Christopher Newton-Cheh

Dr. Newton-Cheh is a complex trait geneticist and cardiovascular epidemiologist, as well as a practicing cardiologist. His laboratory investigates hypertension, sudden cardiac death and cardiotoxic drug response as manifest in the electrocardiographic QT interval. He has led several international consortia that have identified scores of novel genetic factors contributing to hypertension, myocardial repolarization and sudden cardiac death in work published in Nature Genetics, Nature, with many additional high-impact publications in JAMA and the New England Journal of Medicine. He has received awards from MGH for his highly collaborative science efforts to characterize the role of natriuretic peptides in blood pressure regulation, spanning the Center for Human Genetic Research, the Cardiology Division and the Department of Anesthesia, Critical Care and Pain Medicine.

Dr. Newton-Cheh's finding of eight genetic loci related to blood pressure was highlighted as one of the ten most important discoveries of 2009 by the American Heart Association. He is currently leveraging the rapid growth of human genetics to identify genetic variants in genes known and previously unknown which underlie cardiac diseases, and to translate these genetic discoveries into an improved understanding of human physiology through clinically-focused research. This important work seeks to define the role of genetics and other factors in predicting patients' risk of disease and cardiotoxic drug response. He has several ongoing physiological trials in humans to better understand the mechanisms by which common variants contribute to the development of disease.

Education

• Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
  Master of Public Health (MPH), Biostatistics

• Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons
  Doctor of Medicine (MD), Medicine

• Dartmouth College
  BA, English Language and Literature/Letters