Meredith Rizzo
Meredith Rizzo is a visuals editor and art director on NPR's Science desk. She produces multimedia stories that illuminate science topics through visual reporting, animation, illustration, photography and video. In her time on the Science desk, she's reported from Hong Kong during the early days of the pandemic, photographed the experiences of the first patient to receive an experimental CRISPR treatment for sickle cell disease and covered post-wildfire issues from Australia to California. In 2021, she worked with a team on NPR's Joy Generator, a randomized ideas machine for ways to tap into positive emotions following a year of life in the pandemic. In 2019, she photographed, reported and produced another interactive visual guide exploring how the shape and size of many common grocery store plastics affect their recyclability.
Her video work has included science explainer videos on the physics of bullets to how long you can be contagious with the flu, and an animated series on the science of invention. As an art director, she helped build NPR's network of freelance illustrators and animators, growing the community through NPR's Illustration Tumblr. She has also art directed for three seasons of the NPR podcast Invisibilia.
Rizzo holds a master's degree in New Media Photojournalism from Corcoran College of Art + Design and a bachelor's degree in photography from Wolverhampton University in the U.K. Prior to joining NPR in 2013, she photographed artifacts from the Library of Congress' collections, contributing to a public archive of more than 150,000 images over four years.
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Family violence increases in places that have been severely burned in bushfires, Australian research finds. The isolation and financial stress of COVID-19 appear to be exacerbating the problem. -
After deadly 2009 wildfires, authorities offered to buy property to encourage people to move. Few accepted. The questions raised by Australia's experience are freshly urgent after its latest fires. -
Students, business owners, sanitation workers and doctors are all struggling to cope with the daily frustrations of living in a city of 7 million that's afraid of an outbreak of COVID-19. -
Heavy rains in eastern Australia are causing mudslides and debris flows in areas that burned. Scientists are trying to predict when and where slides are likely to happen. -
In the year since Paradise, Calif., was devastated by fire, certain flame-tinged objects — scorched pottery fragments or remnants of toys — have become talismans of resilience beyond pain. -
Not all bullets are created equal. This video compares the damage caused by different kinds of rounds.
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Across the West, hundreds of communities are vulnerable to wildfires. But wildfire and recovery experts warn that the impulse to re-create what was there before disaster is misguided and dangerous. -
Rethinking Disaster Recovery After A California Town Is Leveled By WildfireThe 2018 Camp Fire destroyed 90% of the town of Paradise, Calif., and killed 85 people. Should the federal government jump in to rebuild communities at high risk of future disasters? -
They had always been partners, in a way — artists who connected through their work. So, when Gene DiRado began withdrawing from the world, his son rushed toward him — and brought along a camera. -
For the first time in years, Delta County in western Colorado is experiencing population growth, one indicator that rural Americans are increasingly feeling optimistic about their economic future.
