Hornet poison

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Hornet with stinger outstretched

Hornet poison is the poison of the hornets (hereinafter essentially referred to the species Vespa crabro ). It contains biogenic amines , peptides and enzymes and, contrary to popular belief, is less toxic than bee venom .

The mean lethal dose is given as the dose at which half of the test animals (mice) die, for hornet venom with 10 to 90 mg per kg of body weight, for honey bees with 2.8 to 6 mg per kg of body weight. This makes it clear that anecdotal reports of extreme sting injuries in animals and humans and the old motto “three hornet stings kill a person and seven a horse” are by no means correct. Due to its size, the hornet has a correspondingly larger poisonous bladder content than the honeybee, for example, but the poison is less effective. Ultimately, stings from wasps , hornets , bees and also bumblebees are about equally effective and painful. However, this does not necessarily apply in the case of an allergy, as the composition of the poisons of the individual animal species is different, see also insect venom allergy and insect bite .

Biogenic amines

Were detected histamine , serotonin , dopamine , norepinephrine , epinephrine and acetylcholine , the latter with a proportion of 5 per cent of the dry matter. Probably not the longer sting of the hornet, but acetylcholine , which is not found in bee venom, bumblebee or wasp venom, causes a person who has been stung by a hornet to experience greater pain.

Peptides

Basic polypeptides and kinins should be mentioned here.

Enzymes

Phospholipase A and -B , hyaluronidase and acidic, alkaline and neutral DNases and proteases fall into this group; Together with the antigen V , these components of the poison are to be blamed as the main allergens for the insect venom allergy , which occurs even after repeated hornet stings , from which around 2 to 3 percent of the population suffer, but which must be viewed completely separately from any toxin effect.

The allergen spectrum of hornets largely corresponds to that of wasps, so allergy sufferers are treated similarly.

Individual evidence

  1. Hornet poison - toxicity, poison amount and effect. In: Facts about hornet poison - reactions to hornet stings. On Hornissenschutz.de, accessed on December 24, 2018.
  2. Guo Yibin, Zheng Jiang, Zhou Hong, Lv Gengfa, Wang Liangxi, Wei Guo, Lu Yongling: A synthesized cationic tetradecapeptide from hornet venom kills bacteria and neutralizes lipopolysaccharide in vivo and in vitro. In: Biochemical pharmacology. Volume 70, number 2, Elsevier, Amsterdam 15 July 2005, pp. 209-219, doi: 10.1016 / j.bcp.2005.04.040 . PMID 15935330 .