Brian is a cardiologist and genetic epidemiologist who was educated and trained at Harvard, Yale, Oxford and Cambridge Universities. He graduated from Yale Medical School, and trained in clinical epidemiology and genetic epidemiology at Yale. He then trained in cardiology and interventional cardiology at Harvard Medical School where he also completed the Program in Clinical Effectiveness at Harvard School of Public Health, and was an NHLBI Cardiovascular (Genetic) Epidemiology Fellow.

He is currently Director of Research in Translational Therapeutics, and Head of the Centre for Naturally Randomized Trials in Cambridge having moved from Wayne State University School of Medicine in Detroit where he was Clinical Chief of Cardiology and Director of the Cardiovascular Genomic Research Centre.

His research focuses on using Mendelian randomization to design ‘naturally randomized trials’ to generate evidence that can be used to improve the drug discovery and development process; inform the optimal design of trials; fill evidence gaps when a randomized trial is not possible or practical; and define the practice of precision cardiovascular medicine.