Julian Forsyth
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Researcher, Developer


I’m a Toronto-based researcher and developer with primary research interests in AI Safety and Interpretability, particularly as they apply to Medicine and Robotics. I'm currently completing my Masters of Science in Applied Computing (MScAC) at the University of Toronto.

In my spare time I try to get outside as much as possible, and watch great and/or terrible movies.

Portrait of Julian

Latest Work

Interactive Concept Explorer

A demo for our Universal Sparse Autoencoder project at ICML 2025! Made in collaboration with Thomas Fel.

Universal Sparse Autoencoder Screenshot Universal SAE Additional Image

Presenting at ICML 2025!

We presented our paper "Universal Sparse Autoencoders: Interpretable Cross-Model Concept Alignment" at ICML 2025 in Vancouver.

Publications

"Universal Sparse Autoencoders: Interpretable Cross-Model Concept Alignment"

2025 International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML)
Access paper here

"Robot Wheelchair Convoys for Assistive Human Transportation"

Proceedings of the 2024 IEEE International Conference on Smart Mobility
Access paper here

Work

Research Assistant, Computer Vision & Imaging Lab

@ York University, 2024 - present
- Collaborated with an inter-institutional team to conduct cutting-edge research focused on interpretability in deep neural networks
- Designed and implemented an innovative training framework
- Developed statistical and visual tools to communicate our findings and reveal model insights
- Contributed as second author to a paper for ICML 2025 (International Conference on Machine Learning)

Software Engineer & Researcher, Elder Laboratory

NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award
@ York University, 2023
- Developed motion control and obstacle avoidance protocols for an autonomous wheelchair robot.
- Collaborated with robotics team made up of engineers and developers under Dr. James Elder.

Teaching Assistant

@ York University, 2022 - Present
- Guided students in Java coding, Object-Oriented Programming concepts and data structures.
- Helped students debug their code and work through challenges.

Education

MSc in Applied Computing

@ University of Toronto, Sept 2025 – Dec 2026 (expected)

B.A. Honours in Computer Science

@ York University, 2020 - 2024, GPA: 3.9
Graduated First Class with Distinction

B.A. in Philosophy

@ Concordia University, 2017 - 2019, GPA: 3.8

Projects

Short Term Load Forecasting with GANs

@ York University, 2024
- Exploring Generative Adversarial Networks as a tool for predicting energy usage on residential power grids. Supervised by Dr. Michael Jenkin.

Syntax Writing Assistance Tool

@ York University, 2023
- Created a tool to improve word choice in text using GPT-2 and BERT.

E-Commerce Platform

@ York University, 2023
- Built a model marketplace with Java Spring, SQL backend, and React frontend, deployed on AWS.