Headshot of Kat McGowan.

Kat McGowan

Contributing Editor
The Transmitter

Kat McGowan is a freelance writer and editor based in the Bay Area. She edits Deep Dive articles for The Transmitter.

Previously a special projects editor at Discover magazine and a senior editor at Psychology Today, she writes for a range of digital and  print publications, most recently Wired, Nautilus, Aeon, Genome and Slate. She writes about neuroscience, genetics, psychology and other ideas about who we are as people and as a species. Her Discover cover story about the failures of memory, “Out of the Past,” was selected for “Best American Science and Nature Writing” in 2010.

Explore more from The Transmitter

Illustration of a bridge shaped like minds.

Commentary: Citation graphs may underestimate neuroscience’s influence on AI

An alternative, albeit less quantitative, way to trace this history is through the people who carried ideas between the fields.

By Anthony Zador
26 October 2026 | 5 min read
Illustration of a person, shown from the torso down, walking over a bridge shaped like minds.

Commentary: The rising absolute number of neuro-inspired AI papers represents a substantial footprint

Many of the design choices present in the current generation of artificial-intelligence tools parallel purported properties of the brain.

By Kim Stachenfeld
26 October 2026 | 2 min read
Illustration of a person walking over a bridge shaped like minds.

Examining the bridge between neuroscience and AI

A citation analysis reveals that the connection between the two fields is real and gaining momentum. But it’s also narrow and tool-heavy; we need to find ways to widen it.

By Renato Duarte
26 October 2026 | 12 min read