The Generative Brain

EU reference laboratory for TSEs (consortium led by the Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale del Piemonte, Liguria e Valle d Aosta, Turin, with the Istituto Superiore di Sanita, Rome)

The EU reference laboratory (EURL) for transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs) is the top laboratory for animal prion disease testing in the EU. Since 1 January 2019 it has been a consortium of the Turin veterinary public health institute (Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale del Piemonte, Liguria e Valle d Aosta, IZSPLV or IZSTO), which leads it, and the Istituto Superiore di Sanita (ISS) in Rome. It took over from the UK laboratory at Weybridge, whose EU designation ended on 31 December 2018 after the UK Article 50 notification. Its job is to keep BSE, scrapie and chronic wasting disease testing consistent across national reference laboratories: it checks their rapid and confirmatory methods, runs proficiency tests, characterises TSE isolates, supplies reference material, writes technical guidelines and helps the Commission assess new tests. The Commission still lists the Turin institute as the TSE EURL under Regulation 2017/625. It works on animal disease and does not test human samples, so for CJD it is background: it is the network that would first spot a new BSE-like strain in European livestock. Information only.

Key facts

  • Commission Regulation (EU) 2018/221 of 15 February 2018 replaced point 1 of Annex X Chapter B of Regulation 999/2001 to name a consortium of IZSPLVA (Via Bologna 148, Turin) and the ISS (Viale Regina Elena 299, Rome), led by IZSPLVA, as EU reference laboratory for TSEs, and amended Annex VII of Regulation 882/2004 to match; it applies from 1 January 2019.
  • The recitals of that act say the designation of the laboratory then in the United Kingdom would end on 31 December 2018 after the UK Article 50 notification, that the Commission had issued a call for applications on 29 May 2017, and that the start date was set so the new laboratory could be fully running without a gap.
  • APHA, the UK animal and plant health agency at Weybridge, says its EU reference laboratories for avian influenza, Newcastle disease and TSEs were transferred to laboratories in another Member State, with the official transfer completed in December 2018. An Italian news report of 19 October 2017 said an EU veterinary committee had picked Turin to replace Weybridge.
  • The EURL site says the laboratory was designated in 2017 and that its tasks now come from Regulation (EU) 2017/625 on official controls, having previously been set by Annex X of Regulation 999/2001. The Commission's current EURL list, under Regulation 2017/625, gives the TSE entry as IZSTO with a link to the EURL site, and does not name the ISS in that entry.
  • Its stated tasks are scientific and technical support to national reference laboratories and the Commission, coordinating diagnostic methods and active surveillance, regular quality checks of rapid and confirmatory tests at national laboratories, characterising TSE isolates, storing and supplying tissues and reference materials, helping the Commission evaluate new and changed commercial tests, and training through workshops and annual meetings.
  • The network page lists 30 national reference laboratories, among them four non-EU members (Iceland, Norway, Switzerland, North Macedonia). Spain's is the Laboratorio Central de Veterinaria TSE department at Algete, Norway's is the Norwegian Veterinary Institute at As, and Italy's is the Turin institute's national reference centre for animal encephalopathies (CEA).
  • The proficiency test page lists 66 tabulated result files from 2019 to 2025 under coded series, with repeat rounds for some laboratories in 2021, 2023 and 2024; only the histopathology and immunohistochemistry series is identified by name, and the other codes are not explained.
  • Published technical documents include guidelines for submitting samples for confirmatory testing, for sampling and for chronic wasting disease detection in cervids, an approach for provisional classification of bovine TSE isolates, a handbook for strain characterisation in small ruminants (version 3, 2024), a protocol for batch testing of rapid test kits (2024) and guidelines on changes to approved rapid test protocols (version 2, 2026).
  • Within the consortium the ISS part is the Emerging Zoonoses Unit of its Department of Food Safety, Nutrition and Veterinary Public Health, which holds national and EU reference functions for the genetics and strain characterisation of animal TSEs, including biological and molecular strain typing and sheep prion protein genotyping.
  • The Turin institute's CEA has run Italian national BSE and scrapie surveillance and diagnosis since 2001, according to the 2017 news report.
  • The University of Zaragoza prion centre lists the EU TSE reference laboratory (IZSTO Turin and the ISS food safety and veterinary public health department in Rome) among its international collaborators, with no date.
  • The EURL holds a yearly meeting with the national laboratories; the 23rd was announced in May 2025, though the page gives two different places and dates for it.

Timeline

  1. 2001Turin CEA begins national BSE and scrapie surveillance and diagnosis (news report).
  2. 2017Commission call for applications for a new EU TSE reference laboratory.
  3. 2017Italian press reports that Turin has been chosen to replace Weybridge.
  4. 2018Commission Regulation 2018/221 designates the Turin and Rome consortium.
  5. 2018APHA completes the transfer of its TSE EU reference laboratory role to another Member State.
  6. 2018UK laboratory designation ends.
  7. 2019First proficiency test result series listed on the EURL site.
  8. 2019Turin and Rome consortium starts as EU reference laboratory for TSEs.
  9. 2024Strain characterisation handbook for small ruminants, version 3.
  10. 202523rd EURL and NRL annual meeting announced.
  11. 2026Version 2 of the guidelines on changes to approved rapid test protocols.
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