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College of Veterinary Medicine
Comparative Pain Research and Education Center

CPREC Research

Learn more about recent research projects coming out of the CPREC, as well as new grant calls on the topic of pain.

Collaborative CPREC Research

Images of joints in dogs.

Evaluation of mechanistic role of artemin/GFRα3 signaling in
osteoarthritis pain

Dr. Duncan Lascelles and Dr. Santosh Mishra are leading a collaborative project that investigates a newly identified biological signaling pathway involved in osteoarthritis (OA) pain. Building on early discoveries made in tissues from dogs with naturally occurring OA, their team uncovered changes in the artemin/GFRα3 pathway that appear to drive chronic joint pain in both dogs and humans. Their NIH funded work now aims to understand this pathway in detail and assess its potential as a target for safer, nonopioid pain treatments.

Read more about this study
Professor in the Department of Clinical Sciences Margaret Gruen evaluating a dog

Innovative Modeling of the Biopsychosocial Impact of
Chronic Pain in Dogs

Drs. Margaret Gruen, Duncan Lascelles and Brian Hare are leading a collaborative project with the goal of developing and rigorously validating a battery of behavioral, emotional, and cognitive “assays”—carefully designed tests that can reliably measure how persistent pain affects dogs’ emotional states (such as anxiety or motivation) and cognitive abilities (such as learning,
attention, and decision‑making).

Read more about this study

Funding Opportunities

Below are selected current requests for proposals and sites worth bookmarking. CPREC Research Faculty have experience of funding across these types of grants.