Barbara Gastel, Coordinator, MS Program in Science and Technology Journalism
Barbara Gastel, a physician specializing in biomedical writing and editing, is associate professor of integrative biosciences, humanities in medicine, and biotechnology at Texas A&M University, where she coordinates the master's degree program in science and technology journalism.
Dr. Gastel has a BA degree from Yale and MD and MPH degrees from Johns Hopkins. After medical school, she did an American Association for the Advancement of Science mass media fellowship at Newsweek. She then worked in communication and administration at the National Institutes of Health. She also has taught science writing at MIT and spent two years as visiting professor of technical communication at Beijing Medical University (now Peking University Health Science Center). Before coming to Texas A&M University in 1989, she was assistant dean for teaching at the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine.
Dr. Gastel is the author of three books: Presenting Science to the Public (ISI Press, 1983), Teaching Science: A Guide for College and Professional School Instructors (Oryx Press, 1991), and Health Writer's Handbook, now in its second edition (Blackwell Publishing, 2005). In addition, she coauthored, with Robert A. Day, the sixth edition of How to Write and Publish a Scientific Paper (Greenwood Press, 2006). She also has written many articles and chapters on writing, teaching, and medical topics.
Since 1996 Dr. Gastel has directed the US aspect of a program, funded by the China Medical Board of New York, to teach English-language biomedical writing and editing in Asia. Recently she was named Knowledge Community Editor for AuthorAID @ INASP, a program to help researchers in developing countries to publish their work.
Dr. Gastel is editor of Science Editor, the periodical of the Council of Science Editors. She also is active in the American Medical Writers Association. She has received distinguished service awards from these two organizations, and she is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In 2006, the Board of Editors in the Life Sciences named her an Honored Editor in the Life Sciences.
Please contact Dr. Gastel at 1-979-845-6887 or bgastel@cvm.tamu.edu.
