitaries.

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

In 2010, Carolyn worked with JPL as the chief writer for the exhibits in the lab's von Kármán Visitor Center. The 2,800 square-foot exhibition includes 28 exhibit panels and spacecraft models illustrating JPL's contributions to astronomy, planetary exploration, and space science. For this project, Carolyn regularly met with JPL's top scientists and media producers to create approachable content for the wide variety of visitors who come to the lab to see the "latest from NASA". The exhibition is aimed at a very general public audience, and visitors range from visiting politicians and dignitaries to local school and civic groups.

California Academy of Sciences

In 2008, Carolyn Collins Petersen collaborated with Cinnabar California and the CAS in San Francisco on a major exhibit called California's Altered State. She wrote the exhibit copy that covers topics in climate change and global warming, and worked with several of the project's video producers on copy for the exhibit's multimedia sequences. The topic of climate change and global warming is especially relevant to Californians, and so Carolyn's writing approach was approachable, direct, and informative.

Griffith Observatory

From 2005 through 2006, Carolyn Collins Petersen worked with Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles, California, under contract to the Friends of the Observatory. During this time she served as senior science writer for the observatory's extensive astronomy exhibition that extends throughout the building. She wrote astronomy outreach copy for more than 160 text panels, as well as a number of multimedia and video exhibits. The theme of the exhibits was "Turning Visitors into Observers" and the writing uses this idea to bring astronomy to the hundreds of thousands of visitors who come to the site each year. You can see samples of Carolyn's work on this Griffith Observatory Tour.

Gemini Observatory

Carolyn Collins Petersen was Associate Editor of GeminiFocus Magazine, a publication of the Gemini Observatory. From authoring stories to editing submissions by scientists and other writers, she works closely with the observatory's press officer on this and a wide variety of press releases and other materials to help get the Gemini message out to the public.

Subaru Telescope

Carolyn has also supplied on-demand technical editing for the National Observatory of Japan's Suburu Telescope outreach office. She has edited press releases, conference proceedings, technical papers and software cookbooks for the observatory.