Animal poison

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Aspivenin, a vacuum pump for extracting snake or insect venom .
Poison droplets on the poison sting of a hymenoptera
Schneckenhaus a map cone ( Conus geographus ), a fish-eating cone snail , the contulakin-G (Conantokin) synthesized , a potent conotoxin .

Venoms or animal toxins are toxins of animals , so those poisons from animals synthesized or sequestered from other sources (enriched) are. Animal poisons can be used to overcome prey or to ward off microorganisms, parasites or predators .

Some of the animals contain toxins in body parts that are passively transmitted in contact ( English poisonous ), for example through contact or ingestion as food; others can actively transmit their toxins ( English venomous ), for example through a bite ( poison tooth ) or sting ( poison sting ).

ingredients

Many poisons are a complex mixture of different organic chemical substance classes. The main active ingredients of actively released insect venom are peptides and proteins . They also contain alkaloids , terpenes , polysaccharides , biogenic amines (such as histamines ), organic acids (such as formic acid ), and amino acids .

Severe necrosis on the lower leg of an eleven-year-old boy who was bitten by Terciopelo lance viper ( Bothrops asper ) in Ecuador . The picture was taken two weeks after the bite ; the boy had previously been treated with antibiotics (unsuitable for poison bites).

Biological effects

Due to the multitude of poisons, there is a multitude of mechanisms of action. The spectrum of activity is extensive, but for actively released insect venom it can be roughly divided into neurotoxic, hemolytic, digestive, hemorrhagic and algogenic (pain-causing) effects. Nerve poisons may dominate among the particularly potent poisons. Others act as chaperones and change the tertiary structure of proteins and thus their functions.

Poisonous animals

Within the animals there are several poisonous animals among the taxa of sponges (Porifera), flower animals (Anthozoa), hydrozoa , umbrella jellyfish (Scyphozoa), polychaeta (polychaeta), snails (Gastropoda), cephalopods (cephalopods), insects ( insect venom ), arachnids (Arachnida), fish ( poisonous fish ), amphibians ( amphibian poisons , especially known the poison dart frogs ), reptiles and mammals (Mammalia, poisonous mammals ). Among the birds are few poison birds like the spur-winged goose ( Plectropterus gambensis ) known. In the 1990s, it was found that the skin and feathers of the two-color pitohui ( Pitohui dichrous ) living in New Guinea contain batrachotoxin . Also Pitohui ferrugineus and Black Pitohui ( Pitohui nigrescens ) and Blaukappenflöter ( Ifrita kowaldi ) from New Guinea carry the poison in their feathers.

Poisonous animals in Germany

In Germany, the following animals can be harmful to human health :

Jellyfish
in the North and Baltic Seas such as yellow hair jellyfish and fire jellyfish
Arachnids
Garden spider , thorn finger spider , wasp spider ;
insects
many hymenoptera such as bees , wasps , bumblebees ;
Amphibians
Fire salamander , fire- bellied toad , yellow-bellied toad ;
Reptiles
Aspi viper , adder .

Many others such as scale ants , ladybugs or potato beetles contain toxins that are generally not harmful to human health.

Poisonous animals in USA

Poisonous animals appear in the USA: poisonous snakes , scalloped reptiles ( Gila crustaceans ), toads , spiders, scorpions , centipedes , millipedes , insect caterpillars , hymenoptera. Jellyfish , stingrays , cottoidea , cnidarians , sponges , annelids , echinoderms , molluscs and others can also be found on the sea coasts .

Treatment options

The antidote forms a (material) antidote to toxins or other substances that influence an organism.

Acute poisoning

Untreated acute tissue poisoning from potent animal toxins (such as from poison fish , scorpion stings or snakebites ) can leave permanent damage and be life-threatening. A specific antiserum is used if possible for an effective treatment. This is a passive vaccination with an immune serum that contains antibodies against the toxins. These toxins are obtained from poisonous animals bred for this purpose (e.g. in snake farms ). The poison obtained is usually frozen and freeze-dried for better storage life . Highly diluted, it is used to vaccinate pets - often horses, sheep or rabbits. Purified parts of your blood serum result in the antiserum. This is freeze-dried for maximum shelf life and portioned and melted in breakable glass ampoules . If the antiserum is administered soon after the poison has entered and if the antiserum is specifically effective, the prognosis is usually good.

