Roberto Ballarino

I am a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Cell and Molecular Biology at Karolinska Institutet. My research focuses on transcriptional and epigenetic mechanisms that govern brain development and function in health and disease, with a particular interest in cell fate determination and the dynamic decisions made by stem cells.

I grew up in the Netherlands and completed a bachelor’s degree in biomedical sciences at Utrecht University (2011–2015) and a master’s degree in neuroscience at Erasmus University Rotterdam (2015–2017). I subsequently pursued a PhD in Medical Science at SciLifeLab (2017–2023) under the supervision of Nicola Crosetto and Magda Bienko at the Department of Medical Biochemistry and Biophysics, where I studied molecular mosaicism in the brain and the roles of DNA damage and 3D genome organization in stem cell fate and transcriptional regulation. In 2024, I joined Rickard Sandberg’s group at the Department of Cell and Molecular Biology to decode the splicing codes of the brain. My postdoctoral research investigates how alternative splicing functionally diversifies neurons during brain development by combining highly automated single-cell genomics, large-scale developmental datasets, and ongoing contributions to the NIH BRAIN Initiative Cell Atlas Network (BICAN). I am currently expanding this work by examining transcriptional dynamics at single-cell resolution to define what makes neuronal populations unique.

In 2026, I was awarded the Mats Sundin Fellowship in Human Developmental Health, a highly competitive two-year fellowship exchange with the University of Toronto supporting collaborative research on early-life determinants of health. I will join the Donnelly Centre (University of Toronto) to pursue a machine-learning project. The work focuses on integrating single-cell data to identify transient cell states important for neurodevelopmental disorders.

My research focuses on unraveling the intricate role of alternative splicing in diversifying neuronal populations and its impact on synaptic connectivity within the brain. Specifically, my project aims to elucidate how alternative splicing contributes to the fine-tuning of neuronal development, the establishment of synaptic networks, and the overall functionality of the central nervous system. To achieve these objectives, I leverage advanced single-cell sequencing technologies, such as Smart-seq3xpress, Parse Evercode, and Takaras Shasta Total RNA alongside sophisticated deep learning models, to dissect the molecular mechanisms driving these processes on scale.