How are these principles disrupted in neurodevelopmental disorders and hijacked in brain tumors?
We investigate how cell morphology may causally shape cellular function in brain development, evolution and disease. We are located at Human Technopole in Milan, Italy.
We seek to uncover the cellular logic by which the cerebral cortex is built, with a particular focus on how neural stem cell morphology instructs proliferation, fate and tissue architecture during development and evolution.
Read moreWe focus on understanding how brain tumors exploit cellular programs of growth, plasticity and cell-cell interaction, with a particular focus on the role of cancer stem cell morphology in tumor progression.
Read morecombining cell biology, genomics, microscopy and quantitative analysis applied to basic and translational questions in neuroscience and neuro-oncology.
Nature Genetics · 2026
Francesco Iorio, Mathew J. Garnett, Pedro Beltrao, Maximilian Billmann, Larissa Bless, Christoph Bock, Michael Boutros, Alejandra Bruna, Piero Carninci, Giovanni Ciriello, Isidro Cortés-Ciriano, Giuseppina D’Alessandro, Roberta Esposito, Stefania Faletti, Emanuel Gonçalves, Syed Haider, Nereo Kalebic, Manuel Kaulich, Giuseppe Leuzzi, Nuria Lopez-Bigas, Christopher J. Lord, Evangelia Petsalaki, Stephen Pettitt, Ludovica Proietti, Roland Rad, Nevenka Radic, Colm J. Ryan, Jonathan L. Schmid-Burgk, Sumana Sharma, Andrea Sottoriva, Christopher Tape, Livio Trusolino, Jolanda van Leeuwen, David Walter, Lodewyk Wessels & the PRECISE consortium
Together with 30 other research groups, the Kalebic Lab is part of PRECISE (Predictive Relationships Explaining Cancer Genetic Interactions and Synthetic Essentiality), a pan-European network coordinated by Francesco Iorio from Human Technopole, that aims to combine high-throughput perturbation biology, multimodal profiling and AI-driven inference to predict cancer vulnerabilities in disease-relevant models. The vision and the mission of PRECISE have now been presented in a Nature Genetics commentary.
DOI: 10.1038/s41588-026-02658-zBioRxiv · 2026
Kaluthantrige Don F., Barelli C., Bonfanti M., Passi M., Bosotti R., Wagner L., Capra E., Bertani I., Ricca D., Casagrande F., Fasciani A., Peano C. and Kalebic N.
Using human cortical organoids, live imaging and CellShape-seq, we show that basal radial glia morphotypes differ in morphodynamics, proliferative capacity and transcriptional identity. Multipolar bRG are the most proliferative and progenitor-like, whereas bifurcated bRG are less proliferative and enriched for YBX1. Inhibiting YBX1 alters bRG composition, reduces neurogenesis, and promotes glial commitment, linking progenitor morphology to gene expression and fate in human cortical development.
DOI: 10.64898/2026.01.22.701090
Mouse cortical neurons and astrocytes grown in 2D cell culture. MAP2 (red), GFAP (white), nuclei (cyan). Acquired by Ilaria Bertani.
Updates on publications, people, awards, and major collaborative efforts.
Announcement
July 3, 2026
We are pleased to share that the Kalebic Lab website is now live. The site brings together our research directions, team members, publications and lab updates in one place. We will keep using this space to share news, updates and milestones from our...
New publication
July 11, 2026
Kalebic lab is part of the PRECISE consortium, which aims to build predictive models of cancer vulnerabilities. Together with 30 other research groups, the Kalebic Lab is part of PRECISE (Predictive Relationships Explaining Cancer Genetic Interactions and...
Publication
June 4, 2026
Our latest preprint shows that LSD modulates molecular and cellular pathways associated with brain aging and neurodegeneration We are excited to share our latest preprint, “Lysergic acid diethylamide reverses aging and neurodegeneration associated brain...
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