A nonprofit improving understanding, diagnosis, treatment, & rehab for visual disorders & blindness.
12/02/2025
This Giving Tuesday, we’re celebrating the impact our community makes possible. At the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute, every breakthrough begins with a mission rooted in service: to advance understanding of human vision, improve diagnosis and treatment of visual and sensory disorders, and engineer innovative technologies that empower people who are blind or partially sighted.
Your generosity fuels research that moves beyond our labs and into the real world. Because of supporters like you, our scientists are developing earlier detection for childhood eye diseases, designing accessible navigation tools used worldwide, and creating rehabilitation techniques that help individuals regain independence and confidence.
When you give to SKERI, you are investing in discoveries that directly change lives.
On this global day of giving, we invite you to stand with us.
Together, we can advance research, expand accessibility, and build a brighter future for the people who need it most.
💙 Give today and help turn groundbreaking research into real-world impact. https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=4Q8ZAYZ4EAALA
11/24/2025
🌟 Celebrating Big News at Smith-Kettlewell! 🌟
We’re thrilled to share that one of our researchers, Brandon Biggs, has been honored with a GAADy Award from the GAAD Foundation, a global leader working to ensure that accessibility is built into every stage of technology and digital product development.
Even more exciting, he has also been named a 2025 Winner at the PitchAbility 2025 event! These awards were presented for his flagship product, Audiom, a groundbreaking cross-sensory map that allows blind users to navigate using both sound and sight.
🗺️ Why Audiom Matters:
Most geographic maps are completely inaccessible to millions of people, including blind, low-vision, low-literacy, colorblind, and mobility-impaired users.
Launched in April 2024 by XR Navigation, Audiom is the first digital map everyone can use:
✨ View and create maps visually, auditorily, or through text
✨ Accessible on any platform—using headphones, screens, or braille displays
✨ Works alongside existing visual maps or serves as a complete accessible replacement
From campuses, exhibit halls, airplane seat maps, and buildings to eclipse maps, disease maps, and even complex spatial diagrams like anatomical models or circuit boards, Audiom makes spatial information available to everyone.
🏆 We are incredibly proud to celebrate these major recognitions and the accessibility-driven innovation happening right here at Smith-Kettlewell.
11/19/2025
We’re excited to share that scientists from the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute are currently attending the Society for Neuroscience Annual Meeting in San Diego! 🧠✨
Our team is proud to present cutting-edge research that advances our understanding of vision, neuroscience, and accessibility.
We’re grateful for the opportunity to collaborate, learn, and showcase the innovative work happening at SKERI.
Update:
We’ve just added photos of our scientists presenting their posters at this year’s Society for Neuroscience meeting in San Diego! 🧠📸
11/17/2025
🌎💜 Today is World Prematurity Day
At The Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute, we are deeply committed to advancing research that supports these tiny fighters.
One of the most critical challenges premature infants face is Retinopathy of Prematurity (ROP), a sight-threatening condition caused by abnormal blood vessel development in the retina.
Dr. William Good, Smith-Kettlewell’s CEO and a leading pediatric ophthalmologist and clinical researcher, has dedicated his career to understanding and improving outcomes for infants with ROP. His work has helped shape how clinicians detect, monitor, and treat this condition.
Because of research like Dr. Good’s, more babies today are avoiding severe vision loss and families have more hope than ever before.
💜 On World Prematurity Day, we honor these resilient children and reaffirm our commitment to research that protects their sight.
Watch the video below of our CEO as he explains Smith-Kettlewell’s ongoing commitment to research that helps protect the vision of premature infants facing retinopathy of prematurity
11/15/2025
🌍 Happy World Philanthropy Day! 💙
Today, we celebrate the generosity, vision, and compassion that make our work at the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute possible.
For over six decades, SKERI has advanced cutting-edge research that empowers people who are blind or have low vision to live more independent, connected lives. None of this is possible without supporters who believe in science, accessibility, and building a more inclusive world.
✨ If SKERI’s mission resonates with you, today is a beautiful day to give.
Your gift helps fuel breakthroughs in vision science, supports emerging researchers, and brings life-changing technologies closer to the people who need them most.
Thank you for standing with us, believing in our work, and helping create a future where everyone can access the world around them.
Help support The Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute by donating or sharing with your friends.
11/03/2025
Event Highlight: Scaling Up Accessible Tactile Maps & 3D Models!
We’re thrilled to share highlights from our recent collaboration with the Рівненський фаховий коледж інформаційних технологій (Rivne Applied College of Information Technology, RACIT), where The Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute (SKERI) showcased how computer vision and AI technology are being used to make information more accessible for people who are blind or have low vision.
The event, Scaling Up Accessible Tactile Maps and 3D Models, demonstrated innovative approaches to expanding tactile accessibility & showing how SKERI’s research is helping to scale the production of tactile maps and 3D models that translate visual and spatial data into touchable, understandable forms.
