Thomas Young's Contributions to Vision Science

Thomas Young was a polymath who made major contributions to vision science and optics, as well as to other fields including mechanical engineering and Egyptology. He is credited with formulating light's wave nature with his famous two-slit experiment, researching mechanisms of accommodation, corneal astigmatism and trichromacy of the human retina. In this webinar hosted by the Vision Technical Group, David Atchison will review Young's work and in particular his famous Bakerian lecture that was published in 1801.

Subject Matter Level: Introductory - Assumes little previous knowledge of the topic

What You Will Learn:

• Historical lecture regarding Thomas Young's contributions to vision science

Who Should Attend:

• Anybody interested in vision science, optics and history
• All levels of background education in optics (undergraduate students, graduate students, post-docs, industry professionals, professors)

About the Presenter: David Atchison from Queensland University of Technology

Professor David Atchison is at the Centre for Eye Research and Vision at Queensland University of Technology, where he has been involved in teaching and research of visual and ophthalmic optics for 40 years. He has contributions across the breadth of the field. These include design of various ophthalmic lenses, and the development of schematic human eyes related to aging, accommodation and myopia. He has advanced understanding of the central and peripheral aberrations, and of the biometry, optics and visual performance of myopic eyes. His current interest is the optics of multi-segment spectacle lenses used for myopic treatment. He has authored two books, “The Eye and Visual Optics Instrumentation” and “Optics of the Human Eye”. He has several book chapters and over 300 refereed journal articles. He is a Fellow of Optica and of the American Academy of Optometry and has won many awards including the Garland Clay and Glenn Fry awards, Collin Research Medal and the Oberdorfer Award.