Committee

Professor Andrew Coats AO

Professor Andrew Coats is an experienced academic leader and entrepreneur with three decades of international experience in four of the world’s top 50 universities. He has over 900 peer-reviewed full papers, over 180,000 career citations and an H-Index of 170 He has been named one of the top 1,000 researchers of all time by the Webometrics Ranking of World Universities, and is the author of more than 20 awarded patents. He has launched two successful spin-out biotechnology companies with capital raises in excess of USD100M and licensing deals of more than USD1Billion signed.
Professor Coats is a fully accredited physician and cardiologist in the United Kingdom and Australia, a qualified company director (London Business School MBA, Fellow Australian Institute of Company Directors and Member, Institute of Directors, London) with more than 60 board years of experience, and a trained and experienced fundraiser with in excess of $500M raised. He holds two higher doctorates (DM, Oxon, and DSc, Imperial) for separate research areas and has held senior offices in five major Professional Societies, and is President of the largest specialist society in his field (the Heart Failure Association).

Professor Christopher Reid

Christopher Reid is a cardiovascular epidemiologist with appointments as a Research Professor in both the School of Population Health at Curtin University and the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, at Monash University. He was re-appointed as a John Curtin Distinguished Professor in 2021 and is currently Director of the Monash and Curtin Centers of Cardiovascular Research and Education (CCRE).  He has been awarded over $178M as a Chief Investigator and has received continuous NHMRC funding since 2001.  His major research interests include clinical outcome registries, randomized controlled trials, and epidemiological cohort studies.  He has over 750 peer-reviewed publications, many of which are in leading journals including the New England Journal of Medicine, the Lancet, JAMA, JACC, and the BMJ.  He is a Chief Investigator for the Colchicine in Type 2 diabetes trial (COLCOT-T2D), the Aspirin in Reducing Events in the Elderly (ASPREE) Study, and the Statins in Reducing Events in the Elderly (STAREE) Trial. He is the Board Chair of the Australian Clinical Trials Alliance (ACTA) and a board member of the Australian New Zealand Alliance for Cardiovascular Trials (ANZACT) Network and the Australian Cardiovascular Alliance (ACVA)

Professor Len Kritharides

Len Kritharides is Senior Staff Specialist Cardiologist Concord Hospital Sydney, Head of the Atherosclerosis Laboratory at the ANZAC Research Institute, Professor in Medicine at the University of Sydney, and Clinical Director of the Cardiovascular Stream Sydney Local Health District. 

He trained in Cardiology at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, completing a PhD and Post-Doctoral Studies in cell biology and lipoprotein biochemistry at the Heart Research Institute University of Sydney, and the Medical College of Philadelphia USA. He is an academic general cardiologist with clinical and research interests in preventing and treating heart disease in at risk populations.

Previous appointments include Director of Cardiology Concord Hospital Sydney, Chair of the Advanced Training Committee in Cardiology Royal Australasian College of Physicians, Chair of the Scientific Committee Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand (CSANZ), and President of the CSANZ.  

Winthrop Professor Gerald F Watts

Winthrop Professor Gerald F Watts is a leading authority in cardiometabolic medicine, serving as a Senior Academic in the School of Medicine at The University of Western Australia and Senior Consultant Physician at Royal Perth Hospital. A graduate of Imperial College London, his academic and clinical training in medicine and biochemistry underpin a distinguished career in cardiometabolic medicine and research.

Professor Watts has authored over 800 scientific publications, including landmark studies in coronary disease, dyslipidaemia, and novel gene silencing  therapies. His work has shaped international best practice for managing familial hypercholesterolaemia (FH), as exemplified by his leadership of the FH Australasia Network and several national and international patient registries. He has received several awards, including the 2022 RT Hall Prize from the Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand, a 2020 Lifetime Achievement Award from the Medical Research Foundation of Royal Perth Hospital, and the prestigious Myant Lecturer at HEART UK in 2024. He is Editor-in-Chief of Current Opinion in Endocrinology-Diabetes-Obesity and serves on the editorial boards of leading cardiology and lipidology journals.

Professor Watts has attracted multiple competitive research grants and has led two  Centres of Clinical Research Excellence. He has supervised over 60 students and early-career researchers, many now in senior academic and clinical roles. His ongoing clinical trials, leadership in international guidelines, and commitment to knowledge translation continue to improve care for people living with complex and high impact lipid disorders.

Professor John Atherton

John Atherton (MBBS, PhD, FRACP, FCSANZ, FHFA) is a Pre-eminent Staff Specialist and Director of Cardiology at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital (RBWH) and Professor, Faculty of Medicine, University of Queensland.

Professor Atherton was one of four non-European official content reviewers for the 2016 European Society of Cardiology Heart Failure Guidelines and was awarded European Society of Cardiology Heart Failure Association Ambassador (2023-2024). He chaired the 2018 National Heart Foundation of Australia/ Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand (CSANZ) Heart Failure Guidelines, sits on the Therapeutic Guidelines Cardiovascular Expert Group and co-authored the first universal definition of heart failure.

Professor Atherton is Data Custodian for the Queensland Cardiac Outcomes Registry (QCOR)- Heart Failure and sits as a Director on the National Cardiac Registry Board. His clinical and research interests include investigating novel methods to detect pre-symptomatic heart disease, heart failure disease management, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and cardiac genetics.