What do visual prosthesis users see, and why? Clinical studies have shown that the vision provided by current devices differs substantially from normal sight.
Emily M. Joyce
(she/her)
PhD Student
University of California, Santa Barbara
Emily is a PhD student in the Dynamical Neuroscience (DYNS) program at UC Santa Barbara. She previously worked with EM connectomics datasets at Janelia and at the Allen Institute, where she conducted research in cell typing and neural circuitry in sensory areas. During this time, she also developed open-source tools to analyze neuronal morphology and connectivity.
Emily is an inaugural UC Noyce Graduate Student Fellow, one of five graduate students selected across the UC system. Her research focuses on understanding information processing in retinal bipolar cells to improve prostheses that stimulate these cells directly. She uses cell- and circuit-level computational modeling to study how retinal stimulation may give rise to richer visual percepts, including color.
In her free time, she enjoys gardening, training her dogs and learning how to surf.
- 3201D BioEngineering
Honors & Awards
- Graduate Fellowship, UC Noyce Initiative (2026–2028)
- Summer Internship, Science Corporation (2026)
- Regents Fellowship, Dynamical Neuroscience, UCSB (2024–2025)
Education
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PhD in Dynamical Neuroscience, 2029 (expected)
University of California, Santa Barbara
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BA in Neuroscience, 2018
Scripps College
Project Lead
Project Affiliate
Towards a Smart Bionic Eye
Rather than aiming to one day restore natural vision, we might be better off thinking about how to create practical and useful artificial vision now.