Joshua Sariñana, PhD, is a neuroscientist, artist, and writer working at the intersection of science, technology, and cultural representation. He completed his doctorate in neuroscience at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, following research training at NASA Ames Research Center, UCLA, and Harvard University. His early scientific work included co-authoring a Nature paper that provided the first conclusive evidence of sugar-related compounds in meteorites, contributing to broader theories about the chemical origins of life. He later studied how dopamine modulates neural circuits underlying memory and spatial cognition.

Sariñana’s interdisciplinary research brings scientific inquiry into conversation with the humanities, focusing on how cognition, decision-making, and internal experience are shaped by social, technological, and institutional systems. He has directed collaborative projects that bring together poets, artists, and scientists to surface hidden structures that underlie dominant narratives, using multimodal forms including photography, writing, audio, and data visualization.

His current work explores ways of visualizing cognitive and decision processes using qualitative methods and artificial intelligence, translating participants’ internal representations into portraiture, network maps, audio narratives, and statistical analyses. Through this work, he aims to make visible the often-invisible constraints that shape how people think, choose, and act.

Sariñana’s art has been exhibited at Aperture Gallery, recognized by the Sony World Photography Awards, and published in Communication Arts. He has contributed insights to WIRED, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and MIT Technology Review, and served on the National Book Foundation’s 2025 Science + Literature Award committee.