José-Alain Sahel, MD, Receives António Champalimaud Vision Award

José-Alain Sahel, MD, distinguished professor and chairman of the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and director of the UPMC Vision Institute, received the prestigious António Champalimaud Vision Award together with his colleague Botond Roska, MD, PhD, of the Institute for Molecular and Clinical Ophthalmology Basel (IOB), for their work to restore sight using optogenetics, a research tool that uses light to control cell activity.

The retina is a layer of thin, light-sensitive tissue at the back of the eye that converts light into electrical signals for transmission through the optic nerve to the brain, creating sight. Optogenetics uses a combination of gene therapy, which reprograms cells in the retina, and specially engineered goggles that emit light pulses to activate the reprogrammed cells to partially restore vision.

In 2021, Dr. Sahel and Dr. Roska published, along with collaborators at the Paris Institut de la Vision, a groundbreaking study in Nature Medicine that outlined the first instance of partial vision restoration in a human patient. This is the first-ever published clinical application of optogenetics; the trial was conducted in Paris, London, and Pittsburgh.

The Champalimaud Foundation aims to advance medical research and improve clinical care to benefit humanity. The António Champalimaud Vision Award is named for its founder, who lost his sight later in life, and recognizes major advancements in research related to vision and sight restoration and to the fight against blindness and visual impairments in developing regions. As one of the largest and most important awards in vision, the Champalimaud Award extends one million euros in unrestricted funding to its recipients to further their research, clinical practice, or public health programs.

Dr. Sahel and Dr. Roska received the award on Tuesday, Sept. 15 in Lisbon and will deliver the Champalimaud Award Lecture at the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO) Annual Meeting in San Diego in May 2027.