The Generative Brain

Prion Research Center, Colorado State University

The Prion Research Center is a research center inside Colorado State University, not a separate legal body and not a clinic. It sits in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology in the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at Fort Collins, Colorado, and was founded in 2011, first as a university Program of Research and Scholarly Excellence. Glenn Telling has directed it since late 2011 and also sits on the CJD Foundation Scientific Advisory Committee. Four faculty laboratories are listed, those of Mathiason, Moreno, Telling and Zabel, and recent papers add the Woerman group and, on 2026 records, Jason Bartz. The core of the work is chronic wasting disease in deer and elk: how it is transmitted, how many strains exist, how it can be detected in blood and tissue, and whether it can cross into humans. The tools built for that question, in particular gene-targeted mice that carry human or cervid prion protein and can be challenged by peripheral as well as intracranial routes, are the same tools that bear on human prion disease. Funding is mostly federal, through NIAID and NINDS awards to Colorado State, with smaller CJD Foundation grants to individual investigators.

Key facts

  • The center is a unit of Colorado State University housed in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology in the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, Fort Collins, Colorado; its only public contact route is institutional, at 1619 Campus Delivery, Fort Collins, Colorado 80523-1619, with a departmental telephone number and a protected contact address.
  • It was founded in 2011, initially as a Program of Research and Scholarly Excellence, to extend prion research and training that already existed at the university.
  • Glenn Telling, Professor of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology, has directed the center since late 2011; he trained with Stanley Prusiner at UCSF and previously worked at the UK MRC Prion Unit and at the Sanders Brown Center on Aging in Kentucky.
  • Telling is listed as Director of the Prion Research Center on the CJD Foundation Scientific Advisory Committee, which is a documented standing link between the center and the main United States family foundation for human prion disease.
  • The center lists four faculty laboratories, Mathiason, Moreno, Telling and Zabel, and draws faculty from more than one department: Julie Moreno is an Assistant Professor in the center with a departmental home in Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences and is also associate director of the CSU Brain Research Center.
  • The Telling laboratory programme is built on gene-targeted mouse models; a January 2026 Journal of Infectious Diseases paper reports refined gene-targeted mice that reproduce natural chronic wasting disease features with rapid onset after peripheral or intracerebral challenge, and an August 2024 PNAS paper showed that peripheral challenge preserves native strain properties while intracerebral challenge can produce divergent strains.
  • Work directly touching human prion protein includes a September 2025 mBio paper, with Telling and UTHealth Houston, Edinburgh and USDA co-authors, reporting that prions from pigs challenged with BSE induced misfolding of human prion protein in vitro, and a September 2026 Neurobiology of Disease paper with Telling and Bartz on the kuru-protective G127V prion protein variant as a dominant-negative therapeutic strategy.
  • The Mathiason laboratory works on amplification assays for prions in blood and tissue: combined PMCA and RT-QuIC detection in deer muscle (October 2024), evidence of vertical transmission in free-ranging white-tailed deer (August 2025) and detection of prions in the blood of healthy-looking wild white-tailed deer (June 2026).
  • The CJD Foundation has funded center investigators directly: Candace Mathiason received the 2020 Kenneth Wheat Memorial Grant for blood-borne prion amplification assays for the detection of human prion diseases, and Alyssa Block received a one-year 2025 grant announced by the laboratory on 11 July 2025 for refined gene-targeted mouse models of human prion adaptation by intracranial and peripheral routes.
  • Federal funding is the main source. An NINDS R35 award, Preventing Prion Epidemics, Research on Naturally-Occurring Prion Diseases, runs 15 May 2023 to 30 April 2031 with total obligations recorded at 3,091,919 US dollars, and an NIAID R01 on a chronic wasting disease vaccine for cervids runs 8 July 2021 to 30 June 2027 with total obligations recorded at 3,544,335 US dollars.
  • The Telling laboratory also runs the Science Core of an NIH program project on pathogenesis, transmission and detection of zoonotic prion diseases, which recent papers acknowledge as NIAID P01 AI077774, alongside R01 awards on emergent chronic wasting disease strains from Norway and South Korea.
  • Documented collaboration with NIAID Rocky Mountain Laboratories is long running: a 2026 Journal of General Virology paper with Zabel and with Priola, Race and Caughey found that historical and recent western United States chronic wasting disease isolates have similar strain properties, and earlier joint papers cover RT-QuIC validation in ear and rectal biopsy from deer and elk and modified RT-QuIC on placental tissue in a CJD pregnancy.
  • Documented links to the human surveillance side exist but are thin and older: a November 2019 Laboratory Investigation paper with Telling and with Kong, Gambetti and Notari at Case Western Reserve on prion protein glycosylation in human prion replication, and a July 2019 mBio review with Zabel and Brian Appleby of the National Prion Disease Pathology Surveillance Center.
  • The center offers no clinical or diagnostic service to patients or families; nothing on the center pages opened offers testing, referral or clinical advice, and the public route is a contact form, a telephone number and a donations page.

Timeline

  1. 1978Chronic wasting disease, first seen as a wasting syndrome in mule deer near Fort Collins in the late 1960s, confirmed as a prion disease by Elizabeth Williams.
  2. 2011Prion Research Center founded at Colorado State University as a Program of Research and Scholarly Excellence; Telling becomes director in late 2011.
  3. 2019Laboratory Investigation paper with Telling and the Case Western group on prion protein glycosylation in the replication of human prions.
  4. 2020Candace Mathiason receives the CJD Foundation Kenneth Wheat Memorial Grant for blood-borne prion amplification assays for the detection of human prion diseases.
  5. 2021Start of the NIAID R01 on a chronic wasting disease vaccine for cervids, later extended to 2027-06-30.
  6. 2023Start of the NINDS R35 award on naturally occurring prion diseases, running to 2031-04-30.
  7. 2024PNAS paper showing that peripheral challenge of gene-targeted mice preserves native chronic wasting disease strain properties while intracerebral challenge can produce divergent strains.
  8. 2025Telling laboratory news item announcing Alyssa Block's one-year CJD Foundation grant for a refined gene-targeted mouse model of human prion adaptation.
  9. 2025mBio paper with Telling reporting that prions from BSE-challenged pigs induced misfolding of human prion protein in vitro.
  10. 2025PNAS paper on coexpression of prion protein from different species in mice and its effect on strain selection and host range.
  11. 2026Journal of Infectious Diseases paper on refined gene-targeted mice that reproduce natural chronic wasting disease features with rapid onset.
  12. 2026PLoS Pathogens paper from the Telling group on convergent chronic wasting disease strain properties from brain and peripheral tissue conformers in gene-targeted mice, and a Scientific Reports paper from the Mathiason group on prions in the blood of healthy-looking wild white-tailed deer.
  13. 2026Neurobiology of Disease paper with Telling and Bartz on the kuru-protective G127V prion protein variant as a dominant-negative therapeutic strategy.
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