Ricardo Mallarino, assistant professor of molecular biology, has been named a 2021 Vallee Scholar by the Vallee Foundation. The Vallee Scholar Awards Program recognizes outstanding early career scientists at a critical juncture in their careers.

Each Scholar receives discretionary funding to be spent over four years for basic biomedical research. Candidates for the program are competitively selected based on the originality and innovation of their science, the quality of their proposal as evidenced by ideas and execution, and their record of accomplishment.  

The goal of Mallarino’s lab is to uncover the molecular mechanisms that give rise to specific morphological, physiological, and behavioral traits, both within a species and over evolutionary time to generate variation across species. To achieve this, his lab develops genomic and experimental resources in emerging mammalian model species that have diverse, ecologically relevant phenotypes, and integrates approaches from multiple disciplines, including developmental biology, bioinformatics, and evolutionary genomics.

Ricardo Mallarino received a 2020 Dean for Research Innovation award for his study of the naturally occurring antimicrobial agents that marsupials — which carry their offspring to term in an external pouch — employ to kill toxic microbes. Mallarino also was a 2019 Sloan Fellow and Searle Scholar, and was featured in Princeton Alumni Weekly for his study of the genetic codes that underlie the evolution of distinct animal traits. He received his Ph.D. in biology from Harvard University and his B.S. in biology from the University of the Andes in Bogotá, Colombia.

Past Vallee Scholars from Princeton include Jared Toettcher (2019), Alexei Korennykh (2016) and Danelle Devenport (2014) – all molecular biology faculty.

Read more about the 2021 Vallee Scholars on the Vallee Foundation website and on Mallarino’s Vallee Scholar page.