Medical Student Awarded RPB Research Fellowship

Monica Sophia Diaz-Aguilar, a medical student at Rush University Medical College, has been awarded a $30,000 RPB Medical Student Eye Research Fellowship from Research to Prevent Blindness (RPB). This award has enabled her to take a year off from medical school and devote her time to pursuing a research project within the Department of Ophthalmology.  

Diaz-Aguilar will serve as a research fellow under the supervision of Jonathan Lin, MD, PhD, professor of pathology and of ophthalmology at Stanford. 

“I am thrilled for Sophia to join my lab and play a vital role in making advancements for ophthalmic pathology research,” Lin said. “This hands-on experience will equip her for the next steps of her career thanks to the generosity of RPB.” 

The RPB Career Development Award was established in 1990 to attract early-career physicians and basic scientists to eye research. To date, the program has given awards to 234 vision research scientists in departments of ophthalmology at universities across the country.