Rosalyn Moran

Rosalyn J. Moran is a British neuroscientist and computational psychiatrist. She is deputy director of the King's College London Institute for Artificial Intelligence. Her research looks to understand neural algorithms through brain connectivity.

Early life and education
Moran grew up in Ireland, where she studied applied mathematics at the local boys school. Moran was an undergraduate and postgraduate student in electronic engineering at the University College Dublin. Her doctoral research applied information theory to biomedical signal processing. During her PhD, she met a scientist who was combining electrical and chemical analysis of schizophrenia, and became interested in pursuing a career in neuroscience. She was a postdoctoral researcher at University College London supported by the Wellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging.

Research and career
Moran moved to Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine and Research Institute in 2012, where she spent four years as an assistant professor. She returned to the United Kingdom in 2016 and joined the University of Bristol as a senior lecturer. In 2018, she was made associate professor at King's College London. She became deputy director of the King's Institute for Artificial Intelligence in 2022.

Moran's research combines artificial intelligence, Bayesian inference and experimental neurobiology to understand brain connectivity and neural processing. She is interested in how neurotransmitters (e.g. noradrenaline, serotonin) in decision making. She uses deep networks to model diseases, with a focus on neurodegenerative diseases and schizophrenia.

Moran has investigated the free energy principle, an all-purpose mode of the brain and human behaviour. The free energy principle is based on surprise minimisation, brains work to minimise free energy. Moran has argued that the free energy principle offers an alternative rationale for generative artificial intelligence.