D. Jackson Coleman, MD '60

D. Jackson Coleman, MD '60, is a retina specialist with expertise in vitreo-retinal surgery, a technique he pioneered. His strong interest in physics led him, together with Frederic L. Lizzi, to create the first commercially available B-scan ultrasound equipment for the eye. His numerous patents include those for an ultrasonically vibrated surgical knife and ultrasonic diagnostic and therapeutic transducer assembly and method of use, a system of therapeutic ultrasound and real-time ultrasonic scanning, and an ultrasound system for corneal biometry.

Following his internship at the Columbia Medical Division at Bellevue Hospital, he served in the U.S. Public Health Service in Washington, D.C., and then was a resident in ophthalmology at the Edward S. Harkness Eye Institute of Columbia Presbyterian as a National Institutes of Health Special Fellow.

In 1979 he was appointed chief of ophthalmology for The New York Hospital and John Milton McLean Professor of Ophthalmology at Cornell University Medical College. He also served twice as president of its medical board.

Coleman has been an officer of every major ultrasound medical society throughout the world, served as president of the American Retina Society and Club Jules Gonin, authored more than 200 peer-reviewed papers and numerous chapters in ophthalmology textbooks and recently published the second edition of his seminal text, Ultrasonography of the Eye and Orbit.

His work has been recognized with the Greenberg Award of New York-Presbyterian Hospital-Weill Medical College of Cornell University, the Mildred Weisenfeld Award for Excellence in Ophthalmology from the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology, the Herman Wacker Award of Club Jules Gonin, the award of merit in retinal research from the Retina Society and an honorary degree from the University of Ferrara in Ferrara, Italy.

With a generous gift from Charles and Margaret Dyson, Coleman established the Margaret M. Dyson Vision Research Institute, one of the major retinal research programs in the world.