Chairs Message

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the creation of the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of California, Irvine. As our institution has grown in international recognition and acclaim, so has our department, which was founded when the campus was just 10 years old.

In 1975, dean of medicine Dr. Stanley van den Noort and Allergan founder Gavin Herbert pulled off a remarkable feat: they convinced the world’s leading expert on ocular pharmacology to leave his prestigious post as chair of the ophthalmology department at New York’s Mt. Sinai School of Medicine to come to the fledgling Irvine campus. Dr. Irving H. Leopold would serve as the founding chair of the UC Irvine Department of Ophthalmology, and lay the foundation for excellence and innovation upon which we have continued building over the last five decades.

Today, we provide world-class eye research, teaching and patient care in Orange County. In 2024 alone, the Department of Ophthalmology saw more than 95,000 patient visits, and provided more than 5,000 surgeries. And each year, we continue expanding our clinical team and facilities to treat more patients.

Our research enterprise is thriving, as well. Today, Krzysztof Palczewski, Ph.D., holds the title of Irving H. Leopold Chair of Ophthalmology and Distinguished Professor, and continues our founder’s legacy of innovation. When the Falling Leaves Foundation Medical Innovation Building opens this spring next to the Gavin Herbert Eye Institute, the entire sixth floor will be dedicated to groundbreaking research in the Center for Translational Vision Research and the Center and the Program in Precision Genome Editing– both under the direction of Dr. Palczewski.

Celebrations this fall will mark the opening of the Falling Leaves Foundation Medical Innovation Building. Among the festivities, which serendipitously align with our department’s 50th anniversary as well as the formal recognition of the Center for Translational Vision Research by UCI campus as a prestigious Organized Research Unit, there will be an academic symposium featuring lectures by three Nobel Laureates. Certainly, this convergence of great minds will set the tone for the game-changing and inspired research expected to take place inside the new facility.

I’m also delighted to share that ophthalmology and biomedical engineering faculty James V. Jester, Ph.D., the Jack H. Skirball Endowed Chair, has earned the mantle of Distinguished Professor. This campus-level title is reserved for those who have “achieved the highest levels of scholarship over the course of their careers,” and is testament to Dr. Jester’s professional longevity and research productivity. His current work focuses on treating corneal thinning, astigmatism and refractive errors with a laser technique called non-linear optical corneal collagen crosslinking. Additionally, he is researching the meibomian gland’s function to better understand its role in evaporative dry eye disease, which affects so many of our patients.

We are pleased to welcome a new director of the National Keratoconus Foundation, Amy Hellem, PhD, FAAO. Dr. Hellem, who previously served as editor in chief of the Review of Optometry, brings extensive experience in science communication, and will benefit the national nonprofit which we house here in the department.  We extend our heartfelt gratitude to the previous director, Mary Prudden, JD, for her excellent stewardship of this wonderful patient outreach organization run by our department, and wish her the best in her retirement.

Currently, we are in the final stages of recruiting two new faculty: one in visual neuroscience and the other in genome editing. We look forward to announcing them this summer, and welcoming them to our campus sometime in the fall — continuing our growth.

As the Department of Ophthalmology marks its anniversary, we have many visionary leaders, both on campus and in the community, to thank for our growth. They, along with dedicated clinicians and staff, have created an institution that our university and our community can be proud of. Most importantly, we have served countless patients over the last half century who entrusted us with one of their most treasured resources: their vision. We appreciate and celebrate them all, as we look forward to the next chapter.

Baruch D. Kuppermann, MD, PhD

Director, UCI Health Gavin Herbert Eye Institute

Chair, Department of Ophthalmology, UC Irvine School of Medicine