The Generative Brain

Bioaraba Health Research Institute (IIS Bioaraba), Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain

Bioaraba is the public health research institute of Araba province in the Basque Country, set up under a 2017 agreement between BIOEF, the University of the Basque Country, Osakidetza and the Basque Government health department and given its own legal personality in December 2018. It is based at Araba University Hospital (Txagorritxu) in Vitoria-Gasteiz. Its prion work sits mainly in the neurology research group and the Molecular (Epi)Genetics Laboratory of the hospital. The neurology group is the Spanish clinical partner of the JPND funded ProFFIle consortium on early biomarkers in fatal familial insomnia, and the institute led the 2025 study reporting that the two main Spanish genetic prion variants pass to more than half of offspring. It works closely with the CIC bioGUNE prion lab, which co-authors most of its prion papers.

Key facts

  • Bioaraba is a non-profit association created under a 2017 collaboration agreement between BIOEF, UPV/EHU, Osakidetza and the Basque Government Department of Health; it gained its own legal personality in December 2018.
  • It groups public research at OSI Araba, OSI Rioja Alavesa, the Araba mental health network and UPV/EHU, belongs to the Basque network of health research institutes with Biobizkaia, Biogipuzkoa and Biosistemak, and reports more than 400 researchers in more than 40 groups across seven areas.
  • Prion work sits in the neurosciences area, in a neurology research group whose listed research lines include detection of alpha-synuclein and prion protein and neurodegenerative disease genetics.
  • The neurology group at Hospital Universitario Araba is one of six ProFFIle partner groups, with the JPND sheet naming Izaro Kortazar as the Araba lead; the consortium is coordinated from Mario Negri and also includes Goettingen, CIC bioGUNE, Carlo Besta and Sabanci University.
  • Press coverage in 2023 named IIS Bioaraba among the ProFFIle partners at a meeting with patient associations at the Spanish Prion Disease Foundation convention.
  • A 2023 Bioaraba led series of 16 FFI cases from the Basque Brain Bank (2010 to 2021) found polysomnography and genetic testing most useful for diagnosis, with CSF 14-3-3 and RT-QuIC negative; it acknowledged the ProFFIle grant and a Basque Government grant.
  • The 2025 Eur J Neurol study led from Bioaraba neurology and genetics analysed 24 pedigrees, 65 nuclear families and 151 offspring and reported transmission of 67.1 percent for D178N and 70.5 percent for E200K, against the 50 percent usually assumed in counselling. Information only, not genetic or medical advice.
  • That study recruited participants through the hospital neurology service or genetic counselling unit and through the Spanish Prion Disease Foundation; funders listed include the Spanish research agency, ISCIII, Interreg NEURO-COOP, BIOEF and JPND.
  • A follow-up letter in Eur J Neurol in March 2026 from the same Bioaraba and CIC bioGUNE authors addresses methodological points of transmission ratio distortion.
  • Bioaraba genetics staff co-author CIC bioGUNE prion biology papers, including the 2024 Nat Commun PMSA method for spontaneous prion generation and a 2026 Brain Pathol mouse model of the L108I variant.
  • Araba University Hospital neurology and genetics staff co-authored a 2022 Neurology study in 308 people, including 129 with prion disease and 8 presymptomatic PRNP carriers, in which blood beta-synuclein separated prion disease from other groups (AUC 0.97) better than NfL (0.91).
  • Europe PMC lists 17 prion related papers with Bioaraba or Araba University Hospital affiliations from 2014 to 2026, covering FFI neuropathology, sporadic CJD and GSS case reports, biomarkers and genetics.
  • Spanish national surveillance data put genetic prion disease in the Basque Country at about four times the national rate, which is the setting for the Araba cohort work.

Timeline

  1. 2017Collaboration agreement to create the institute signed by BIOEF, UPV/EHU, Osakidetza and the Basque health department.
  2. 2018Bioaraba gains its own legal personality as a non-profit association.
  3. 2021Sporadic CJD case report with Bioaraba neurology, pathology and genetics authors published in Eur J Neurol.
  4. 2021ProFFIle, with the Araba neurology group as partner, listed among JPND 2021 call projects.
  5. 2022Blood beta-synuclein and NfL study with Araba co-authors published in Neurology.
  6. 2023FFI case series from the Basque Brain Bank published.
  7. 2023ProFFIle researchers, Bioaraba among the named partners, meet patient associations at the seventh FEEP convention.
  8. 2024PMSA spontaneous prion generation paper with a Bioaraba co-author published.
  9. 2024ProFFIle results presented at the JPND final symposium in Brussels.
  10. 2025Genetic prion transmission study published in Eur J Neurol.
  11. 2026Letter on transmission ratio distortion methods published.
Sources for this page