Julie M. Harris facts for kids

Julie Marie Harris (born in 1967) is a well-known scientist. She has been a Professor of Vision Science at the University of St Andrews. From 2011 to 2021, she was also the Director of Research in the School of Psychology and Neuroscience there. Her main work is about how our eyes and brains see things. She also studies how animals use camouflage.

Early Life and Education

Where Julie Harris Grew Up

Julie Harris was born in Wolverhampton, a city in England.

Her College Studies

She first went to Imperial College London. There, she studied physics and finished her degree in 1988. After that, she moved to the University of Oxford.

Earning Her Doctorate Degree

At Oxford, she worked on her Doctor of Philosophy degree, which she earned in 1992. Her research focused on how well humans see depth using both eyes. This is called binocular stereopsis. She looked at how our brains figure out how far away things are.

Career and Research

Starting Her Scientific Journey

In 1992, after finishing her studies, Julie Harris went to work in San Francisco. She joined the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute. She worked there for three years as a postdoctoral fellow. This means she was doing research after getting her main degree.

Moving to Different Universities

In 1995, she became a lecturer at the University of Edinburgh. A lecturer is like a teacher and researcher at a university. Later, in 1998, she moved to Newcastle University. There, she became an associate professor. In 2005, she joined the University of St Andrews as a full Professor of Psychology.

What Julie Harris Studies

Professor Harris studies how our visual systems work. She wants to know what information our eyes and brains can use from the world around us. She uses different methods to understand human vision. This includes studying how our eyes move and how our brains process what we see.

How We See Motion and Depth

Her early work looked at how accurately we judge the direction of moving objects with both eyes. She also studies how the brain sees motion, shape, and depth. For example, she has shown that the brain processes 3D information in a special way. It sends signals through two different paths, one fast and one slow. This helps our visual system quickly understand if something is a 3D object.

Research on Animal Camouflage

Professor Harris also studies how animals use camouflage. She looks at how animals like caterpillars use countershading. This is a type of camouflage that helps them blend in by making their shape harder to see.

Vision and Sports

Besides camouflage, Professor Harris has also looked at how vision helps elite athletes. She studies the connection between what athletes see and how their bodies move during training.

New Research on Visual Patterns

In 2019, she received a special grant from the Leverhulme Trust. This grant helps her study how unusual patterns in busy environments might affect our visual system.

Selected Publications

Here are some of the scientific papers she has written:

• Guidance of locomotion on foot uses perceived target location rather than optic flow
• Speed discrimination of motion-in-depth using binocular cues
• Binocular vision and motion-in-depth