Sadaf Ghorbani, PhD
Email Address: Sadaf.ghorbani.no@gmail.com S.ghorbani@uib.no
I completed my PhD in 2018 at Haavik Lab, University of Bergen, where I studied how isoforms of chaperone proteins from 14-3-3 family regulate the phosphorylation and enzymatic activity of tyrosine hydroxylase — the key enzyme in dopamine production. Our findings shed light on the importance of protein-protein interactions in modulating intracellular signaling pathways, with relevance to dopaminergic diseases. I then joined Haukeland University Hospital as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Bergen Psychosis lab, followed by moving to Yale University, where I spent four years in Kristen Brennand's lab. At Yale, I led projects investigating the cell-type-specific functional impact of rare genetic variants associated with schizophrenia and other psychiatric and neurodevelopmental disorders. A key focus of this work was uncovering how genes such as NRXN1 produce distinct isoforms across different neuronal cell types — diversity that has profound implications for synaptic function and disease vulnerability.
In 2025, I returned to Bergen to establish my own research lab, bringing together stem cell biology, functional genomics, protein interaction studies, and translational psychiatry.
I am deeply committed to mentoring the next generation of scientists and to building a collaborative, international lab environment where trainees gain hands-on experience across iPSC modeling, transcriptomic, functional assays, and proteomics — skills that open doors across academia and industry. I am always happy to hear from motivated PhD and postdoc candidates who are excited about understanding the biology of psychiatric disorders.
I welcome collaborations with other labs interested in establishing or advancing iPSC and organoid models in their own labs. If you are looking to develop these systems and think our expertise could be useful, I would love to connect.
Affiliations: Adjunct Associate Professor, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Bergen Principal Investigator, Division of Psychiatry, Haukeland University Hospital Affiliated researcher, Mohn Research Centre for Regenerative Medicine (MRCRM) Affiliated researcher, Bergen Center for Medical Stem Cell Research