Erin Grant, PhD, BSc

Availability

Recruiting for Fall 2026; see "Announcements" below.

About

I am an incoming Assistant Professor jointly appointed in the Departments of Psychology and Computing Science at the University of Alberta, and a Fellow at the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute (Amii). My research bridges cognitive science, neuroscience, and artificial intelligence to understand how minds, brains, and machines learn to perceive the world, structure their knowledge, and act towards short- and long-term goals.

Prior to joining the University of Alberta, I was an Assistant Professor / Faculty Fellow at the Center for Data Science at New York University, and before that, a Senior Research Fellow at the Gatsby Computational Neuroscience Unit and the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre at University College London. I earned my Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley in 2022 with support from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC). During my doctorate, I also worked as a research intern at OpenAI, Google Brain, and DeepMind.

I am passionate about giving back to my research communities. I currently serve on the Board of Directors of the nonprofit Women in Machine Learning, am an active member of the organizing committees of conferences in machine learning, cognitive science and neuroscience (ICLR, NeurIPS, CCN) and regularly co-organize topical workshops within my research interests (Re-Align, Analytical Connectionism, Data on the Brain & Mind).

Research

I investigate how both biological and artificial intelligence systems build internal representations of the world to support perception, cognition, and action. My research combines modelling—namely, simulations and mathematical analysis of artificial neural networks and other machine learning models—with empirical testing against neural and behavioural data from humans and other animals. Using these methods, I aim to identify how simple computational principles of learning and generalization enable complex abilities—like vision, language, decision-making, and planning—and to apply these insights to advance both our understanding of biological intelligence and the development of more robust and transparent artificial intelligence (AI) systems.

See my publications for more details.

Teaching

I will be teaching undergraduate and graduate courses in both the Psychology and Computing Science departments. I have previous experience teaching courses in machine learning and applied mathematics:

DS-GA 1018: Probabilistic Time Series Analysis Fall 2025 at New York University

📌 I am actively seeking motivated trainees at all levels (research intern, undergraduate research student, Master's, PhD, postdoc) with strong backgrounds in computational methods, machine learning, cognitive science, or neuroscience to join my lab.

To express interest in working with me, please fill out this form. I aim to respond to enquiries submitted via this form within 1-2 weeks. (Master's and PhD applications also require meeting a deadline; see the Note below).

Before you reach out over email, please note that due to the number of emails I receive on the topic, I am unlikely to respond to direct enquiries about working with me if we haven't had prior contact ("cold emails"). I am more likely to be able to respond to a submission to the form above, as it asks for the information I need. If you would still like to email me for such an enquiry, please make sure to demonstrate genuine engagement with my research (e.g., by reading a few of my papers so that you can outline how your research interests align with the directions of my lab).

Note on Master's / PhD applications:

I will review applications to graduate degree (Master's, PhD) programs at the University of Alberta in the Fall 2026 application cycle. I can supervise Master's and PhD students through both Psychology (deadline December 1st) and Computing Science (deadline December 15th). (Please note that in Canada, students typically complete a Master's degree before beginning their PhD, so if you do not already have a Master’s degree, please apply to the relevant Master's program.) If you are interested in working with me, please apply to one of these programs, and mention my name in your application. To make sure I see your application, please also fill out the above form.

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