Chief Genomics Officer
Heidi Rehm, PhD is a board-certified laboratory geneticist and serves as the Chief Genomics Officer at Mass General. Prior to joining Mass General, Dr. Rehm built and led the Partners Laboratory for Molecular Medicine for 15 years. She is a leader in defining standards for the interpretation of sequence variants and a principal investigator of ClinGen, providing publicly accessible resources to support the interpretation of genes and variants. Dr. Rehm also co-leads the Broad Center for Mendelian Genomics with Daniel MacArthur focused on discovering novel rare disease genes and co-leads the Matchmaker Exchange to aid in gene discovery.
Dr. Rehm received her bachelor's degree from Middlebury College in molecular biology and biochemistry. She completed her PhD in genetics at Harvard University studying the genetic and pathological basis of Norrie disease, a deaf-blindness syndrome, and served as a postdoctoral fellow at Mass General and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, expanding her studies into the genetic basis of hearing loss.
She is a strong advocate and pioneer of open science and data sharing, working to extend these approaches through her role as a Vice Chair of the Global Alliance for Genomics and Health. Dr. Rehm is also a principal investigator in the eMERGE consortium supporting genomic discovery and genomic medicine implementation, a principal investigator on a project to develop i2b2 into a Health Innovation Platform for clinical decision support and a principal investigator of the Broad-LMM-Color All of Us Genome Center supporting the sequencing and return of results to a cohort of one million individuals in the U.S.
Amit V. Khera, MD, MSc
Co-medical Director
Amit V. Khera, MD, MSc is a cardiologist at Mass General, Associate Director of the Precision Medicine Unit in the Mass General Center for Genomic Medicine and Associate Director of the Cardiovascular Disease Initiative at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard.
He received his MD with Alpha Omega Alpha distinction from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, and went on to complete clinical training in internal medicine and cardiology at Brigham and Women's Hospital and MGH. He completed a Masters of Science from the Harvard School of Public Health, and a postdoctoral research fellowship in human genetics at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard prior to accepting a faculty position.
He has developed substantial expertise in epidemiology, clinical medicine, and human genetics. Among his scientific contributions, he pioneered a new approach to quantify genetic risk for common diseases, developed biomarkers that provide new biologic insights, and analyzed large-scale gene sequencing data to highlight key pathways underlying risk for cardiometabolic disease. His research program uses genetic variation as a tool to uncover new biology and enable enhanced clinical care informed by inherited susceptibility. In tandem with his research efforts he is co-leading a new Preventive Genomics Clinic to provide a clinical infrastructure for genome-first medicine.
Dr. Khera has authored more than 50 scientific publications, including lead-authored publications in the New England Journal of Medicine, Journal of the American Medical Association, Cell, Nature Reviews Genetics, Nature Genetics, Journal of the American College of Cardiology and Circulation. He is a 2017 recipient of the National Lipid Association Junior Faculty Award and the 2019 recipient of the Douglas P. Zipes Distinguished Young Scientist Award from the American College of Cardiology.
Co-medical Director
Dr. Hull joined the faculty in the Division of General Internal Medicine at Mass General in 2019. She is a general internist working to equip primary care physicians to incorporate genetic testing modalities in their practice to improve and personalize patient care.
She completed her BA in molecular biology with honors from Princeton University in 2008, her MD at Stony Brook University School of Medicine in 2013, and a primary care-focused internship and residency at University Hospitals Case Medical Center and the Louis Stokes Cleveland VA in 2016. She is a member of the Gold Humanism and Alpha Omega Alpha Honor societies. Following her residency, she obtained additional training in health services research methods through the Harvard General Internal Medicine Fellowship and Boston VA's Center for Healthcare Organization and Implementation Research, and completed her MPH at the Harvard School of Public Health in 2018.
Fellow
Alexander Bick is a physician-scientist in the Mass General Department of Medicine with a clinical and research focus on genomic medicine. He received his MD and PhD degrees from Harvard Medical School and is completing his clinical training at Massachusetts General Hospital. His research has focused on defining the contribution of rare mutations to the health of individuals in the general population. His work has been published in Science, New England Journal of Medicine, JAMA and Nature Genetics. In 2015, he was named to the Forbes “30 Under 30” list in health care.
Renee Pelletier, MS, CGC
Genetic Counselor, Clinical Lead
Renee Pelletier is a genetic counselor for the Preventive Genomics Clinic and Center for Genomic Medicine, where she works on both clinical and research initiatives related to genomic medicine. She earned her BS in biology from Northeastern University, and obtained her master’s degree in genetic counseling at Boston University. Prior to joining the Center for Genomic Medicine, she was a genetic counselor in the Mass General Center for Cancer Risk Assessment, where she met with patients in the breast/ovarian and GI cancer genetics clinics in both Boston and Danvers. She has research interests in the equitable implementation of clinical genomics, and additionally serves on the Public Policy Committee for the National Society of Genetic Counselors.
Deanna Brockman, MS, CGC
Genetic Counselor, Research Lead
Deanna Brockman is a genetic counselor in the Center for Genomic Medicine and Preventive Genomics Clinic, where she leads research initiatives related to improving the implementation of genomic medicine at Mass General. She also serves as a liaison between Mass General and The Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard where she has helped to establish a pipeline for clinical whole genome sequencing at Mass General and currently drives research aimed at improving the communication of polygenic scores. Deanna received her BS in biology from SUNY Geneseo, and her master’s degree in genetic counseling from Boston University School of Medicine.
Clinical Molecular Geneticist
Christina Austin Tse, PhD is a clinical molecular geneticist in the Center for Genomic Medicine at Mass General and an instructor in pathology at Mass General and Harvard Medical School (HMS). She also serves as a part-time clinical molecular geneticist at the Partners Laboratory for Molecular Medicine, a CLIA-accredited molecular diagnostics laboratory. She received her PhD from the HMS Biological and Biomedical Sciences program in 2013 and completed her molecular genetics fellowship through the HMS Genetics Training Program in 2018. At Mass General, she participates in both clinical and research programs focused on genetic testing. She has more than five years experience in interpreting and reporting genetic testing results, and specializes in the analysis of clinical whole exome sequencing (WES) and whole genome sequencing (WGS) data.
Courtney Leonard
Genetic Counseling Assistant
Courtney Leonard is a Genetic Counselor Assistant (GCA) for the Preventive Genomics Clinic, Center for Genomic Medicine, Medical Genetics and Cardiovascular Genetics program. She received her BS in biology at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst where she served as a teaching assistant and undergraduate researcher for a genetics lab. Prior to her role as a GCA, she worked in the Department of Cardiology at Mass General, coordinating a large-scale clinical trial for atrial fibrillation screening. She hopes to become a genetic counselor in the future.