Peter Libby, MD, a cardiovascular specialist at Mass General Brigham holds the Mallinckrodt Professorship of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He served as Cardiovascular Medicine Chief from 1998 – 2014. His areas of clinical expertise include general and preventive cardiology. His major research focus is the role of inflammation in vascular diseases such as atherosclerosis. Dr. Libby has translated his basic laboratory studies to pilot and then large-scale clinical cardiovascular outcome trials. He initiated and helped to lead the >10,000 patient Canakinumab Anti-Inflammatory Thrombosis Outcomes Study (CANTOS) that provided the first clinical validation of benefit of targeting inflammation in human atherosclerosis. This study, which neutralized the pro-inflammatory cytokine interleukin-1 beta, emerged from decades of work on this mediator in Dr. Libby’s laboratory. The success of CANTOS spawned great interest and inspired many ongoing follow-on anti-inflammatory studies in the cardiovascular arena. He has helped to pioneer understanding the cardiovascular consequences of clonal hematopoiesis in recent years.

Dr. Libby’s research awards include the Distinguished Scientist Award from the American College of Cardiology (ACC), the Gold Medal of the European Society of Cardiology, the Basic Research Prize of the American Heart Association, the Anitschkow Prize in Atherosclerosis Research of the European Atherosclerosis Society, the Ernst Jung Gold Medal for Medicine, and the Benditt Award from the North American Vascular Biology Organization and the ACC Valentin Fuster Award for Innovation in Science for 2024. In 2025 he was the Princess Lilian Foundation Visiting Professor in Belgium, and the Myant Lecturer at Heart UK

Dr. Libby’s professional memberships include the Association of American Physicians, the American Society for Clinical Investigation, and honorary memberships in the British Atherosclerosis Society, the Japan Circulation Society, and the Japanese College of Cardiology. He has served as the President of the Association of University Cardiologists. He served the American Heart Association as chairman of several research committees and member of executive committees. He presided the ACC’s Research Peer Review Committee for two terms. He has frequently consulted for the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, including membership on the Board of Scientific Councilors. He directed the DW Reynolds Cardiovascular Clinical Research Center and two cycles of Leducq Foundation Awards. He has received continuous funding from the US National Heart Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) for several decades. He was president of the International Atherosclerosis Society from 2022-2024 and currently Presides the Residual Risk Reduction Initiative (R3i Foundation).

Dr. Libby has published extensively in medical journals including Circulation, Journal of Clinical Investigation, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, New England Journal of Medicine, and Nature. He is an Editor of Braunwald’s Heart Disease, and was the Editor-in Chief of the current 12th Edition. Dr. Libby has also contributed chapters on the pathogenesis, treatment, and prevention of atherosclerosis to many editions of Harrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine. He has held numerous visiting professorships and delivered more than 150 major named or keynote lectures throughout the world.

Dr. Libby earned his medical degree at the University of California, San Diego, and completed his training in internal medicine and cardiology at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital (now Mass General Brigham). He holds an honorary MA degree from Harvard University, and honorary doctorates from the Université de Lille, France , Université Laval in Québec, Canada, and Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main, Germany.