Balamurali Ambati

Balamurali Krishna "Bala" Ambati (born July 29, 1977)<ref name="NYTimes-Prodigy-May1990" /><ref name="Ambati-MorganEyeCtr"/> is an Indian-American ophthalmologist, educator, and researcher. On May 19, 1995, he entered the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's youngest doctor, at the age of 17 years, 294 days.<ref>Notable Firsts. Indian American Heritage Project</ref><ref name="Glenday2011">Template:Cite book</ref>

Biography

Ambati was born into a Telugu family<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> in Vellore, Tamil Nadu in southern India.<ref name="NYTimes-Prodigy-May1990" /><ref name="NYTimes-Ambati-May1995" /> His family moved to Buffalo, New York when he was three.<ref name="NYTimes-Prodigy-May1990" /><ref name="NYTimes-Ambati-May1995" /> According to his parents,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Ambati was doing calculus at the age of four.<ref name="NYTimes-Ambati-May1995"/> The family later moved to Orangeburg, South Carolina, and then to Baltimore, Maryland.<ref name="NYTimes-Prodigy-May1990" /> Ambati initially attended high school at Baltimore Polytechnic Institute before transferring to Baltimore City College,<ref name="BaltSun-WhizKid-Dec2013">Template:Cite news</ref> graduating in 1989 at age 11.<ref name="NYTimes-Prodigy-May1990">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="NYDaily-Ambati-May1995">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="BaltSun-May1995">Template:Cite news</ref> Also at age 11, he co-authored a research book on HIV/AIDS titled AIDS: The True Story – A Comprehensive Guide.<ref name="USGov-1991">Template:Cite book</ref> He graduated from New York University at the age of 13. He graduated from Mount Sinai School of Medicine with distinction at the age of 17,<ref name="NYDaily-Ambati-May1995" /><ref name="BaltSun-May1995"/> scoring above 99 percent on his National Medical Boards,<ref name="BaltSun-May1995"/> and becoming the world's youngest doctor in 1995.<ref name="Ambati-MorganEyeCtr">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="BaltSun-May1995"/>

Ambati expressed that he disliked being compared to Doogie Howser, the fictional teenage doctor.<ref name=victorialadvocate>The Victoria Advocate. Teen doctor: 'Just don't call me Doogie'. May 17, 1995. Accessed 2013-04-02.</ref> Ambati described himself as being popular with people and, standing 6 feet tall, did not appear too young for a career in medicine;<ref name=victorialadvocate/> when he entered medical school at 14 years old he looked just like the other medical students.<ref>Vitals.com. Dr. Balamurali Ambati, Real Life Doogie Howser, Has Greater Aspirations Template:Webarchive. April 8, 2011. Accessed 2013-04-03.</ref>

He completed an ophthalmology residency at Harvard University, where he developed strategies to reverse corneal angiogenesis<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> after becoming a winner at the Westinghouse Science Talent Search and the International Science & Engineering Fair and becoming a National Merit Scholar.Template:Citation needed He received the prestigious Raja-Lakshmi Award in 1995 from Sri Raja-Lakshmi Foundation, Chennai.

After completing a fellowship in cornea and refractive surgery at Duke University in 2002, he joined the faculty of the Medical College of Georgia, where he practiced clinical ophthalmology and conducted research in such areas as corneal angiogenesis and outcomes of corneal and refractive surgery.

He also volunteers with the ORBIS Flying Eye Hospital, traveling to under-privileged countries to practice and teach ophthalmic surgery.<ref name="BaltSun-WhizKid-Dec2013"/><ref>ORBISTemplate:Dead link</ref> In 2008, he earned a PhD in Cell Biology from the Medical College of Georgia.<ref name="ClearVision-Ambati">Template:Cite web</ref> In 2011, Ambati donated a kidney to a 16-year-old boy from Idaho.<ref name="BaltSun-WhizKid-Dec2013"/><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

From 2008 to 2016, Ambati worked at the Moran Eye Center and served as professor of ophthalmology and visual sciences, adjunct associate professor of neurobiology and anatomy, and director of corneal research at the University of Utah School of Medicine.<ref name="ClearVision-Ambati"/><ref name="Armstrong-Root-Ambati-Ap2017">Template:Cite news</ref> As of 2017, he practices in Eugene, Oregon at Pacific Clear Vision Institute.<ref name="ClearVision-Ambati"/><ref name="Armstrong-Root-Ambati-Ap2017"/><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

He has been Professor & Director of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences at University of Oregon's Knight Campus for Accelerating Scientific Impact since 2020.

Family

Ambati's father's name was Ambati Rao and was an industrial engineer, while his mother was a math teacher.<ref name="NYTimes-Prodigy-May1990" />

Balamurali wrote a book on AIDS at age 11 with his brother Jayakrishna, who is also a physician.<ref name="NYTimes-Ambati-May1995">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="NYDaily-Ambati-May1995" /><ref name="USGov-1991" />

Awards

He won the Ludwig von Sallmann Clinician-Scientist Award from the ARVO Foundation in 2014<ref>Ludwig von Sallmann Clinician-Scientist Award recent recipient Template:Webarchive. arvo.org.</ref> and the Troutman-Véronneau Prize from the Pan-American Association of Ophthalmology in 2013.<ref>Dr. Bala Ambati Claims Prestigious Troutman-V茅ronneau Prize and Celebrates Recent Publication Template:Webarchive. utah.edu.</ref> He was also awarded the Fourth IRDS Awards for Medicine for his achievements, awarded by the Lucknow-based Institute for Research and Documentation in Social Sciences (IRDS).<ref>IRDS Award Winners 2013. irdsindia.com</ref>

See also

• Child prodigy
• Sho Yano

References

<references />

External links

• https://www.doctorambati.com/