Gregory R. Jackson, Ph.D., co-founder and chief technology officer of MacuLogix, was honored with a 2019 UAB Department of Psychology Distinguished Alumni Scholar Award.

Jackson worked in Cynthia Owsley’s lab as a Ph.D. student in the behavioral neuroscience program, and then stayed on as a post-doc with the UAB Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences. He was instrumental in the development of Owsley’s research program – focusing on AMD. He eventually joined the department’s faculty and thereafter moved to Penn State where he was appointed Director of Clinical Research in the Department of Ophthalmology.

Research has established that dark adaptation function is dramatically impaired from the earliest stages of AMD, with increasing deterioration as the disease progresses. Usually expressed as a night vision complaint, impaired dark adaptation can be used to identify patients with subclinical AMD up to three years before drusen are visible. The AdaptDx® makes dark adaptation testing affordable and accessible for optometry or ophthalmology practices. Jackson and Owsley are the joint inventors of the AdaptDx®, and he is responsible for the patent’s successful commercialization through MacuLogix. The AdaptDx® is now sold all over the world.

Jackson has published over 40 articles or chapter, many of them focusing on dark adaptation in understanding retinal diseases. He earned a B.S. in psychology from Clarion University and a Ph.D. in behavioral neuroscience from University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Image Caption: Jackson with his dissertation advisor, Cynthia Owsley, Ph.D., and two other committee members, Christine A. Curcio, Ph.D., and Michael Sloane, Ph.D.