Danièle Aron-Rosa facts for kids

Danièle Aron-Rosa (born in 1934) is a French-Tunisian eye doctor and scientist. She is famous for creating a special laser for eye surgeries. This laser, called the picosecond ophthalmic Nd:YAG laser, works very, very fast. Many people see her as one of the most important pioneers in using lasers for eye care, along with Franz Fankhauser.

Besides her work as a doctor, Danièle Aron-Rosa is also a talented painter. She uses the artist names Genskof or Aron Genskof. Her paintings are so good that some are kept in museums in France and the United States.

Early Life and Learning

Danièle Sylvie Rosa was born in 1934 in Tunis, Tunisia. Her parents were Renée and André Rosa. She first started studying physics at university. Later, she decided to switch to medicine.

In 1962, she earned her medical degree from the University of Paris. She then continued her training at a big group of hospitals in Paris called Assistance Publique – Hôpitaux de Paris. During her training, she became very interested in ophthalmology, which is the study of eyes. She completed her special training in eye care with more studies from the hospital and the University of Paris. In 1958, she married Jean-Jacques Aron.

Career Highlights

Eye Doctor and Laser Inventor

Starting in 1962, Danièle Aron-Rosa led the eye clinic at the Assistance Publique Hôpitaux. By 1972, she became a professor and head of the eye department at Paris Diderot University. In 1974, she took on leadership roles at two other hospitals in Paris: Hospital Robert Debrè [fr] and Hospital Foundation Adolphe de Rothschild [fr].

Early in her career, she studied growths at the back of the eye. While working at the Rothschild Eye Foundation in the early 1970s, she started trying to cut tiny threads inside the eye, called vitreous strands, using a laser. At that time, Ruby lasers were used for eye surgery. However, they were often too strong and too slow, which could harm the eye. Because she loved physics, she began to research how to make lasers faster and less powerful.

In 1973, she talked with a physicist named Pierre Victor Auger. This conversation helped her realize that pulsed YAG lasers could be less strong but still very powerful if they pulsed quickly. In 1975, she watched a science show on TV. It showed how a tiny part of a cell, called a mitochondrion, could be removed without hurting the rest of the cell. This made her think even more about how ultra-rapid laser pulses could work.

Working with Jean-Claude Griesemann, Danièle Aron-Rosa created and got a patent for the picosecond ophthalmic Nd:YAG laser in 1978. This special laser was designed for eye surgeries. Using this new laser, she was able to perform a type of eye surgery called posterior capsulotomies.

By 1982, Aron-Rosa had successfully operated on over 6,500 patients in France using her new laser. She then introduced her technology in the United States. The next year, in 1983, she received a very special award from France called the Chevalier in the Legion of Honour.

She continued to receive many honors for her work. In 1987, she was given the Innovator's Lecture award from the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery. In 2003, she was added to their Hall of Fame. The next year, she was named Academy Laureate by the American Academy of Ophthalmology. Danièle Aron-Rosa stopped working as an eye doctor in 2010 to spend more time on her painting. She is known as one of the two most respected pioneers in laser eye surgery, along with Franz Fankhauser.

Her Art

Danièle Aron-Rosa paints under the names Genskof or Aron Genskof. Many of her artworks explore religious themes. For example, in 2010, some of her paintings were shown at the Musée d'Art et d'Histoire du Judaïsme (Museum of Jewish Art and History) in Paris.

One of her famous paintings is called Giocodell'oca del popolo ebraico. It is a large blue painting with a menorah (a special candle holder) in the middle. Around it are boxes showing people dreaming about the creation of the State of Israel. Her paintings are part of the permanent collections in museums in Les Sables-d'Olonne, France, and in Memphis and Nashville, USA.