The Ophthalmic Research Center, affiliated with Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, is committed to enhancing the country’s progress in ophthalmology and expanding the boundaries of knowledge in this field. Following the approval of the Ministry of Health and Medical Education, this center was established in 1997 as Iran’s first ophthalmic research center. This center has been actively involved in scientific research. In recent years, scientific need assessments, advancements in biological science, and increased attention to epidemiological research across different fields have underscored the need to establish effective interdisciplinary collaboration. This objective is crucial for expanding ophthalmic knowledge on both national and international scales.

Two additional and independent research centers were founded in 2016 comprising the Ocular Tissue Engineering Research Center and the Ophthalmic Epidemiology Research Center.  These two centers joined the Ophthalmic Research Center, leading to the establishment of the first Research Institute for Ophthalmology and Vision Science in Iran, in 2020. The three research centers have so far attained scientific recognition both nationally and internationally and have been engaged in official collaboration with the World Health Organization and other international institutions in the field of eye health and prevention of vision loss. The scientists and researchers affiliated to these research centers have published more than 1,450 articles in reputable scientific journals indexed in PubMed, Web of Science, and Scopus.  In addition, they have had more than 1,100 presentations in different seminars. The first internationally recognized scientific journal in Iran dedicated to ophthalmology and vision science called the Journal of Ophthalmic and Vision Research (JOVR) was launched in 2006. JOVR is an open-access journal indexed in Web of Science, PubMed, and Scopus. The Editorial Board of JOVR consists of experts and specialists in various fields of ophthalmology and vision science from all around the world. 

In addition, the Ophthalmic Knowledge Management Unit was established at the Ophthalmic Research Center and was approved by the Ministry of Health and Medical Education in 2011.