Ronald van Gaal obtained his bachelor's degree in Molecular Life Sciences from Radboud University Nijmegen in 2009 and his master's degree in Molecular Mechanisms of Disease (bene meritum) from Radboudumc in 2012. In 2019, he successfully completed his PhD research, titled "Living kidney membranes based on supramolecular materials," at Eindhoven University of Technology.

Ronald received an NWO Rubicon grant, titled “Engineering ureters in kidney organoids,” to continue his research in the group of Prof. Jennifer Lewis at Harvard University. He is currently appointed as a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Pharmacology at Utrecht University. In 2025, hr received a NWO XS-Open competition titled "Photo-sculpting drainage channels in kidney organoids" and co-received NWO KIC Smart on "Advanced Dialysis by Artificial Cell based Protein-bound Toxin removal".

Ronalds research focuses on developing (i) living membranes to improve dialysis equipment, and (ii) advanced kidney organoids for disease modeling, drug discovery, and as potential building blocks for donor organs.