Gabriel Capellá obtained his MD degree by the University of Barcelona in 1983. He trained as a general and digestive surgeon. His interest in translational cancer research lead him to a postdoctoral stay with Dr. Manuel Perucho the years 1989 and 1990 at La Jolla, USA.

Back to Spain he spent 8 years at the Gastrointestinal Research Laboratory at the Hospital de Sant Pau where he focused his research in the molecular basis of pancreatic and colorectal cancer. He was Director of the Translational Research Laboratory of the Catalan Institute until 2011 where he is now Director of the Hereditary Cancer Program, role that he combines with being head of the IDIBELL Hereditary Cancer group. He is also the coordinator of the CIBERONC's Digestive Tract Tumors Research Program.

He has pioneered the implementation of cancer genetics units and molecular testing of hereditary cancer in Spain. His research projects are centered in the detection and clinical and molecular characterization of Lynch Syndrome and Familial Adenomatous Polyposis, also in the development of novel technologies for genetic analysis.

He is coauthor of more than 400 publications in international peer-reviewed journals and has co-founded the spinoff VCN Biosciences, aimed at the development of oncolytic virus-based therapies. He served as vice-director of Investigation and Innovation of the Catalonian Health Department from 2013 to 2016, when he was appointed Director of IDIBELL.