Julia C. Gorman
Julia Gorman

Julia C. Gorman

Anticipation and control in neural population dynamics.

PhD candidate in the Gentner Lab at UC San Diego. Joining the Brunton Lab at the University of Washington as a postdoctoral fellow in April 2027.

research

The brain does not just react to the world. It anticipates it. My work asks what that anticipation looks like in the geometry of neural populations, and how it shapes behavior. I study these questions in the songbird vocal system, a distributed circuit that controls a closed-loop behavior, singing. The sounds the motor system produces are the same sounds the auditory system perceives. This gives a natural parity between production and perception, and lets me ask the same question of both systems within one analytical framework. In both systems, anticipation shows up in how activity across a population of neurons is arranged as opposed to being visible through looking at single-neuron tuning effects alone. My thesis combines large-scale electrophysiology, dynamical systems modeling, and naturalistic behavior. I expect to defend in December 2026. My work is supported by an NIH F99/K00 Predoctoral to Postdoctoral Transition Award.

More on my research

outreach and teaching

I have spent close to a decade helping build pathways into science. At UCSD I sit on the board of Colors of the Brain, an undergraduate mentorship program that partners with the Kavli Institute for Brain and Mind on a summer research program for students from historically marginalized backgrounds. I have also taught and TA’d for STARTneuro, an NIH BP ENDURE program that funds research experiences for incoming transfer students. I went through a BP ENDURE program myself, at Washington University in St. Louis.

In summer 2025 I designed a course from scratch, Brain, Behavior, and Evolution, and served as instructor of record for a class of upper-division students. I paired textbook chapters with the primary papers behind them, so students could see not only what we know about a behavior but how that knowledge was actually gained.

Courses and syllabi

elsewhere

I grew up in Bend, Oregon and did my bachelor’s in mathematics and biology at Seattle University. In San Diego you can find me at the pottery wheel, trail running, and freediving. I also write about science for general audiences and have translated several pieces into Spanish.

Writing and sci-comm

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