Director

Robert C. Green, MD, MPH is an internationally recognized leader in genomics, serving as Professor of Medicine (Genetics) at Harvard Medical School and as a physician-scientist who directs the Genomes2People (G2P) Research Program at Mass General Brigham, Broad Institute and Ariadne Labs. Dr. Green’s pioneering efforts have significantly contributed to accelerating the implementation of genomic/precision medicine on a global scale.

Education and Training: Dr. Green completed his undergraduate degree at Amherst College and his Doctor of Medicine (MD) at University of Virginia School of Medicine. He has also received a Master of Public Health (MPH) in epidemiology from Emory University School of Public Health. His specialty training was at Harvard Medical School, and he is board certified in both neurology and medical genetics.

Research Achievements: Dr. Green led the first experimental trials disclosing common complex disease risk (REVEAL Study) and the first prospective studies of direct-to-consumer genetic testing services (PGen Study). As a trailblazer in population screening research, he has led and co-led the first NIH-funded randomized trials of sequencing in adults (MedSeq Project), newborns (BabySeq Project) and active-duty US military personnel (MilSeq Project). Additionally, he co-leads the PopSeq Project which returns clinically actionable genomic results to participants in the Framingham Heart Study and in the all African American cohort of the Jackson Heart Study.

Dr.Green is currently demonstrating the feasibility of genomic sequencing in healthy newborns in the second phase of the BabySeq Project, which is recruiting in Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, Detroit, and Birmingham, with several additional sites pending. With continuous funding from the NIH for 26 years, he has published more than 400 papers with an h-index of 110. In 2014, he won the Coriell Prize for Scientific Achievement in Personalized Medicine, and in 2019 was named by BIS Research as one of the 25 most influential voices in precision medicine. Since joining the Harvard Medical School faculty in 2011, the G2P research team has been awarded research support of over $59 million.

Research Leadership: Dr. Green co-chaired the Steering Committee of both the Clinical Sequencing Exploratory Research program (18 NIH grants, over 300 investigators), and the Steering Committee of the Newborn Sequencing in Genomic Medicine and Public Health program (4 NIH grants, over 100 investigators) and is a co-investigator on the Boston site within the Electronic Medical Records and Genomics Network. He has led the development of protocols for return of genomic results in the All of Us Research Program of the United States Precision Medicine Initiative and the Google/Verily Project Baseline. Most recently, Dr. Green leads Precision Population Health, a new initiative launched by Ariadne Labs and G2P that brings together world-class clinical genomics experts, primary care leaders and implementation scientists with the goal of addressing the challenges facing healthcare systems as they adopt precision medicine into primary care.

Policy Leadership: Dr. Green has been a pioneer in accelerating the worldwide implementation of medical genomics. He was lead author on the influential recommendations for managing secondary findings in clinical sequencing from the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics and contributing author on recommendations for managing incidental findings in research biobanks among participants and family members. He is a Board Member of the Council for Responsible Genetics and works within the Global Alliance for Genomics and Health and the All of Us Research Program on designing efforts to return genomic information to research participants. Dr. Green has also championed efforts to bring together international leaders in newborn sequencing by co-founding the International Consortium on Newborn Sequencing in 2022 with the mission of informing clinical and public health research and implementation of genomic screening in newborns through the harmonization and aggregation of scientific evidence and resources.

Clinical Care: Dr. Green directs the Preventive Genomics Clinic at Mass General Brigham, providing evidence-based genomic and multi-omics evaluation to early adopters seeking to anticipate and prevent future illness.

Entrepreneurship: In 2016, Dr. Green co-founded Genome Medical, a telegenomics technology and services company providing genetics expertise to patients, providers, employers and healthcare systems which has since completed over 200,000 genetic counseling sessions. In 2022, he co-founded Nurture Genomics to offer genome sequencing to newborns and children in the US for treatable conditions.

Presentations & Media: Scientific plenary presentations include American College of Medical Genetics/Genomics, Cold Spring Harbor, Advances in Genome Biology and Technology Precision Health Conference, European Society for Human Genetics, BioData World, Precision Medicine Network Forum, and International Conference on Newborn Sequencing. Presentations to business include Forbes Healthcare Summit, World Science Festival, Future of Genomic Medicine, Exponential Medicine, Festival of Genomics, Aspen Ideas Festival, SXSW, Asian Healthcare Leadership, JP Morgan, Precision Medicine World Conference, and the Lake Nona Impact Forum. His work and commentary have been featured on PBS television/radio, NBC Nightly News, CBS Sunday Morning, Today Show, CNBC, the Doctors, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Time Magazine, New Scientist, FastCompany, GenomeWeb, Gizmodo and Buzzfeed. Research findings from Genomes2People Research are highlighted in these podcasts, blog posts and videos.

Research Support: Dr. Green’s research is primarily supported by funding from National Institutes of Health, with additional support from Corewell Health, Danaher Foundation, Southcentral Foundation, the Department of Defense, the Snite Foundation and the Franca Sozzani Fund for Preventive Genomics.

Disclosures: Dr. Green receives compensation for advising the following companies: Allelica, Atria, Fabric, Genomic Life and Juniper Genomics; and is co-founder of Genome Medical and Nurture Genomics.