Michael J. Ackerman, M.D., Ph.D. is the Windland Smith Rice Cardiovascular Genomics Research Professor and Professor of Medicine, Pediatrics, and Pharmacology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. Dr. Ackerman was born and raised in Iowa. He graduated valedictorian from Sheldon High School in 1984, and in 1988, he graduated summa cum laude from Luther College in Decorah, Iowa majoring in chemistry and mathematics. He received his M.D. and Ph.D. degrees from the Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine and the Mayo Clinic Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences in 1995 and completed residency (pediatrics) and fellowship (pediatric cardiology) training in the Mayo Clinic Graduate School of Medicine in 2000. He has been a faculty member of Mayo Clinic since July 2000 and has served as President of the Sudden Arrhythmia Death Syndromes (SADS) Foundation since 2006.

As a genetic cardiologist, Dr. Ackerman has published over 600 manuscripts from bench-to-bedside that pertain to most of the sudden death-predisposing genetic heart diseases including long QT syndrome, catecholaminergic polymorphic ventricular tachycardia, and hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and is internationally known for empowering athletes with such genetic heart diseases to return-to-play. In 2010, he was inducted into the American Society of Clinical Investigation, in 2018, he received the Heart Rhythm Society’s Distinguished Scientist Award, and in 2021, he was inducted into the Association of American Physicians. He was named Mayo Clinic’s Distinguished Clinician in 2015 and its Distinguished Investigator in 2021. As Director of Mayo Clinic’s Windland Smith Rice Genetic Heart Rhythm Clinic and its complementary Windland Smith Rice Sudden Death Genomics Laboratory, Dr. Michael Ackerman strives to fulfill the two-fold objective of medical education and biomedical research as stated by Dr. Charles H. Mayo: “to heal the sick and to advance the science.”