James Chodosh, MD, MPH is Professor and the Inaugural Chair of the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences at the University of New Mexico (UNM) School of Medicine, which he joined on September 1^st, 2022. He is also Professor in the UNM Department of Neurosciences and the UNM Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, and a member of the Board of the UNM Medical Group. He completed his residency in Ophthalmology at Baylor College of Medicine, clinical fellowship in Corneal Diseases at the Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, and postdoctoral research fellowships in Virology & Molecular Biology and Infectious Diseases at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. During his postdoctoral fellowship, he also served part-time as Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology at the University of Tennessee. His career as full-time faculty began at the Dean McGee Eye Institute, University of Oklahoma, where from 1995 to 2008 he rose to Professor of Ophthalmology, received his Masters of Public Health, served as Residency Program Director, and was awarded the MG McCool Endowed Chair. He was then recruited to Mass Eye and Ear/Mass General Hospital in 2008 to assist Dr. Claes Dohlman with further developing the FDA-approved Boston keratoprosthesis. While at Mass Eye and Ear, he served the Harvard Medical School Department of Ophthalmology as Vice Chair for Education, Director of Diversity and Inclusion, Associate Director of the Cornea and Refractive Surgery Service, Associate Director of the Infectious Disease Institute, Director of the Ocular Burn Service, and from 2017 to 2022 as Director of Boston Keratoprosthesis. He was also a member of the Harvard PhD Program in Virology, and was a key author for the American Academy of Ophthalmology web pages on COVID-19, which garnered over 1.5 million views. He remains the Harvard Medical School Edith Ives Cogan Professor of Ophthalmology Emeritus. He has served as Chair of the Anterior Eye Disease NIH Study Section, and on the National Advisory Eye Council for the NIH, and is currently Chair of the US FDA Dermatologic and Ophthalmic Drugs Advisory Committee. Dr. Chodosh has published over 400 peer reviewed papers and book chapters, provided 20 named lectures, and was co-Editor-in-Chief of the British Journal of Ophthalmology. His published work has been cited more than 16,000 times, and his Google Scholar h-index is 69. He is a recipient of the Alcon Research Institute Award, and four awards from Research to Prevent Blindness. A dedicated teacher with many teaching and mentorship awards, he personally trained over 70 clinical cornea fellows, and mentored over 40 medical students under-represented in medicine. He is known internationally for his work on development and use of the Boston keratoprosthesis for severe corneal blindness, and he co-invented and obtained FDA approval for a new, low-cost keratoprosthesis, the “Lucia”, to address blindness in low resource countries. His basic research program on adenovirus keratitis and viral evolution is unique world-wide and has been continuously funded by the NIH since 1996 – his current NIH funding runs through 2027. His primary clinical interests include infectious eye disease, ocular chemical injury, Stevens Johnson syndrome, and the restoration of seemingly hopeless cases of corneal blindness. He is dedicated to improving the quality of life for every person with vision loss, particularly those who may be otherwise underserved, and to growing diversity and equity in his profession of Ophthalmology. To this end and to increase access to quality eye care for all the peoples of New Mexico, he joined the new Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences at UNM, where he was awarded approval by the ACGME to start a new residency training program for Ophthalmology. The very first three ophthalmology residents at UNM entered the program in June 2024.