Dr. Richard J. Johnson received his medical degree from the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and then underwent his residency in internal medicine and fellowships in nephrology and infectious diseases at the University of Washington in Seattle, Washington.

He is currently a professor of medicine and chief of the Division of Renal Diseases and Hypertension at the University of Colorado, Denver, and an adjunct professor of medicine at the University of Florida. In addition, he is a board member of the Gout Education Society.

Dr. Johnson is an expert on uric acid as it may relate to hypertension, obesity and cardiovascular disease. He also is an expert on the role of sugar and fructose in gout and uric acid related diseases and is author of the 'The Sugar Fix' (2009), 'The Fat Switch' (2014) and 'Nature Wants Us To Be Fat' (2022).

Dr. Johnson has received numerous honours in his career including the American Society of Nephrology/American Heart Association Young Investigator Award and membership in the American Society of Clinical Investigation. He has lectured in more than 30 countries and received several distinguished lectureships, including the Inaugural Priscilla Kincaid-Smith Visiting Professor in Australia and the Tokyo Forum speaker. He has been a member of numerous editorial boards for publications such as Kidney International, Journal of the American Society of Nephrology, American Journal of Kidney Disease, Hypertension, American Journal of Physiology and American Journal of Nephrology.

He is coeditor of Comprehensive Clinical Nephrology with Dr. John Feehally, which is highly regarded as one of the better clinical textbooks in nephrology. He also has published more than 400 articles, for which more than 50 have received more than 100 citations.