Tuesday, April 21, 2026
The NIH Clinical Center is the largest research hospital in the world.
Dr. Jonathan M. Green has been selected to lead the NIH Clinical Center
Jonathan M. Green, M.D., MBA, has been selected as the chief executive officer of the National Institutes of Health’s Clinical Center, the world’s largest hospital devoted to clinical research. Dr. Green is expected to begin his role on May 17, 2026.
In announcing the selection, NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya, M.D., Ph.D., said, “Dr. Green’s leadership in strengthening NIH’s human research protection program, combined with his experience as a researcher and training in pulmonary and critical care, uniquely position him to guide the Clinical Center—long the crown jewel of our agency—into a new era. Under his direction, we will fully realize its potential as both a place of hope for patients through groundbreaking clinical trials and a state-of-the-art engine for NIH scientists to advance discovery.”
As CEO, Dr. Green will oversee the Clinical Center’s nearly $700 million annual operating budget and the day-to-day operations and management of the 200-bed, 870,000-square-foot research center on NIH’s Bethesda campus. Last year, the Clinical Center had over 3,000 inpatient admissions and nearly 72,000 outpatient visits. Every patient at the Clinical Center is on a research protocol. Additionally, the Clinical Center is undergoing an extensive expansion to add over 570,000 square feet of space to modernize facilities and ensure that the hospital can continue to provide high-quality patient care alongside cutting-edge biomedical research. Work is expected to be completed in 2029.
Dr. Green joined NIH in 2018 to serve as director of the NIH Office of Human Subjects Research Protections. In that role he led the highly successful reorganization of the human research protection program, consolidating the 12 separate NIH Institute and Center-specific Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) into a new, centralized IRB serving the entire NIH intramural research program. IRBs are committees of experts and community representatives that are charged with reviewing all research involving human participants to ensure that the research meets ethical and regulatory standards. Approval by an IRB is required before the research can commence.
Prior to joining NIH, Dr. Green was a professor of medicine, pathology, and immunology, and served as Associate Dean for Human Studies, and Executive Chair of the IRB at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. There, he conducted research on the molecular mechanisms of T cell activation, focusing on the CD28 costimulatory family of receptors.
He received his medical degree from Wayne State University, Detroit, followed by residency training in internal medicine at Boston City Hospital. He then completed a fellowship in pulmonary and critical care medicine at the University of Michigan Medical Center, Ann Arbor, and additional post-doctoral training at the University of Chicago. He is board certified in internal medicine, pulmonary diseases, and critical care medicine. Dr. Green continues to serve as an attending physician in the Medical Intensive Care Unit and Pulmonary Consult Service at the NIH Clinical Center, and he maintains a long-standing interest in biomedical ethics. He currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Association for the Accreditation of Human Research Protection Programs.
“I would like to offer my sincere thanks to Pius A. Aiyelawo, who has effectively led the NIH Clinical Center as its Acting CEO since 2025,” said Dr. Bhattacharya.
About the NIH Clinical Center: The NIH Clinical Center is the clinical research hospital for the National Institutes of Health. Through clinical research, clinician-investigators translate laboratory discoveries into better treatments, therapies and interventions to improve the nation’s health. More information: https://www.cc.nih.gov.
About the National Institutes of Health (NIH): NIH, the nation’s medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit www.nih.gov.
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