On behalf of the Board of Directors, Welcome to VSS 2026!
As always, we have a packed Schedule for the meeting, with almost 1200 posters and talks plus 52 undergraduate just-in-time posters, 6 Symposia, 13 Satellite Events, and 4 workshops. The meeting also includes events that allow for outreach to the public including a 3-Minute-Thesis Competition in which graduate students describe their research to students at St. Petersburg High School and the ever-popular Public Lecture. This year Bevil Conway will talk about visual aesthetics at the Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, which lets you see a great talk and a fun museum in one go.
We strive to make it easy for people attending VSS for the first time to feel welcome. As such, we are holding two events to help new VSS attendees to get to know the lay of the land, including an Online Event prior to the meeting and a Lemonade Social Friday evening. The lemonade social is a great place for new attendees and undergraduates to get to know how VSS works and to meet one another so that you will have friends to share a table at the Opening Reception and to visit with throughout the meeting.
There are two major events that happen, allied with VSS, both at the Tradewinds. Just prior to VSS is a satellite meeting, MODVIS, that is specifically about modeling the visual system. New this year is the Applied Vision Science meeting. This takes place Wednesday after VSS and is the inaugural year of an annual meeting that will be the prime venue bringing together basic vision scientists and those who investigate applied vision issues in visual displays, VR and many other applied areas.
VSS remains essentially an international meeting with a large percentage of our participants coming from around the world. The situation in the US and internationally has continued to make it difficult for some people to come to a meeting in Florida. This has reduced the number of submitted abstracts and people coming to the meeting, but fortunately not by a huge amount. We have responded to this by opening up a limited number of talk and poster slots for remote presentation. Coupled with our recent move to provide videos of all the talks to the membership after the meeting, this should allow everyone to participate in VSS in one way or another.
The political situation in the US has had substantial impacts on science and, in particular on science funding. Suggested budgets have been reduced for the main agencies that fund vision research in the US and changes in policy at NSF and NIH have greatly reduced funding rates. VSS has advocated for vision science by signing on to several letters (circulated by FABBS and other groups) that have been delivered to Washington. We certainly will continue to advocate for our members in the US and internationally whenever and wherever possible.
One way we try to help out our members is to help with the costs of attending VSS itself. VSS has an NEI/NIH conference grant, and last year Michael Grubb successfully acquired an NSF grant. Between these two grants we are able to provide travel grants to most US trainees. With support from Elsevier, the Yellott Family Endowment and from your contributions to VSS, we also support a number of international trainees with travel grants. VSS is also continuing our program of Caregiver Grants to support childcare costs at the conference for those traveling with young children.
Returning this year are two resources overseen by our Student-Postdoc Committee (SPC): they have set up Discord channels to facilitate sharing of information about the conference (accommodation, transportation, hot tips for presenting, quick announcements, dinners, childcare, etc.) and our Community Table, which you will find near the registration desk, where a member of the SPC provides information about all our VSS communities: the SPC, Females of Vision et al. (FoVea), the Spark Society, and Visibility, a gathering of LGBTQ+ Vision Scientists and Friends. The Community Table will also provide information and resources for new participants at VSS, as well as information about satellites, workshops and social events being organized to make VSS 2026 the most welcoming and inclusive meeting possible.
One thing is missing this year: a phone App for navigating the meeting. There were many problems with the app we’ve used in previous years, and no end of accurate complaints from our members about its inadequacies. So, while VSS needs to tighten its belt due to the drops in membership and registration, this was one savings that made sense. We continue to provide a PDF of the program through the website.
Congratulations to this year’s VSS award winners! This year’s recipient of the Elsevier/VSS Young Investigator Award is Ilker Yildirim. This year the Davida Teller Award was repurposed as an award for mid-career scientists and the winner is T. Rowan Candy. Finally, the Ken Nakayama Medal for Excellence in Vision Science goes to Nancy Kanwisher. Please come hear them talk about their research in the Awards Session (Monday at 12:30PM).
The 2026 VSS Keynote Lecture (Saturday at 7:30PM) will be given by Dr. Michael Chiang, Director of the National Eye Institute. He will talk about the impact of AI and Data Science on eye care from the perspective of NEI. We are excited to have Dr. Chiang meet the VSS community.
The Business Meeting (Tuesday, 12:15PM) is the best place for you to provide direct input to the VSS Board to help guide VSS to a robust and successful future. We will talk about VSS’ financial situation and the status of future VSS meetings (2027 in Seattle, 2028 in St. Pete Beach, but TBD for future meetings). And, of course, I will introduce your 2026-2027 President: Rich Krauzlis.
VSS remains a time for fun as well as excellent science. Demo Night will take place Monday night as usual with fabulous illusions, games and environments to experience. The time just before Demo Night is unscheduled and is a good time for you to hold a lab dinner or other social event (and there are new restaurant offerings at Tradewinds). Tuesday night will feature the Visibility Social, followed by Club Vision (with VSS member djs) and Chill Vision.
I’d like to thank everyone who makes VSS the special place that it is. This includes our sponsors and exhibitors (and I encourage you to visit all the exhibits), our abstract reviewers and the members of our many external committees. A huge thank you is due to Shauney Wilson and the entire Meeting Perfect crew, who work all year long to make VSS happen so smoothly. And thanks to all of you, the VSS community, for providing the science and spirit that make for such a great meeting.
We look forward to seeing you in May!
Mike Landy
President, VSS Board of Directors, 2025-2026