July 2021 Newsletter
Feature Story
Our faculty, alumni, and guests recently came together to celebrate the department’s latest innovations across all sub-specialties of ophthalmology at the USC Roski Eye Institute 45th Annual Symposium.








HIGHLIGHTS
Chair Appointment
Fellow of the ASRS Designation
USC President Carol Folt approved Dr. Jesse Berry's appointment as the holder of the Berle and Lucy Adams Chair in Cancer Research. Her appointment is made based on the recommendation of a committee of eminent faculty colleagues and is in recognition of her outstanding contributions to USC and the Keck School of Medicine.
Several USC Roski Eye Institute faculty have received the new Fellow of the American Society of Retina Specialists (FASRS) designation:


Meet Our New Residents and Fellows
Caption: Ophthalmology residents pose with faculty leadership following the
resident white coat ceremony.
Caption: New Ophthalmology Fellows pose together on first day of fellowship orientation. Pictured (L to R): Linden Doss, MD (Oculoplastics); Chang Sup Lee, MD (Surgical Retina); Nicole Koulisis, MD (Surgical Retina); Ekjyot Gill, MD (Cornea);
and Van Nguyen, MD (Glaucoma).

Awards and Grants
Jesse Berry MD, delivered the keynote graduation speech at the University of Florida Department of Ophthalmology
Quote: "Don’t ever forget to follow your Northstar — it is your guiding light that should inform every step in your career. It is your why — why you wake up and take care of patients every day. Your Northstar will lead you to unexpected places in your life and in your career but it will ensure you will always stay true to your passions."

Melinda Chang, MD, received the Blind Children’s Center (BCC) Grant
Project Title: Eye tracking and Teller acuity for visual assessment in children with cortical visual impairment (CVI)
Award Date: July 1, 2021

Melinda Chang, MD, received the RCDA Research Career Development Award
Project Title: Validation of eye tracking in children with cortical/cerebral visual impairment (CVI) and correlation with neuropsychological testing
Award Date: July 1, 2021

David Cobrinik, MD, PhD, received the TSRI 2nd NIH R01 Pilot Grant Program
Project Title: Trans-cytoplasmic Transport of Repetitive Element DNAs
Award Date: July 1, 2021

Qifa Zhou, PhD, received the USC Stevens Center for Innovation Technology Advancement Grant (TAG); Co-PIs: Mark Humayun, MD, PhD; and Brian Song, MD, MPH
Project Title: Super Resolution Ultrasound Blood Flow Imaging of the Posterior Eye for Glaucoma
Award Date: July 1, 2021

In the News
Newsweek named Gloria Chiu, OD, FAAO, FSLS; Narsing Rao, MD; and Benjamin Xu, MD, PhD as America's Best Eye Doctors 2021.


Faculty Publications
Since July 1, 2021 our faculty have published 30 papers. Eligible publications included those that were e-published in June:

Faculty Publications:

1.   Melinda Chang, MD, co-authored the paper, “Botulinum Toxin Injection for the Treatment of Strabismus: A Report by the American Academy of Ophthalmology” in Ophthalmology.

2.   Melinda Chang, MD, co-authored the paper, “Home- and Office-Based Vergence and Accommodative Therapies for Treatment of Convergence Insufficiency in Children and Young Adults: A Report by the American Academy of Ophthalmology" in Ophthalmology.

3.   Aaron Nagiel, MD, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Characterization of the Spectrum of Ophthalmic Changes in Patients With Alagille Syndrome” in Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science.

4.   Jesse Berry, MD, co-authored the paper, “Sex, gender, and retinoblastoma: analysis of 4351 patients from 153 countries” in Eye (London).

5.   David Cobrinik, MD, PhD, and Jesse Berry, MD, co-authored the paper, “Comprehensive Somatic Copy Number Analysis Using Aqueous Humor Liquid Biopsy for Retinoblastoma” in Cancers.

6.   Cheryl Craft, PhD, and Shinwu Jeong, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Matrix metalloproteinase-9 (MMP-9) and tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinases 1 (TIMP-1) are localized in the nucleus of retinal Müller glial cells and modulated by cytokines and oxidative stress” in PLoS One.

7.   Mark Humayun, MD, PhD, and Gianluca Lazzi, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Publisher Correction: Color and cellular selectivity of retinal ganglion cell subtypes through frequency modulation of electrical stimulation” in Scientific Reports.

