Professor Michel Michaelides

About Professor Michaelides

Professor Michel Michaelides is a consultant ophthalmologist at Moorfields Eye Hospital in the departments of medical retina, inherited eye disease and paediatric ophthalmology; and is a Professor of Ophthalmology at the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology.

His clinical and research interests include diabetic eye disease, age-related macular degeneration and inherited eye disease in adults and children; with over four hundred peer-reviewed publications and 50 co-authored book chapters. He is actively involved in retinal clinical trials investigating novel and established therapies, being a principal investigator in ten on-going clinical trials.

Professor Michaelides’s training has included a Medical Retina and Genetics clinical fellowship at Moorfields Eye Hospital, London, UK (2008-2009), and a combined Ophthalmic Genetics and Paediatric Ophthalmology clinical and research fellowship at Casey Eye Institute, Oregon Health and Science University, Portland, Oregon, USA (2009-2010).

He is also the recipient of a Career Development Award (5 years) from the Foundation Fighting Blindness (USA) – an award that is rarely given to non-US applicants, and the Department of Health/HEFCE ‘New Blood’ Clinical Senior Lectureship Award (5 years); and has gained membership of the highly prestigious Macula Society and Retina Society in the USA.

Throughout the period of (2002-2004) he has undertaken a period of dedicated research with his doctoral thesis entitled: “Cone and Central Receptor Dystrophies – A Clinical and Molecular Genetic Investigation”.

He is acknowledged as a world authority and key opinion leader in inherited eye disease in both adults and children and has a rich research portfolio which incorporates twelve on-going ethically approved studies. These include multi-centre international natural history studies for Stargardt disease and USH2A-retinopathy, and he is also actively involved in retinal clinical trials investigating novel and established therapies, being a principal investigator in ten on-going clinical trials, including gene therapy and the world’s first ocular stem cell therapy trial.

Professor Michaelides has been awarded funding from multiple sources including the National Institutes of Health-National Eye Institute (USA), Medical Research Council, National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), NIHR Rare Diseases Translational Research Collaboration, Wellcome Trust, Foundation Fighting Blindness (USA), Retina UK (UK), Fight For Sight (UK), Macular Society (UK), Bayer Healthcare, Moorfields Special Trustees, and Moorfields Eye Charity – totalling over £12,000,000.

Professor Michel Michaelides has made outstanding contributions to the fields of ophthalmology and visual science. His research has a strong translational focus with the aim of developing novel therapies for retinal diseases.

He has been a central figure in developing a strong collaborative team investigating retinal diseases at University College London (UCL) and Moorfields Eye Hospital over the last 20 years; providing key clinical leadership. His strength has been to identify key advances in basic science and then incorporate these into clinical research. This approach is highlighted by the development of high-resolution quantitative retinal imaging of individual photoreceptors in vivo through an adaptive optics scanning laser ophthalmoscope – the only one of its kind outside of the USA. This and other deep phenotyping of retinal diseases has improved understanding of disease mechanisms and allowed the development of novel outcomes for clinical trials. He is a key member of a team developing gene and stem cell therapy at UCL, providing the clinical expertise and leadership. This has culminated in him being a founding member of a UCL gene therapy spin-out company, which was acquired by MeiraGTx, where he is Head of Clinical Ophthalmology and is now in partnership with Johnson & Johnson to develop a pipeline of gene therapies for inherited retinal diseases, age-related macular degeneration, and diabetic eye disease.

Professor Michaelides is a strong advocate for patients with retinal disease and has played a key role in improving the quality, depth, and breadth of scientific, medical and research information available on the websites of several national and international patient support groups and charities.

NHS and Academic Posts

Consultant ophthalmic surgeon, Moorfields Eye Hospital (2010), Clinical senior lecturer in Ophthalmology, UCL Institute of Ophthalmology (2010)

Additional information

Professor Michaelides Speaks Conversational Greek

External Articles

Professor Michaelides has played a major role in improving the quality, depth, and breadth of scientific, medical and research information patients with inherited eye disease can access by providing first class text and images for the website of Retina UK. This is the primary source of information for patients in the UK with inherited retinal dystrophies and receives over four million hits annually – suggesting a far wider audience. He has also helped to establish the only dedicated resource for patients with Stargardt disease (https://stargardtsconnected.org.uk/research/).

His focus now is on the development and validation of clinical trial endpoints to accelerate the process of testing novel therapies. This has improved advice on prognosis and genetic counselling, identified the underlying molecular genetic basis of multiple isolated and syndromic disorders, shed light on mechanisms of disease, identified potential novel therapeutic targets, and provided data that will be invaluable for current and future therapeutic interventions.

He has over four hundred peer-reviewed publications and 50 authored book chapters; with over 300 publications since 2010, and over 15,000 citations in total.