A lightbulb moment is shorthand for an epiphany that changes one’s thinking — and possibly the world — in an instant. Yet, the light bulb was not an invention born in a single moment. The idea grew out of years of research by people in different domains that converged into an invention that was built, failed, was iterated on and eventually enlightened the world.

Francine Siegal, M.D., and William Zieverink, M.D., graduates of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, believe the time is ripe for convergences like this. “We’re living during an exciting time in history, really a renaissance, an openness and acceptance of rapidly evolving, edgy, sci-fi ideas from teams [in] hyphenated sciences — biotechnology, neuro-immunology — working to ingeniously solve complex problems with simplicity,” says Siegal.

The possibilities of imaginative solutions, however, require a focus on a particular challenge. The one the couple chose to focus on is vision loss. Siegal and Zieverink created the Vision Science Fund at the Wilmer Eye Institute to spur researchers to explore ideas that push the current boundaries of known science to build creative yet feasible technologies to help people see again. The fund is meant to support basic science research — the “bench” in the bench-to-bedside model of academic medicine — with the goal of restoring vision by any means.

The impetus for creating the Vision Science Fund sprang from Zieverink’s personal experience with eye disease. After the onset of viral meningitis, his immune system killed the virus but attacked his retina. “I woke up one morning on a Sunday, and I had a big blind spot in my left eye,” says Zieverink. A day later, he woke up with a black spot in his right eye that obstructed his vision. “I was blind for four months. That captures your attention,” he says. “It’s what makes us think a really good use of our money would be to help people who have eye disease.”

When initially considering avenues of research they wanted their gift to facilitate, Zieverink thought of cells. “I’m the biochemist and the molecular biologist in the family. So, I started thinking in those terms,” he says. Molecular biologists in vision science are concerned with rods and cones, oxidative stress, and cell metabolism, for example.

Siegal approached their brainstorming from another direction. “We need to substitute the idea that we see with our eyes by promoting the truth: We actually see with the visual cortex of our brain,” she says.

The couple acknowledges that science and technology are moving at a breakneck speed, so what ends up being funded could be something not yet even imagined. But that has not stopped them from envisioning how the funds could be used. An example they have discussed is “building a simple receptor that’s applied, perhaps, to the cornea to perceive images that will be communicated directly, wirelessly, to the visual cortex of the brain — so everyone, everywhere, in all countries across the globe, will be able to see, cost-effectively, no matter the cause of their blindness,” Siegal says.

Laura Ensign, Ph.D., the Marcella E. Woll Professor of Ophthalmology, is vice chair for research at Wilmer. She knows the enduring impact an unrestricted gift like the Vision Science Fund can have on a cutting-edge research program like that at Wilmer.

“I could name several current research initiatives that the fund might support in the near term, but the exciting truth is no one knows yet where this funding could lead, and I think that is the promise that Dr. Siegal and Dr. Zieverink see,” Ensign says. “The future is that wide open. This fund gives us the flexibility to pursue the most promising ideas.”

Wilmer Director Peter J. McDonnell, M.D., the William Holland Wilmer Professor of Ophthalmology, appreciates that focus on the future.

“Unrestricted gifts like this are the lifeblood of the high-risk, high-reward research the Wilmer Eye Institute is known for,” he points out. “Only this sort of out-of-the-box research can lead to bold new approaches to address blindness. Their wisdom in establishing the Vision Science Fund will allow researchers at the forefront of sight restoration to explore exciting new approaches that would have been impossible without their support. We are profoundly grateful to them for their foresight and their generosity.”

The couple hopes to plant “a seed of imagination among young researchers to create vision,” says Siegal. And because research is costly, particularly when a line of questioning is brand new, they hope to excite the passion of other donors to support the cause of restoring vision — by any means imaginable.