Please join us in congratulating our colleagues on these many wonderful achievements!

Richard L. Abbott received the International Council of Ophthalmology Mark Tso Golden Apple Award at the World Ophthalmology Congress in Guadalajara, Mexico. This award is bestowed upon that individual who has demonstrated innovation or exceptional achievements in ophthalmic education, and who has advanced, advocated, and worked towards improvement of education in the region.

Christophe Baudouin, Professor and Chair of Ophthalmology at the Quinze-Vingts National Ophthalmology Hospital, received the most important medal in France, the Légion d’Honneur. In recognition of his outstanding contributions to the ophthalmic field, the French Minister of Health, Marisol Touraine, presented the award to Dr. Baudouin during a ceremony at the Quinze-Vingts National Ophthalmology Hospital in Paris on April 22, 2015. The Legion of Honour (Ordre National de la Légion d’Honneur) is the highest decoration in France. In the era following the French Revolution, when the orders of chivalry had been abolished, Napoleon Bonaparte decided to create an award to recognize exemplary civilians, persons of all ranks and professions, based upon merit instead of nobility. Dr. Baudouin’s Chevalier status is given only to those with eminent merits. Christophe Baudouin was also awarded membership in the Academia Ophthalmologica Internationalis (Chair LXXIII) in 2013 and in the European Academy of Ophthalmology (Chair XV) in 2014.

Edward Buckley was appointed Chair of Department of Ophthalmology at Duke University.

Louis B. Cantor was elected to his second term as Senior Secretary for Education at the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO). In that role he serves on the Executive Committee of the AAO.

Michael Chiang received the following appointments: Associate Editor, Journal of AAPOS; Board of Trustees, American Academy of Ophthalmology; Associate Editor, Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association; he also received the Secretariat Award and the Senior Achievement Award from the American Academy of Ophthalmology.

Reza Dana received the Kersley Medal from the British Ocular Surface Society and delivered an associated lecture entitled, "Ocular surface inflammation - lab to bedside" at the Society's 22nd Annual Scientific Meeting in London on December 4, 2015.

Janet L. Davis received the AAO Life Achievement Honor Award in 2015 and also was named the Leach Distinguished Professor of Ophthalmology at the Bascom Palmer Eye Institute.

Alan H. Friedman was elected President of The New York Ophthalmological Society (NYOS) for 2016. The NYOS is older than the AOS and was founded in 1864!

Thomas Gardner received the Award of Merit in Retina Research from the Retina Society and was inducted as an ARVO Fellow (Gold).

Morton F. Goldberg has established the RYR-1 Foundation (please see www.ryr1.org), and AOS members contributed generously to support the Foundation in its inaugural year. Donations from friends and family have enabled the RYR-1 Foundation to confer four major research grants related to RYR-1 myopathy, a currently untreatable progressive muscle degeneration affecting Dr. Goldberg’s family. Grant applications were submitted from seven different countries, and $360,000 were awarded after peer review. An inaugural International Family meeting will be held in Baltimore from July 22-24, 2016 to provide information and support to affected families. Details of this meeting are available at www.ryr1.org.

Karl Golnik was named Chair of Ophthalmology at the University of Cincinnati in September 2015.

Evangelos Gragoudas was awarded an honorary doctorate from the Faculty of Health Sciences of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki on November 27, 2015 in recognition of his pioneering work in retinal diseases and intraocular tumors. Dr. Gragoudas also presented the J. Donald M. Gass lecture at the Retina Society Annual Meeting in Paris, France on October 8, 2015, in recognition of the 40th anniversary of the first patient with choroidal melanoma receiving proton beam therapy. Dr. Gragoudas and colleagues developed the use of proton beam irradiation for uveal melanoma, which has been used to safely treat over 15,000 patients to date.

Mark Humayun received the National Medal of Technology and Innovation, which will be awarded by President Obama at the White House. Dr. Humayun is one of nine recipients of the medal this year and was recognized for his lifelong dedication to using medical science and engineering to restore sight to the blind and visually impaired as exemplified by the Argus II retinal prosthesis.

Judy E. Kim, Professor of Ophthalmology at the Medical College of Wisconsin, was the recipient of a Senior Honor Award at the 2015 Annual Meeting of American Society of Retina Specialists held in Vienna, Austria.

Joan W. Miller was elected to the National Academy of Medicine. Only 70 national and 10 international members are elected annually. Dr. Miller and her colleagues pioneered the application of photodynamic therapy to the treatment of choroidal neovascularization and recognized the importance of vascular endothelial growth factor in ocular neovascularization.

J. Sebag is editor of the book entitled, The Vitreous in Health and Disease, published by Springer. The book can be viewed at the following link: http://www.springer.com/us/book/9781493910854.

Kent W. Small along with an international group of collaborators (including fellow AOS member, Edwin Stone) has identified mutations causing North Carolina Macular Dystrophy (Small KW, DeLuca AP, Whitmore SS, et al. North Carolina Macular Dystrophy Is Caused by Dysregulation of the Retinal Transcription Factor PRDM13. Ophthalmology. 2016 Jan;123(1):9-18). Dr. Small began investigating the cause of this disease when he was a resident at Duke! In an accompanying editorial, Dr. Richard Weleber described the work as “one of the most important studies in our field in the past several decades.”

Bruce Spivey received the Laureate Award, the highest honor of the American Academy of Ophthalmology and the Marshall M. Parks, M.D. Silver Medal from the American Association for Pediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus (AAPOS) and Children’s Eye Foundation.

David Wallace was appointed Vice Chair for Clinical Strategic Planning in the Department of Ophthalmology at Duke University.

Steven Wilson received a 5-year renewal of his NIH grant entitled, “Corneal Epithelial Growth Factors and Receptors.” This renewal constitutes 26 years of continuous NIH funding!

Please join us in congratulating our colleagues on these many wonderful achievements!