Board of Visionary Scientists

  • Samuel G. Jacobson, M.D., Ph.D., Chairman

    Center for Hereditary Retinal Degenerations
    Scheie Eye Institute

    Dr. Jacobson received his M.D. in 1970 from the University of Illinois and earned his Ph.D. from the University of London in 1977. After he completed his Ph.D., he began his training in ophthalmology at Harvard Medical School and completed this residency in 1980. He is currently leading the research on the RPE65 project at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Jacobson is the director of the Center for Hereditary Retinal Degenerations and holds the F.M. Kirby Chair in Ophthalmology at Scheie Eye Institute, University of Pennsylvania.

  • Jean Bennett, M.D., Ph.D.

    University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, F.M. Kirby Center for Molecular Ophthalmology, Scheie Eye Institute & Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Center for Cellular and Molecular Therapeutics
    Philadelphia, PA

    Dr. Bennett attended Yale University and graduated in 1976 with a degree in honors biology. She earned a PhD in Zoology and Cell and Developmental Biology from University of California, Berkeley in 1980 and then carried out a postdoctoral fellowship in Anatomy and Radiation Biology and Environmental Health at University of California, San Francisco. She received her MD from Harvard Medical School in 1986 and then carried out post-graduate work at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. It was during this time that she began working on gene therapy for retinal degenerative diseases. She joined the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in 1992 where she is currently a professor of Ophthalmology and Cell and Developmental Biology.

  • Thomas W. Chalberg, Ph.D.

    Genentech
    San Francisco, CA

    Dr. Chalberg attended Harvard College and graduated in 1998 with a degree in biochemistry. He earned a Ph.D. in Genetics from Stanford Medical School in 2005, where his research focused on retinal diseases and novel technologies for gene therapy, including development of site-specific genomic integration using non-viral vectors. Dr. Chalberg is currently a Manager in Market Development at Genentech, where he works on Lucentis, a novel therapeutic for age-related macular degeneration.

  • Alex W. Cohen, M.D., Ph.D.

    Albert Einstein College of Medicine
    Bronx, NY

    Alex Cohen received his M.D., Ph.D. from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. He has published over twenty research articles focusing on the genetic and molecular basis of diseases such as diabetes, cardiomyopathy, and retinal degeneration. He will be a resident in the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of Iowa.

  • Debora B. Farber, Ph.D.

    Jules Stein Eye Institute
    UCLA Center for Health Science
    Los Angeles, CA
    Dr. Farber received her Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from the University of Buenos Aires in 1966 and subsequently completed postdoctoral work in the fields of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She is currently a Professor of Ophthalmology at the David Geffen School of Medicine, UCLA. From 1994 until 2005 Dr. Farber served as Associate Director of the Jules Stein Eye Institute and Co-Chief of its Vision Science Division. Dr. Farber is also a member of UCLA¹s Molecular Biology Institute and of UCLA¹s Brain Research Institute. She has discovered several genes that when mutated cause different types of retinal degenerations and lately has been working on the development of novel gene therapy methods to cure inherited diseases of the retina.

  • Joe G. Hollyfield, Ph.D.

    Cole Eye Institute
    Cleveland Clinic Foundation

    Dr. Hollyfield received his Ph.D. degree in Zoology in 1966 from the University of Texas at Austin and was a postdoctoral fellow at the Hubrecht Laboratory in Utrecht, The Netherlands. In 1995, he moved to the Cleveland Clinic Foundation from the Retinitis Pigmentosa Research Center in the Cullen Eye Institute, where he had been director since 1978. He currently is Director of Ophthalmic Research at The Cleveland Clinic Foundation.

  • Nancy J. Mangini, Ph.D.

    Indiana University School of Medicine-Northwest

    Dr. Mangini earned her Ph.D. from Washington University, St. Louis in 1978 and continued with postdoctoral work at Purdue University in the fields of visual electrophysiology and biochemistry. She currently is an associate professor in cell biology and anatomy at Indiana University and is a full member of its Graduate Faculty.

  • Carmen Puliafito, M.D., M.B.A.

    Dean, Keck School of Medicine
    University of Southern California

    Dr. Puliafito received his M.D. from Harvard University and earned his M.B.A. from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. He is professor and chairman of the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and medical director of the Institute’s Anne Bates Leach Eye Hospital. In 2001, Dr. Puliafito was appointed director of Bascom Palmer Eye Institute and holds the Institute’s Stanley and Kathleen Glaser Chair in Ophthalmology.

  • Val Sheffield, M.D., Ph.D.

    Roy J. and Lucille A. Carver College of Medicine
    University of Iowa

    Dr. Sheffield received both his M.D. and Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. Dr. Sheffield is also Professor of Pediatrics and Director of the Division of Medical Genetics at the University of Iowa Roy J. and Lucille A. Carver College of Medicine. In 1998, he was chosen by the prestigious Howard Hughes Medical Institute to be a HHMI investigator.