Dr. Dimitrios Christaras studied Applied Mathematics and Physical Sciences at the Technical University of Athens (NTUA). He continued his studies in France, where he received an MSc in particle physics from universities Pierre et Marie Curie (VI), Paris Diderot (VII) και Paris Sud (XI). From 2009-2011 he worked as a young researcher at the University of Cyprus in the field of computational particle physics and more specifically on the study of the properties of elementary particles through lattice chromodynamics (LQCD). On the side, he also worked as a teaching assistant at the Department of Physics of the University of Cyprus. He, then, moved to Pablo Artal’s Laboratorio de Optica in Murcia, Spain, where he completed his PhD in biomedical optics. His thesis was on light diffusion phenomena in vision and in imaging (http://hdl.handle.net/10803/396679). From 2015 to 2017 he was a research associate at the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology in London, UK and he currently continues as an honorary research associate. His project was to design and build an adaptive optics system for psychophysical experiments in colour vision and high-resolution fundus imaging. He eventually returned to Laboratorio de Optica in Murcia, where he worked as post-doctoral researcher (investigador doctor) on an innovative method and a corresponding optical instrument for the measurement of the optical density of macular pigment. His research resulted to patent and he was awarded the Visiometrics award for Best oral presentation at the VPOptics 2018 conference.
He has co-supervised 2 bachelor dissertations at King’s College London (KCL), one dissertation at the Universidad de Murcia and 3 student internships. He taught the course "Introduction to numerical computation and image processing" at the post-graduate programme "Optics and Vision" at the University of Crete.
He has been a member of several societies such as the Optical Society of America (OSA), the Colour Group (GB), the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO) and he has been reviewing articles for scientific journals such as Journal of Optical Society of America A, Journal of Ophthalmology, Ophthalmic and Physiological Optics, Journal of Cataract and Refractive Surgery, Biosensors (MPDI), Optics Express and Current Eye Research.
In 2017 he was selected as the young research in focus from the European Vision Institute (http://www.vision-research.eu/index.php?id=1107).
In 2020 he was awarded a Marie Sklodowska Curie Individual Fellowship. His project with the acronym IR:WAVE, aims to develop a prototype instrument for the assessment of central and peripheral image quality in the human eye.
Publications
I. Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles
- Peripheral image quality in pseudophakic eyes. K. Togka, A. Livir-Rallatos, D. Christaras, S. Tsoukala, N. Papasyfakis, P. Artal and H. Ginis (2020) Biomedical Optics Express DOI: 10.1364/BOE.387254
- Ocular axial length and straylight, D. Christaras, JJ. Rozema, and H. Ginis, Ophthalmic and Physiological Optics 2020. https://doi.org/10.1111/opo.12681
- Objective method for measuring the macular pigment optical density in the eye. Christaras D, Ginis H, Pennos A, Mompean J, Artal P (2019) Biomed Opt Express. 2019;10(7):3572-3583. doi:10.1364/BOE.10.003572
- Effect of intraocular scattering in macular pigment optical density measurements, D. Christaras, A. Pennos, H. Ginis and P. Artal, Journal of Biomedical Optics, 23(5), 056001 (2018).
- Scattering contribution to the double-pass PSF using Monte Carlo simulations, D. Christaras, H. Ginis, A. Pennos and P. Artal, Ophthalmic and Physiological Optics, 37(3):342-346 (2017).
- Performance of a differential contrast sensitivity method to measure intraocular scattering, A. Pennos, H. Ginis, A. Arias, D. Christaras, and P. Artal, Biomedical Optics Express, 8(3):1382-1389 (2017).
- Scattering compensation in fundus imaging, D. Christaras, H. Ginis, A. Pennos, P. Artal, Biomedical Optics Express, 7(10):3996-4006 (2016).
- Spatial properties of fundus reflectance and red-green relative spectral sensitivity, D. Christaras, H. Ginis, P. Artal, JOSAA, 32(9):1723-8 (2015).
- Strange and charm baryon masses with two flavors of dynamical twisted mass fermions, C. Alexandrou, J. Carbonell, D. Christaras,V.Drach, M. Gravina, M. Papinutto,May 2012, Phys.Rev. D86 (2012) 114501.
- Exact calculation of disconnected loops, C. Alexandrou, D. Christaras, A. O’Cais, A.Strelchenko, PoS LATTICE2010:035,2010.
II. Selected Peer-reviewed proceedings
- Computational, physical and psychophysical evaluation of the peripheral optics in the pseudophakic eye, K. Togka, S. Tsoukalas, D. Christaras, P. Artal and H.Ginis, 3rd International Biennial Ocular Regeneration Symposium: Tissue engineering and the eye, Oct. 2018.
- Intraocular scattering compensation in macular pigment density measurement, D. Christaras, H. Ginis, A. Pennos, P. Artal, IOVS 56(7):4119 (2015) ARVO E-abstract.
