Writing & Science

About

Steve Midway is a writer, scientist, and professor.

Steve has a BS degree from the University of Vermont, an MS from North Carolina State University, and a PhD from the University of North Carolina Wilmington. As a writer, Steve has been published in National Geographic, SLATE, and Southlands Magazine, among other places. He wrote The Science of Writing, a text used in teaching and by emerging science writers, and he was the lead editor for Methods for Fish Biology, 2nd Edition, which is considered a foundational text in fisheries science. Steve lives in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Writing

Publish and Perish :: SLATE, May 2026

Cannabis may make you remember things that never happened :: National Geographic, April 2026

Swamp to Table :: How Louisiana Invented the Crawfish Industry :: 64 Parishes [Forthcoming]

Poverty Point :: Southlands Magazine, March 2026

The growing fang-to-pharmacy pipeline :: STAT News, July 2026

Research

As a professor at Louisiana State University in the Department of Oceanography and Coastal Science, I manage a research lab focusing on ecology, fisheries, and how humans interact with the environment. I also investigate how people do science, including trends in peer review, best practices for data visualization, and what’s wrong with common assumptions we all make. My publications are available on Google Scholar; feel free to email me if you would like a copy of anything. I currently serve as the Editor-in-Chief of Transactions of the American Fisheries Society, the world's oldest fisheries science journal. I teach courses in scientific writing and data analysis, and I manage and advise a lab group working on a variety of projects.

Please reach out to discuss research ideas, collaborations, or anything else.

Consulting

I regularly consult on a wide range of projects. I have conducted patient surveys in healthcare systems, compiled syntheses of single species for permitting, and designed long-term ecosystem models. Consulting services range from study design to data analysis to report writing and visualization.