8.   Brian Toy, MD, co-authored the paper, “Implementation of a pilot teleretinal screening protocol for hydroxychloroquine retinopathy in a Los Angeles County safety net clinic” in the Journal of Telemedicine and Telecare.

9.   Cheryl Craft, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Clusterin enhances cell survival by suppressing neuronal nitric-oxide synthase expression in the rhodopsin S334ter-line3 retinitis pigmentosa model” in Brain Research.

10. Qifa Zhou, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Deep image prior for undersampling high-speed photoacoustic microscopy” in Photoacoustics.

11. Mark Borchert, MD, and Melinda Chang, MD, co-authored the paper, “Ophthalmologic characteristics and outcomes of children with cortical visual impairment and cerebral palsy” in JAAPOS.

12. Liya Xu, PhD, Jonathan Kim, MD, and Jesse Berry, MD, co-authored the paper, "Inter-eye genomic heterogeneity in bilateral retinoblastoma via aqueous humor liquid biopsy" in NPJ Precision Oncology.

13. Paul Thompson, PhD, co-authored the paper, “The ENIGMA Toolbox: multiscale neural contextualization of multisite neuroimaging datasets” in Nature Methods.

14. Arthur Toga, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Functional Outcomes Over the First Year After Moderate to Severe Traumatic Brain Injury in the Prospective, Longitudinal TRACK-TBI Study” in JAMA Neurology.

15. Arthur Toga, PhD, co-authored the paper, “The Health & Aging Brain among Latino Elders (HABLE) study methods and participant characteristics” in Alzheimer’s & Dementia (Amsterdam, Netherlands.)

16. Paul Thompson, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Correction: Brain structural abnormalities in obesity: relation to age, genetic risk, and common psychiatric disorders” in Molecular Psychiatry.

17. Arthur Toga, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Transcranial eddy current damping sensors for detection and imaging of hemorrhagic stroke: feasibility in benchtop experimentation” in Neurosurgical Focus.

18. Arthur Toga, PhD, co-authored the paper, “A systematic review of next-generation point-of-care stroke diagnostic technologies” in Neurosurgical Focus.

19. Paul Thompson, PhD, co-authored the paper, “MV(2)Net: Multi-Variate Multi-View Brain Network Comparison over Uncertain Data” in IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics.

20. Arthur Toga, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Pathological Computed Tomography Features Associated With Adverse Outcomes After Mild Traumatic Brain Injury: A TRACK-TBI Study With External Validation in CENTER-TBI” in JAMA Neurology.




Affiliate Faculty Publications:

1.   Yonggang Shi, PhD, co-authored the paper, “LncRNA MEG3 regulates breast cancer proliferation and apoptosis through miR-141-3p/RBMS3 axis” in Genomics.

2.   Cheng-Ming Chuong, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Global feather orientations changed by electric current” in iScience.

3.   Yonggang Shi, PhD; and John Ringman, MD, MS, co-authored the paper, “Past, present and future role of retinal imaging in neurodegenerative disease” in Progress in Retinal and Eye Research,

4.   John Ringman, MD, MS, co-authored the paper, “Pattern and degree of individual brain atrophy predicts dementia onset in dominantly inherited Alzheimer's disease” in Alzheimer’s & Dementia (Amsterdam, Netherlands).

5.   Cheng-Ming Chuong, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Regional specific differentiation of integumentary organs: SATB2 is involved in α- and β-keratin gene cluster switching in the chicken” in Developmental Dynamics.

6.   Jeannie Chen, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Huntingtin fibrils with different toxicity, structure, and seeding potential can be interconverted” in Nature Communications.

7.   Yonggang Shi, PhD, co-authored the paper, “The Health & Aging Brain among Latino Elders (HABLE) study methods and participant characteristics” in Alzheimer’s & Dementia (Amsterdam, Netherlands).

8.   Cheng-Ming Chuong, PhD, co-authored the paper, “A quantitative image-based protocol for morphological characterization of cellular solids in feather shafts” in STAR Protocols.

9.   Cheng-Ming Chuong, PhD, co-authored the paper, “Cyclic growth of dermal papilla and regeneration of follicular mesenchymal components during feather cycling” in Development.

10. Cheng-Ming Chuong, PhD, co-authored the paper, “The global regulatory logic of organ regeneration: circuitry lessons from skin and its appendages” in Biological Reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society.