- Diffusers induced ocular light scattering measured by a psychophysical and an optical method, M. Van der Mooren, H. Ginis, R. Rosen, A. Benito, L. Franssen, A. Pennos, D. Christaras, P. A. Piers, P. Artal, IOVS 55(5):3781 (2014), ARVO E-abstract.
- Spatial retinal reflectance properties and red-green relative spectral sensitivity, D. Christaras, H. Ginis, P. Artal, IOVS 55(5):6249 (2014), ARVO E-abstract.
III. Patents
- Instrumento óptico para la medida de la densidad del pigmento macular en el ojo y método asociado (P201630921) – Optical instrument and associated method for the measurement of the macular pigment optical density in the eye.
He has co-supervised 2 bachelor dissertations at King’s College London (KCL), one dissertation at the Universidad de Murcia and 3 student internships. He taught the course "Introduction to numerical computation and image processing" at the post-graduate programme "Optics and Vision" at the University of Crete.
He has been a member of several societies such as the Optical Society of America (OSA), the Colour Group (GB), the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO) and he has been reviewing articles for scientific journals such as Journal of Optical Society of America A, Journal of Ophthalmology, Ophthalmic and Physiological Optics, Journal of Cataract and Refractive Surgery, Biosensors (MPDI), Optics Express and Current Eye Research.
In 2017 he was selected as the young research in focus from the European Vision Institute (http://www.vision-research.eu/index.php?id=1107).
In 2020 he was awarded a Marie Sklodowska Curie Individual Fellowship. His project with the acronym IR:WAVE, aims to develop a prototype instrument for the assessment of central and peripheral image quality in the human eye.
Publications
I. Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles
- Peripheral image quality in pseudophakic eyes. K. Togka, A. Livir-Rallatos, D. Christaras, S. Tsoukala, N. Papasyfakis, P. Artal and H. Ginis (2020) Biomedical Optics Express DOI: 10.1364/BOE.387254
- Ocular axial length and straylight, D. Christaras, JJ. Rozema, and H. Ginis, Ophthalmic and Physiological Optics 2020. https://doi.org/10.1111/opo.12681
- Objective method for measuring the macular pigment optical density in the eye. Christaras D, Ginis H, Pennos A, Mompean J, Artal P (2019) Biomed Opt Express. 2019;10(7):3572-3583. doi:10.1364/BOE.10.003572
- Effect of intraocular scattering in macular pigment optical density measurements, D. Christaras, A. Pennos, H. Ginis and P. Artal, Journal of Biomedical Optics, 23(5), 056001 (2018).
- Scattering contribution to the double-pass PSF using Monte Carlo simulations, D. Christaras, H. Ginis, A. Pennos and P. Artal, Ophthalmic and Physiological Optics, 37(3):342-346 (2017).
- Performance of a differential contrast sensitivity method to measure intraocular scattering, A. Pennos, H. Ginis, A. Arias, D. Christaras, and P. Artal, Biomedical Optics Express, 8(3):1382-1389 (2017).
- Scattering compensation in fundus imaging, D. Christaras, H. Ginis, A. Pennos, P. Artal, Biomedical Optics Express, 7(10):3996-4006 (2016).
- Spatial properties of fundus reflectance and red-green relative spectral sensitivity, D. Christaras, H. Ginis, P. Artal, JOSAA, 32(9):1723-8 (2015).
- Strange and charm baryon masses with two flavors of dynamical twisted mass fermions, C. Alexandrou, J. Carbonell, D. Christaras,V.Drach, M. Gravina, M. Papinutto,May 2012, Phys.Rev. D86 (2012) 114501.
- Exact calculation of disconnected loops, C. Alexandrou, D. Christaras, A. O’Cais, A.Strelchenko, PoS LATTICE2010:035,2010.
II. Selected Peer-reviewed proceedings
- Computational, physical and psychophysical evaluation of the peripheral optics in the pseudophakic eye, K. Togka, S. Tsoukalas, D. Christaras, P. Artal and H.Ginis, 3rd International Biennial Ocular Regeneration Symposium: Tissue engineering and the eye, Oct. 2018.
- Intraocular scattering compensation in macular pigment density measurement, D. Christaras, H. Ginis, A. Pennos, P. Artal, IOVS 56(7):4119 (2015) ARVO E-abstract.
- Diffusers induced ocular light scattering measured by a psychophysical and an optical method, M. Van der Mooren, H. Ginis, R. Rosen, A. Benito, L. Franssen, A. Pennos, D. Christaras, P. A. Piers, P. Artal, IOVS 55(5):3781 (2014), ARVO E-abstract.
- Spatial retinal reflectance properties and red-green relative spectral sensitivity, D. Christaras, H. Ginis, P. Artal, IOVS 55(5):6249 (2014), ARVO E-abstract.
III. Patents
- Instrumento óptico para la medida de la densidad del pigmento macular en el ojo y método asociado (P201630921) – Optical instrument and associated method for the measurement of the macular pigment optical density in the eye.