Dr. Bhatnagar is Professor of Medicine and Distinguished University Scholar at the University of Louisville. He is the Director of the Christina Lee Brown Envirome Institute and Co-Director of the American Heart Association Tobacco Regulation Center.  He is a leading expert studying the effects of air pollution on heart disease.  In this area his research interests span from studying how different inhaled pollutants affect the risk of heart disease to the beneficial effects of urban greenspaces.  Working with investigators at the University of Louisville and collaborators across the world, he has spearheaded the development of the new field of new field of Environmental Cardiology, which links the risk of heart disease to natural, social, and personal environments. His work has shown that most of the risk of chronic diseases could be linked to environmental conditions, social structures, and lifestyle choices. In particular he has found that living in greenspaces decreases exposure to air borne chemicals and pollutants and that it decreases the risk of developing chronic diseases such as cancer and heart disease.

Dr. Bhatnagar was the Deputy Editor of the prestigious journal - Circulation Research for 10 years. He has participated in over 50 NIH review panels and chaired several review panels. He was the recipient of the President’s Award for Outstanding Scholarship, Research and Creative Activity, University of Louisville. In 2007, he also received the first Outstanding Faculty Mentor of Graduate Students, and the Outstanding Mentor Award from the Conference of Southern Graduate Schools. In 2017, he was designated Research Exemplar by Washington University. Dr. Bhatnagar has published 424 peer-reviewed manuscripts, 25 book chapters and reviews and over 200 abstracts. He has mentored 61 graduate students and post-doctoral fellows in his laboratory and has served on the dissertation committee of 18 Ph.D. students.