[1] Originally trained as a civil engineer, he switched to the medical profession, receiving his degree from the University of Paris in 1868.

At middle-age Javal developed glaucoma, and by 1900 was totally blind after suffering repeated attacks of acute angle-closure.

He was a friend of Ludwik Łazarz Zamenhof (1859-1917), the inventor of Esperanto, and he stressed the importance of learning this language by the blind.

Today the "Louis Emile Javal Silver Service Distinction" is issued by the International Contact Lens Council of Ophthalmology.

Javal died of stomach cancer and donated his left eye to histopathological research in England where, however, it got lost without a report being published.