Glenn Yiu, MD, PhD

Dr. Yiu is an Associate Professor of Ophthalmology at the University of California, Davis. As a clinician-scientist and retinal specialist, he combined clinical care of patients with retinal diseases with translational research to study the pathogenesis and treatments for age-related macular degeneration (AMD). After he graduated Summa Cum Laude at Columbia University, he pursued a combined MD-PhD degree at Harvard Medical School, his my doctoral research in neurobiology helped discover a novel neuronal receptor involved in central nervous system regeneration, including optic nerve axons. He participated in clinical research during his ophthalmology residency at the Massachusetts Eye & Ear Infirmary, then became more involved in advanced ocular imaging research as a clinical fellow in vitreoretinal surgery at Duke University. His studies using optical coherence tomography (OCT) helped provide insight into the role of blood vessels in AMD and other retinal diseases, and garnered various awards including the Heed Ophthalmic Foundation Fellowship award, the Fellowship Research Award from the Retina Society, the Evangelos S. Gragoudas Award from the Macula Society, and the Ronald G. Michels Fellowship award. Since joining UC Davis in 2014, he has built a translational research program that combines ocular imaging with genetic and molecular techniques to develop novel therapies and disease models of AMD across mice, monkeys, and humans. He also serves as Director of the UC Davis Reading Center and Director of Tele-Ophthalmology, where he analyzes image data from clinical studies in ophthalmology and tele-health eye screening programs. With the support of a K08 career development award from the National Eye Institute, he has developed research focuses in CRISPR-based gene editing, multimodal ocular imaging, and optical control of genes and drug delivery, and hope to uncover new and more effective treatments for AMD in the future.