Allergy

The same dose of poison sometimes has a different effect on different people. This can often be traced back to different degrees of allergy and is known as allergy . Especially after stings by honey bees ( Apis mellifera ), wasps (especially Vespula vulgaris , Vespula germanica ), more rarely hornets ( Vespa crabro ) and bumblebees ( Bombus spp. ), Insect venom allergies can occur more frequently, the range of reactions can range from 'harmless' to anaphylactic Shock extend. In an emergency, electrolyte solutions can be administered intravenously or, in particularly severe cases, adrenaline can be injected.

For the therapy of poison allergies, especially against hymenoptera, the triggering insecticides can be administered in low doses; this is known as desensitization .

literature

  • Philipp Teichfischer : Animal poisons as remedies - a contribution to the history of ancient medicine. In: Medizinhistorisches Journal , 50, 2015, 4, pp. 319–356.
  • Edstrom is different: Venomous and poisonous animals. Krieger Publishing Company, 1992, ISBN 0-89464-627-3 .
  • Wolfgang Bücherl, Eleanor E. Buckley, Venancio Deulofeu (eds.): Venomous Animals and Their Venoms: Venomous Vertebrates. Vol. 1, Elsevier, September 17, 2013, ISBN 978-1-4832-6363-2 .
  • Gerhard Venzmer : Poisonous animals and animal poisons. Stuttgart 1932.
  • Julian White, Jurg Meier: Handbook of clinical toxicology of animal venoms and poisons. Vol. 236, CRC Press, 1995, ISBN 0-8493-4489-1 .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Anders Edstrom: Venomous and poisonous animals. Krieger Publishing Company, 1992, ISBN 0-89464-627-3 .
  2. ^ WL Meyer: Most toxic insect venom. (PDF) In: Book of Insect Records. Chapter 23, Gainesville Florida May 1, 1996. Retrieved July 6, 2015.
  3. ↑ MS Blum: Chemical defenses in arthropods. Academic Press, New York 1981, p. 562.
  4. ↑ PR de Lima, MR Brochetto-Braga: Hymenoptera venom review focusing on Apis mellifera. In: J. Venom. Anim. Toxins incl. Trop. Dis. Volume 9, No. 2 Botucatu 2003.
  5. ^ JO Schmidt: Chemistry, pharmacology and chemical ecology of ant venoms. In: T. Piek (Ed.): Venoms of the hymenoptera. Academic Press, London 1986, pp. 425-508.
  6. ↑ MS Blum: Chemical defenses in arthropods. 'Academic Press. New York 1981, p. 562.
  7. ↑ Naofumi et al .: Protein function: chaperonin turned insect toxin. In: Nature . 411, No. 6833, 2001, pp. 44-44, doi: 10.1038 / 35075148 .
  8. ^ A b John Tidwell: The intoxicating birds of New Guinea. (PDF) (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on July 9, 2015 ; accessed on July 16, 2015 . In: ZooGoer. Volume 30, No. 2., 2001.
  9. ^ Henry M. Parrish: Analysis of 460 fatalities from venomous animals in the United States. In: The American journal of the Medical Sciences. Volume 245, No. 2, 1963, pp. 35-47.
  10. ↑ David BK Golden, David G. Marsh, Anne Kagey-Sobotka, Linda Freidhoff, Moyses Szklo, Martin D. Valentine, Lawrence M. Lichtenstein: Epidemiology of insect venom sensitivity. In: JAMA . 262, No. 2, 1989, pp. 240-244, doi: 10.1001 / jama.1989.03430020082033 .
  11. ↑ Martin D. Valentine et al .: The value of immunotherapy with venom in children with allergy to insect stings. (PDF) In: New England Journal of Medicine. 323, No. 23, 1990, pp. 1601-1603.
  12. ↑ Iris Bellinghausen, Gudrun Metz, Alexander H. Enk, Steffen Christmann, Jürgen Knop, Joachim Saloga: Insect venom immunotherapy induces interleukin ‐ 10 production and a Th2 ‐ to ‐ Th1 shift, and changes surface marker expression in venom ‐ allergic subjects. In: European Journal of Immunology. 27, No. 5, 1997, pp. 1131-1139, doi: 10.1002 / eji.1830270513 .