Botond Roska (born 1969) is a Hungarian medical doctor and biomedical researcher. Much of his research is on the pathways of visual perception and how to treat diseases that cause blindness.
Botond Roska | |
|---|---|
| Born | December 17, 1969[1] |
| Citizenship | Hungary |
| Education | |
| Children | 3 |
| Awards | Wolf award 2024 |
| Scientific career | |
| Institutions | |
Early life and education
editBotond Roska was born in 1969 in Budapest, Hungary.[2] His mother was a musician and his father, Tamás Roska, was a computer scientist.[3][4] He learned to play the cello and studied at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music from 1985 to 1989. After a hand injury ended his cello career, he decided to study medicine and mathematics instead.[5] He studied mathematics at Eötvös Loránd University from 1991 to 1995.[6] He received a Doctor of Medicine from Semmelweis University in 1995 and then a PhD in neurobiology at the University of California, Berkeley.[7][2]
Career
editAfter finishing his PhD, Roska researched genetics and virology through the Harvard Society of Fellows at Harvard University and its medical school. He then went to Basel, Switzerland to establish a research group at the Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research. In 2010 he joined the faculty at the University of Basel.[2] He is the founding director of the Institute for Molecular and Clinical Ophthalmology Basel (IOB) in Switzerland and an advisor for the Allen Institute.[7] He has been co-editor of the Annual Review of Neuroscience with Huda Zoghbi since 2017.[6]
Much of Roska's research is on visual perception, including its principles and the pathways of information processing. He also researches therapies to combat visual dysfunction and restore sight to those who are visually impaired.[2] In 2018 his research team succeeded in growing a functional, artificial retina in a laboratory.[4]
Awards and honors
editIn 2019 he was awarded the Semmelweis Budapest Award, which is the highest award given by Semmelweis University. Also in 2019 he received the Hungarian Order of Saint Stephen, the highest order of Hungary,[8] and the Louis-Jeantet Prize for Medicine.[2] In 2020 he won, as third time to hungarians, the Körber European Science Prize for his research on a gene therapy that could potentially be used to reactivate the retinae of individuals who are blind.[5] In 2024 he was awarded the Wolf Prize in Medicine jointly with José-Alain Sahel.[9]
Personal life
editRoska enjoys listening to the music of Bach and writing mathematical proofs. [4][10]
References
edit- ^ "Botond Roska MD PhD, Curriculum vitae" (PDF). college-de-france.fr.
- ^ a b c d e "Botond Roska". Fondation Louis-Jeantet. 15 January 2019. Retrieved 5 January 2021.
- ^ Kaszás, Fanni (24 June 2020). "Hungarian Neurobiologist Botond Roska to Receive This Year's Körber European Science Prize". Hungary Today. Retrieved 5 January 2021.
- ^ a b c Jäggi, Simon (9 June 2018). "Botond Roska: Of maths and sight". Horizons. Retrieved 5 January 2021.
- ^ a b "Hungary's researcher Roska wins award for procedure that could cure blindness". DW. 9 July 2020. Retrieved 4 January 2021.
- ^ a b "Botond Roska MD PhD Curriculum vitae" (PDF). Körber-Stiftung. Retrieved 5 January 2021.
- ^ a b "Botond Roska". Allen Institute. Retrieved 5 January 2021.
- ^ Raubinek, Ágnes (25 June 2020). "DR. BOTOND ROSKA RECEIVES KÖRBER EUROPEAN SCIENCE PRIZE". Semmelweis University. Retrieved 5 January 2021.
- ^ Wolf Prize in Medicine 2024
- ^ "Botond Roska, M.D., Ph.D." (PDF). Institute for Molecular and Clinical Ophthalmology Basel. June 2020. Archived from the original (PDF) on 7 January 2021. Retrieved 5 January 2021.