Stephen A. Burns, Ph.D.
Distinguished Professor
Indiana University School of Optometry
Dr. Stephen Burns is the 35th recipient of the Clair Bobier Distinguished Lecture Award.
Stephen Burns received a B.S. in Engineering from Lehigh University and a Ph.D. in Biophysics from the Ohio State University. He is currently a Distinguished Professor of Optometry at Indiana University. Steve is a fellow in ARVO (gold), OPTICA, and the American Academy of Optometry (senior fellow). He is the 2010 awardee of OSA’s Tillyer Award and the American Academy of Optometry’s 2021 Prentice Award as well as an Honorary Doctorate from SUNY School of Optometry. While in graduate school at OSU he worked on opponent color theory and that interest in color and early visual processing has been a major interest for his entire career. During his postdoctoral studies at the University of Chicago he learned about clinical aspects of vision science. He has continued research in both clinical and basic aspects of eye research at the University of Pittsburgh (1979-1987), the Schepens Eye Research Institute and Harvard Medical School (1987-2005) and now at Indiana University (2005-2026). His research typically includes both technology development and the application of these technologies to focused investigations of the eye’s structure and function. Thus, he developed and applied psychophysical techniques for measuring cone photopigment kinetics, used nonlinear analysis of electrophysiological (ERG) and psychophysical responses, as well as developing and applying optical techniques for measuring the optical aberrations of the eye and measuring the Stile-Crawford effect. Currently his lab is a major contributor to advances in using adaptive optics to better understand the impact of cardiovascular diseases on the eye. His research has been funded continuously by NIH since 1982.