We were honored to welcome Mykhailo Boiko, Deputy Director of Educational and Methodological Works at RACIT, who traveled all the way from Rivne, Ukraine to San Francisco to strengthen collaborations between RACIT and Smith-Kettlewell. His visit marks an exciting step forward in our shared mission to foster international partnerships that advance accessibility through science and technology.
A heartfelt thank you to our partners at RACIT and to everyone who joined us for this inspiring event. Together, we’re proving that collaboration knows no borders when it comes to building a more inclusive world.
📸 Photos from the event are included below!
10/30/2025
A Fantastic Day at the Bay Area Science Festival! 🎉
The Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute had an incredible time sharing the wonders of neuroscience, vision, and accessibility research with families, students, and fellow science lovers at this year’s Bay Area Science Festival!
From hands-on demos to conversations about how our scientists are helping people who are blind or visually impaired live fuller, more independent lives. It was inspiring to see so much curiosity and excitement.
A heartfelt thank you to everyone who stopped by our booth, asked great questions, and joined in exploring how science and technology can make the world more inclusive. 💡🧠
📸 Check out the photos below for some of our favorite moments from the day!
10/27/2025
🚨 POSTDOC JOB ALERT: Applications due December 10! 🗓
The Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute announces an opening in the postdoctoral fellowship program. We are a non-profit institute completely devoted to basic and translational research and offer a unique environment for postdoctoral fellows interested in a research career with the option to apply for the Principal Investigator (PI) track.
Smith-Kettlewell is a uniquely attractive place to receive postdoctoral training in vision research, low vision and blindness. Our research areas include: visual development, strabismus and amblyopia, eye movements, visual attention, brain plasticity, mobility, low vision/blindness rehabilitation and accessibility technologies using approaches such as psychophysics, eye and head tracking, clinical assessment, computational modeling, EEG, fMRI, computer vision, AI, and sensor technologies.
Our fellowship program offers the flexibility to propose and pursue independent research in close collaboration and mentorship with one or more of our experienced principal investigators. During the training period, fellows who are interested in a research career and have achieved necessary milestones are encouraged to apply for grants as mentored or independent investigators at Smith-Kettlewell.
The fellowship requires a Ph.D., O.D., or M.D. and will be awarded for 1 year, with further support contingent on grant funding. The selected fellow must start before March 31, 2026. The fellowship is funded by an NEI Training Grant that requires fellows to be US citizens or permanent residents. For further details, please visit https://www.ski.org/how-apply/
10/23/2025
The Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute is thrilled to be part of this year’s Bay Area Science Festival 🎉
Stop by our booth for hands-on demonstrations and interactive activities where you can learn about neuroscience, vision, and blindness. It’s a fun and engaging way for kids, families, and curious minds of all ages to experience real science in action. 🧠👁️
📅 All the details are in the flyer below. We hope to see you there!
10/21/2025
🎉 Congratulations to Our Student Interns! 🎉
We’re thrilled to share that two University of San Francisco psychology students, Ariana Zhao (senior) and Jade Fakuade (junior), have been recognized for their outstanding research internships at the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute (SKERI)!
Ariana and Jade are recipients of USF’s $1,000 Changemakers stipend, which supports students in volunteer internships that make a real impact. As part of Dr. Santani Teng’s Cognition, Action, and Neural Dynamics Lab, they’ve contributed to groundbreaking research on EEG studies of braille reading and perceptual experiments on assisted ultrasonic echolocation.
They join a growing group of USF students gaining hands-on experience at SKERI where undergraduates get the chance to participate in cutting-edge vision science research, develop valuable skills, and even earn co-authorships on conference presentations and journal publications.
👏 Congratulations again, Ariana and Jade, on your well-deserved recognition!
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Contact The Practice
Send a message to The Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute:
The Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute is a non-profit independent research center. We are interested in three main areas of research: basic scientific research to increase the understanding of normal vision in support of vision disorders, clinical research to develop new diagnostic procedures and treatments for visual and other sensory disorders, and engineering research to produce better techniques for aid and rehabilitation of the blind and partially sighted.
The research that the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute is doing has expanded its understanding of how the visual system (including both eye and brain) work and are affected by disease and vision impairment. In fact, millions of people around the world benefit from the Institute's work diagnosing and treating eye diseases. The studies conducted by its staff have also led to the development of innovative devices, and enhanced services for partially sighted, blind, and hearing-impaired people. A few examples of the Institute's accomplishments are highlighted below.
Innumerable innovations in diagnosis and surgery for childhood vision diseases, notably crossed eyes (strabismus)
Botulinum toxin (“Botox”), originally for correction of crossed eyes, leading to many wider uses
