George Bakris, M.D., is the Professor of Medicine and Director of the American Heart Association Comprehensive Hypertension Center at the University of Chicago Medical Center.  Dr. Bakris was previously Vice-Chairman of Preventive Medicine and Director of the Rush University Hypertension Center in Chicago.  He has published over 800 articles and more than 100 book chapters on hypertension, diabetic kidney disease, and progression of nephropathy.  He also served as an expert member on the Cardio-Renal Advisory Board of the FDA and was a special government expert to the FDA and CMS.  He has served on many national guideline committees, including the Joint National Committee (JNC) Writing Groups VI & 7, the JNC 7 executive committee, the American Diabetes Association Clinical Practice Guideline Committee, the National Kidney Foundation's Kidney Disease Outcomes Quality Initiative (KDOQI) Blood Pressure Guideline committee, and the KDOQI Diabetes Guideline committee.  Dr. Bakris is also the past president of the American College of Clinical Pharmacology and the American Society of Hypertension. 

Rajiv Agarwal, M.D., is a tenured Professor of Medicine at Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis, IN.  Dr. Agarwal is an internationally recognized leader in the area of clinical and translational research in nephrology.  He was among the first to demonstrate the effect of add-on angiotensin receptor blockade on cytokine production and oxidative stress, but none on proteinuria in patients with chronic kidney disease.  He currently serves on the Board of Directors of Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO), the Editorial Boards of Kidney International, Clinical Journal of American Society of Nephrology (CJASN), and Hypertension and Seminars in Dialysis, and serves as an Editor for Nephrology Dialysis Transplantation, American Journal of Nephrology and the Journal of the American Society of Hypertension.

Glenn Chertow, M.D., is Chief, Division of Nephrology at Stanford University School of Medicine, Norman S. Coplon Satellite Healthcare Professor of Medicine and (by courtesy) of Health Research and Policy.  Dr. Chertow completed his undergraduate education at the University of Pennsylvania and medical education at Harvard.  He completed a residency in internal medicine and fellowship in nephrology at Brigham and Women's Hospital before joining the Harvard faculty, where he remained until 1998.  He then joined the faculty at the University of California San Francisco, where he served as Director of Clinical Services in the Division of Nephrology and was promoted through the academic ranks to full Professor in the Departments of Medicine and Epidemiology and Biostatistics until joining the Stanford faculty in 2007.  In addition to an active clinical practice, administrative responsibilities, teaching, and mentoring, Dr. Chertow has developed and maintained a robust clinical research program.  He has served or is currently serving in leadership roles for multiple NIDDK-, NHLBI-, and VA-sponsored clinical trials, including HEMO, DAC, ATN, FHN, SPRINT, PRESERVE, ISCHEMIA, CURE-GN, and TiME, and for several industry-sponsored clinical trials including TREAT, EVOLVE, BEACON, SYMPLICITY, and REPRISE.  He has served in an advisory capacity to the Medicare Payment Advisory Committee and the National Quality Forum on issues related to the ESRD program, on NIH study sections, and in multiple roles with the American Society of Nephrology (ASN), including the Public Policy Board, Quality Metrics Taskforce, and as JASN Associate Editor.  He is Co-Editor of Brenner and Rector's The Kidney.  Dr. Chertow was honored by the American Kidney Fund in 2007 with the National Torchbearer Award and in 2011 with the Nephrologist of the Year Award, in recognition of his contributions to the care of persons with kidney disease.  Dr. Chertow was elected to the American Society of Clinical Investigation in 2004.  In 2015, he received the Belding H. Scribner Award from ASN and was elected to the Association of American Physicians and the National Academy of Medicine.  In 2018, Dr. Chertow received the David M. Hume Memorial Award, the highest honor given by the National Kidney Foundation to a distinguished scientist-clinician in the field of kidney and urologic diseases.

Charles Herzog, M.D., is a professor of Medicine at the University of Minnesota and has been a cardiologist at Hennepin County Medical Center (HCMC) for 34 years.  He founded the program in interventional cardiology at HCMC and served as cardiac catheterization laboratory director from 1985-1991, and cardiac ultrasound laboratory director from 1997-2012.  He was director of the United States Renal Data System Cardiovascular Special Studies Center from 1999-2014.  He participated in the development of the KDOQI Guidelines for Cardiovascular Disease in Dialysis Patients, the KDIGO Clinical Practice Guidelines on Acute Kidney Injury, and the KDIGO 2017 Clinical Practice Guidelines Update for CKD-Mineral and Bone Disorder.  He co-chaired the 2010 KDIGO Controversies Conference, "Cardiovascular Disease in CKD: What is it and What Can We Do About It?" and is a co-chair of the KDIGO Kidney, Heart, and Vascular Conference Series.  He was an Executive Committee member of the EVOLVE Trial.  He chairs the Renal Committee of the ISCHEMIA-CKD Trial and Critical Event Committee of the CARSK Trial and was Co-PI of the WED-HED (Wearable Cardioverter Defibrillator in Hemodialysis Patients) Study.  He currently co-chairs the workgroup "Understanding and Overcoming the Exclusion of Patients with Kidney Disease from Cardiovascular Trials" for the Kidney Health Initiative.  Dr. Herzog has over 250 published papers.  His special interests include cardiac disease and CKD, and echocardiography.

Aldo Peixoto, M.D., is a Professor of Medicine in the Section of Nephrology at the Yale University School of Medicine.  He is also Associate Chair for Ambulatory Services Operations and Quality (Department of Internal Medicine) and Clinical Chief of the Section of Nephrology.  Dr. Peixoto has published more than 100 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters in nephrology and hypertension and is the author of a book on bedside diagnosis.  He is an associate editor of Blood Pressure Monitoring and is on the Editorial Board of the American Journal of Nephrology and the Brazilian Journal of Nephrology.  Dr. Peixoto also serves as a reviewer for many internal medicine, nephrology and hypertension journals.