Kenneth A. Newell graduated from Kalamazoo College and the University of Michigan Medical School. Following a residency in general surgery at Loyola University Medical Center, he obtained a PhD in immunology and completed a fellowship in transplantation surgery at the University of Chicago. After seven years as a faculty member at the University of Chicago, he moved to Emory University where he is Professor of Surgery and Vice Chair for Academic Affairs.

His clinical practice focuses on kidney transplantation in adults and children, pancreas transplantation, and living kidney donation. His research interests span the spectrum from basic laboratory investigation to clinical trials focusing on alloimmunity, immunosuppression and tolerance. He has lead numerous studies supported by the NIH and the Immune Tolerance Network.

He has served the transplant community in a variety of roles. He is a Past President of the American Society of Transplantation (AST). He has served the NIH sponsored Clinical Trials in Organ Transplantation (CTOT) consortium in many different roles. He is an associate editor for the American Journal of Transplantation and previously served as a member of the NIH study section Transplantation, Tolerance, and Tumor Immunology. He currently serves as an AST representative on the Transplant Therapeutics Consortium and is the co-chair of Workgroup 1, which is focused on gaining regulatory endorsement of new surrogate endpoints for clinical trials.