Thomas P. Cappola, MD, ScM
William Smilow Professor
Attending, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Heart Failure and Transplantation Service
Member, Penn Cardiovascular Institute
Member, Institute for Diabetes, Obesity, and Metabolism
Member, Institute for Translational Medicine and Therapeutics
Member, Penn Genome Frontiers Institute
Chief, Division of Cardiovascular Medicine, University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine
Department: Medicine
Graduate Group Affiliations
Contact information
Perelman Center for Advanced Medicine
Division of Cardiovascular Medicine
11-113 South Pavilion
3400 Civic Center Boulevard
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Division of Cardiovascular Medicine
11-113 South Pavilion
3400 Civic Center Boulevard
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Office: 215-662-3140
Fax: 215-349-8017
Fax: 215-349-8017
Publications
Education:
A.B. (Chemistry)
Princeton University, 1991.
M.D. (Medicine)
Harvard Medical School, 1995.
Sc.M. (Clinical Investigation )
Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, 2004.
Permanent linkA.B. (Chemistry)
Princeton University, 1991.
M.D. (Medicine)
Harvard Medical School, 1995.
Sc.M. (Clinical Investigation )
Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, 2004.
Description of Research Expertise
Thomas Cappola is the William Smilow Professor and Chief, Cardiovascular Medicine, University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. His research aims to uncover heart failure mechanisms in human subjects and to use these insights to improve treatment. This has involved diverse approaches, including applied genomics, population science, laboratory studies, and clinical trials. He has established and leads a multicenter cohort study of advanced heart failure (Penn Heart Failure Study, PHFS); co-loads a multicenter consortium for human myocardial transcriptomics and systems genetics (Myocardial Applied Genomics Network, MAGNet); serves as a Principal Investigator on the NHLBI Heart Failure Clinical Research Network; and is a contributing member of numerous international genomics consortia. Within the Cardiovascular Division, he has established collaborative leadership to create programs integrating science and clinical care, and has used these as a platform for research and training. In his clinical role, he treats patients with advanced heart failure on the inpatient and outpatient heart failure/transplant service.Description of Clinical Expertise
My clinical focus is evaluation and treatment of advance heart failure including medical therapy, device therapy, investigational therapy, and cardiac transplantationSelected Publications
Abramowitz SA, Hoffman-Andrews L, Zhang D, Judy R, Cappola TP, Day SM, Reza N, Owens AT, Damrauer SM, Levin MG; Penn Medicine BioBank: Polygenic background and penetrance of pathogenic variants in hypertrophic and dilated cardiomyopathies. JAMA Cardiol Page: e254739, Dec 2025.Vajargah KK, Dib MJ, Tavolinejad H, Zamani P, Richards AM, Mann DL, Rietzschel E, van Empel V, Burgess S, Cappola TP, Chirinos JA.: Proteome-Wide Genetic Investigation of Kidney Function in Heart Failure With Preserved Ejection Fraction. JACC Heart Fail Page: 102771, Nov 2025.
Woerner J, Westbrook TM, Joo J, Shivakumar M, Venkatesh R, Cherlin T, Jung SH, Jeong S, Maseda D, McKeague M, Shwetank, Ionita M, Wagenaar J, Abramowitz SA, Verma A, Zhao B, Lee S, Damrauer S, Levin MG, Heo SC, Cappola TP, Rader DJ, Day S, Deo R, Gelfand JM, Ramessur R, Guerraty MA, Setia-Verma S, Pasaniuc B, Ritchie MD, Apostolidis SA, Greenplate AR, Wherry EJ; Penn Medicine Biobank; Nam Y, Kim D.: Large-scale evaluation of proteomic and polygenic risk scores reveals complementary contributions to incident disease prediction. medRxiv [Preprint] Page: 25331242, Jul 2025.
Lindholm ME, Abramowitz S, Waggott DM, Grove ME, Dewey FE, Pan C, Pavlovic A, Shang C, Huang Y, Bensabath L, Goldfeder RL, Cordero P, Erbilgin A, Priest JR, Chaib H, Puckelwartz MJ, Day SM, McNally EM, Cappola T, Dorn GW, Ashley EA, Wheeler MT: Identification of candidate cardiomyopathy modifier genes through genome sequencing and RNA profiling. Front Cardiovasc Med 12: 1546493, Jul 2025.
Lee DSM, Cardone KM, Zhang DY, Abramowitz S, DePaolo JS, Aragam KG, Biddinger K, Conery M, Dilitikas O, Hoffman-Andrews L, Judy RL, Khan A, Kulo I, Puckelwartz MJ, Reza N, Satterfield BA, Singhal P; Regeneron Genetics Center; Arany ZP, Cappola TP, Carruth E, Day SM, Do R, Haggarty CM, Joseph J, McNally E, Nadkarni G, Owens AT, Rader DJ, Ritchie MD, Sun Y, Voight BF, Levin MG, Damrauer SM.: Common- and rare-variant genetic architecture of heart failure across the allele frequency spectrum. Nat Genet 57(4): 829, Apr 2025.
