The Generative Brain

University of Verona, neurology prion research group (Zanusso)

A neurology and neuropathology research group in the Department of Neurosciences, Biomedicine and Movement Sciences of the University of Verona, associated with Gianluigi Zanusso as senior author. It is best known for olfactory mucosa (nasal brushing) RT-QuIC, the test for sporadic CJD it reported in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2014 together with Rocky Mountain Laboratories and the Istituto Superiore di Sanita. The group has since extended nasal sampling and seed amplification to CSF diagnosis, Parkinson disease, Lewy body dementia, frontotemporal dementia and ALS. Zanusso, listed with the University of Verona, is one of the three organisers of Prion 2026, held in Verona in November 2026. The name used here is descriptive: the department site does not list a named prion group. Information only, not advice on testing.

Key facts

  • The 2014 NEJM study of RT-QuIC on nasal brushings had Zanusso as last author and Verona co-authors from the then Department of Neurologic and Movement Sciences, working with the Rocky Mountain Laboratories group of Caughey, the University of Cagliari, the Verona university hospital ENT clinic and the ISS in Rome.
  • In that study brushings were positive in 30 of 31 CJD patients and negative in all 43 controls (97 percent sensitivity, 100 percent specificity), compared with 77 percent sensitivity for CSF RT-QuIC in the same patients, and each brushing held an estimated 10^5 to 10^7 prion seeds.
  • A 2017 JAMA Neurology study led from Verona (Bongianni first author, Zanusso last) with RML, ISS and other Italian centres found that combining olfactory mucosa and CSF RT-QuIC detected all 61 sporadic CJD cases, with no positives among 71 CSF and 67 olfactory samples from people without prion disease; 6 of 8 symptomatic genetic cases were positive.
  • A 2020 prospective Verona series of 182 CSF samples and 42 brushings from people with suspected sporadic CJD or rapidly progressive dementia reported 96 percent sensitivity and 100 percent specificity for CSF RT-QuIC, ahead of 14-3-3 and total tau, and 100 percent for both measures when CSF and olfactory mucosa were combined.
  • The University of Verona reported in October 2019 that its team (Bongianni, Ferrari, Fiorini, Monaco and Zanusso of the Department of Neuroscience, Biomedicine and Movement) shared the 2019 Aspen Institute Italia prize for Italy and United States scientific collaboration for the nasal brushing study.
  • The group has applied nasal sampling to other seeding proteins: alpha-synuclein in Parkinson disease (2022 swab site study favouring the agger nasi), dementia with Lewy bodies and REM sleep behaviour disorder (2021), and TDP-43 in frontotemporal dementia (2023) and ALS (2025).
  • Its Europe PMC record also covers the 2020 ring trial of second generation RT-QuIC, the 2022 European CSF RT-QuIC concordance study, the 2021 Lancet Neurology diagnostic guideline paper and human cerebral organoid CJD models made with RML.
  • With RML it co-authored a 2020 study in which nasal brushings from CJD patients transmitted disease to mice while CSF and RT-QuIC reaction products did not, which bears on the handling of brushing samples.
  • A Verona author (Zanusso) is a co-author of the October 2026 Acta Neuropathologica tribute to the RT-QuIC work of Byron Caughey.
  • Prion 2026, the international prion congress, is set for 10 to 14 November 2026 at the Palazzo della Gran Guardia in Verona, with Zanusso (University of Verona), Biasini (University of Trento) and Legname (SISSA) as its organising committee.
  • The department runs a neuropathology laboratory of about 600 square metres with electron and confocal microscopy and DNA sequencing, but its web pages do not mention prions or name a prion research group.

Timeline

  1. 2014NEJM publishes the nasal brushing RT-QuIC test for CJD with Verona, RML and ISS authors.
  2. 2015Recruitment for the combined olfactory mucosa and CSF study begins (January to June 2015).
  3. 2017JAMA Neurology print publication of the combined olfactory mucosa and CSF RT-QuIC study.
  4. 2019University of Verona team shares the Aspen Institute Italia prize for the nasal brushing study.
  5. 2020Prospective Verona CSF and olfactory RT-QuIC series published in Int J Mol Sci.
  6. 2020Study of CJD transmission from nasal brushings, with RML, published.
  7. 2022Nasal swab site optimisation for alpha-synuclein detection in Parkinson disease published.
  8. 2023TDP-43 seeding in olfactory mucosa in frontotemporal dementia published online.
  9. 2026Prion 2026 opens in Verona (10 to 14 November).
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