KEynote speakers
We are very happy and proud to announce that the following distinguished scientists have agreed to present their outstanding work during dedicated keynote lectures.
Vinit B. Mahajan, M.D., Ph.D.
Professor of Ophthalmology Stanford University Stanford, CA
Dr. Mahajan is a professor and vitreoretinal surgeon in the Department of Ophthalmology at Stanford University. He is the Vice Chair for Research and directs the Molecular Surgery Program and the NIH-funded Omics Laboratory that uses high-throughput methods in proteomics, genomics, and phenomics to identify molecules involved in eye disease. The lab uses liquid biopsies to identify protein biomarkers to better understand inflammation and immune mechanisms in the eye. His team also created the TEMPO precision health tool that integrates human proteomics with single cell gene expression to identify molecular pathways active in living humans. As a gene and molecular therapy surgeon, Mahajan and his multidisciplinary team help translate laboratory studies into human clinical trials at Stanford and through the founding and support of biomedical start-ups.
Rachel Huckfeldt, MD,PhD
Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology
Harvard Medical School
Boston, MA
Rachel Huckfeldt, MD, PhD is an Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology at Harvard Medical School and a clinician-scientist at Massachusetts Eye and Ear. She completed her MD and PhD training at Washington University in St. Louis with PhD research focused on retinal development in the lab of Dr. Rachel Wong. After finishing her ophthalmology residency at Mass Eye and Ear, Dr. Huckfeldt conducted postdoctoral research focused on novel therapeutics in the lab of Dr. Jean Bennett at the University of Pennsylvania followed by clinical fellowships in medical retina (University of Iowa) and inherited retinal disorders (Mass Eye and Ear).
Dr. Huckfeldt’s clinical practice and clinical research are focused on inherited retinal disorders (IRDs). As Director of IRD Clinical Trials at Mass Eye and Ear, she leads Mass Eye and Ear’s participation in multiple clinical trials of investigational therapies. She is also the Co-Chair of the Foundation Fighting Blindness Clinical Consortium, which is comprised of over 40 clinical sites with expertise in IRDs. The Consortium’s activities include a growing number of prospective natural history studies with goals that include using the resulting data to inform clinical trial design and endpoint selection. Dr. Huckfeldt is also the director of the Inherited Retinal Degenerations clinical fellowship at Mass Eye and Ear.
Donald T. Miller , PhD.
Professor
School of Optometry
Indiana University
Donald T. Miller is a professor at the School of Optometry and the Graduate Program in Vision Science at Indiana University. He received his BS degree in Physics from Xavier University and his PhD in Optics from the University of Rochester in 1996. He continued on as a postdoctoral fellow at Rochester and later served as a National Research Council Research Associate at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. In 1998, he joined the faculty at Indiana University School of Optometry, where he has held the rank of Professor since 2011.
Dr. Miller’s research focuses on applying optical engineering and biomedical optics to the human eye. His laboratory develops and utilizes powerful optical imaging systems to study structures and processes in the living human retina at the cellular level in normal and diseased eyes, studies that have been traditionally limited to histology. In particular, he has pioneered the development of high-resolution imaging systems based on the technologies of adaptive optics and optical coherence tomography. The unprecedented 3D resolution and speed of these systems have enabled cells across the full thickness of the retina to be imaged and tracked for the first time, including the highly transparent neurons of the inner retina, such as ganglion cell somas, and the photoreceptor somas of the outer retina. This has opened exciting new possibilities for both basic and clinical research targeting these previously elusive cells. In collaboration with others, Dr. Miller is using this technology to investigate cellular-level structural and functional biomarkers for retinitis pigmentosa, Stargardt disease, glaucoma, and pentosan polysulfate sodium maculopathy, in addition to scientific studies on color vision anomalies and photoreceptor spectral sensitivity. Dr. Miller is a fellow of SPIE and Optica, and a recipient of the Glenn Fry Award, sponsored by the American Academy of Optometry, and the Rank Prize for Optoelectronics, sponsored by the Rank Foundation. He has received Indiana University Trustees’ Teaching Award twice for excellence in teaching.
Leah Byrne, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology
University of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, PA
Leah Byrne, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor at the University of Pittsburgh Department of Ophthalmology. The primary research focus of the Byrne lab is to create new approaches that directly address the most important unmet needs in the field of gene therapy. The Byrne Lab develops gene therapies for retinal disease, including a diverse group of blinding disorders that have a profound impact on the quality of life of patients. The Byrne lab is exploring gene augmentation, optogenetics, and genome editing approaches to treat inherited and age-related forms of blindness.
Dr. Byrne earned a bachelor’s degree in Neuroscience from Hamilton College. She then studied as a Fulbright Fellow at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden. Dr. Byrne earned a PhD in Neuroscience from the University of California Berkeley in 2007. Dr. Byrne then worked as a Ruth L. Kirschstein NRSA Postdoctoral Fellow, and a Ford Foundation Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania and UC Berkeley. Dr. Byrne started her research program at the University of Pittsburgh in 2017. Dr. Byrne has been awarded a RPB Career Development Award, A Foundation Fighting Blindness Individual Investigator Award, and in 2023 she received the University of Pittsburgh Office of Innovation Emerging Innovator Award. Recently, Dr. Byrne was named a Senior Member of the National Academy of Inventors. Dr. Byrne is also the co-founder and CSO of Avista Therapeutics, a gene therapy biotechnology company based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.