Henry A, Mo X, Finan C, Chaffin MD, Speed D, Issa H, Denaxas S, Ware JS, Zheng SL, Malarstig A, Gratton J, Bond I, Roselli C, Miller D, Chopade S, Schmidt AF, Abner E, Adams L, Andersson C, Aragam KG, Ärnlöv J, Asselin G, Raja AA, Backman JD, Bartz TM, Biddinger KJ, Biggs ML, Bloom HL, Boersma E, Brandimarto J, Brown MR, Brunak S, Bruun MT, Buckbinder L, Bundgaard H, Carey DJ, Chasman DI, Chen X, Cook JP, Czuba T, de Denus S, Dehghan A, Delgado GE, Doney AS, Dörr M, Dowsett J, Dudley SC, Engström G, Erikstrup C, Esko T, Farber-Eger EH, Felix SB, Finer S, Ford I, Ghanbari M, Ghasemi S, Ghouse J, Giedraitis V, Giulianini F, Gottdiener JS, Gross S, Guðbjartsson DF, Gui H, Gutmann R, Hägg S, Haggerty CM, Hedman ÅK, Helgadottir A, Hemingway H, Hillege H, Hyde CL, Aagaard Jensen B, Jukema JW, Kardys I, Karra R, Kavousi M, Kizer JR, Kleber ME, Køber L, Koekemoer A, Kuchenbaecker K, Lai YP, Lanfear D, Langenberg C, Lin H, Lind L, Lindgren CM, Liu PP, London B, Lowery BD, Luan J, Lubitz SA, Magnusson P, Margulies KB, Marston NA, Martin H, März W, Melander O, Mordi IR, Morley MP, Morris AP, Morrison AC, Morton L, Nagle MW, Nelson CP, Niessner A, Niiranen T, Noordam R, Nowak C, O'Donoghue ML, Ostrowski S, Owens AT, Palmer C, Paré G, Pedersen O, Perola M, Pigeyre M, Psaty BM, Rice KM, Ridker PM, Romaine SPR, Rotter JI, Ruff CT, Sabatine M, Sallah N, Salomaa V, Sattar N, Shalaby AA, Shekhar A, Smelser DT, Smith NL, Sørensen E, Srinivasan S, Stefansson K, Sveinbjörnsson G, Svensson P, Tammesoo M , Tardif JC , Teder-Laving M , Teumer A, Thorgeirsson G, Thorsteinsdottir U, Torp-Pedersen C, Tragante V, Trompet S, Uitterlinden AG, Ullum H, van der Harst P, van Heel D, Jvan Setten J, van Vugt M, Veluchamy A, Verschuuren M, Verweij N, Vissing CR, Völker U, Voors AA, Wallentin L, Wang Y, Peter E Weeke, Wiggins KL, Williams LK, Yang Y, Yu B, Zannad F, Zheng C; Genes & Health Research Team; Estonian Biobank Research Team; DBDS Genomic Consortium; Asselbergs FW, Cappola TP, Dubé MP, Dunn ME, Lang CC, Samani N, Shah S, Vasan RS, Smith G, Holm H, Shah S, Ellinor PT, Hingorani AD, Wells Q, Lumbers RT; HERMES Consortium : Genome-wide association study meta-analysis provides insights into the etiology of heart failure and its subtypes. Nat Genet 57(4): 815, Apr 2025.
Chadwick J, Hinterberg MA, Asselbergs FW, Biegel H, Boersma E, Cappola TP, Chirinos JA, Coresh J, Ganz P, Gordon DA, Kureshi N, Loupey KM, Orlenko A, Ostroff R, Sampson L, Shrestha S, Sweitzer NK, Williams SA, Zhao L, Kardys I, Lanfear DE: Harnessing the Plasma Proteome to Predict Mortality in Heart Failure Subpopulations Circ Heart Fail 18(4): e011208, Apr 2025.
Zamani P, Shah SJ, Cohen JB, Zhao M, Yang W, Afable JL, Caturla M, Maynard H, Pourmussa B, Demastus C, Mohanty I, Miyake MM, Adusumalli S, Margulies KB, Prenner SB, Poole DC, Wilson N, Reddy R, Townsend RR, Ischiropoulos H, Cappola TP, Chirinos JA: Potassium Nitrate in Heart Failure With Preserved Ejection Fraction: A Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA Cardiol 10(3): 284, Mar 2025.
Tan K, Tay D, Tan W, Ng HK, Wong E, Morley MP, Singhera GK, Lee CJM, Jain PR, Tai FL, Hanson PJ, Cappola TP, Margulies KB, Foo R, Loh M: Epigenome-wide association study for dilated cardiomyopathy in left ventricular heart tissue identifies putative gene sets associated with cardiac pathology and early indicators of cardiac risk. Clin Epigenetics 17(1): s13148-025-01854-8, Mar 2025.
Gan S, Azzo JD, Zhao L, Pourmussa B, Dib MJ, Salman O, Erten O, Ebert C, Richards AM, Javaheri A Mann DL, Rietzschel E, Zamani P, van Empel V, Cappola TP, Chirinos JA: Transferrin Saturation, Serum Iron, and Ferritin in Heart Failure: Prognostic Significance and Proteomic Associations. Circ Heart Fail 18(2): e011728, Feb 2025.