Parasites account for huge economic losses by infecting agriculturally important plants and animals. Furthermore, morbidity and death caused by parasites affect a large part of the world population, especially in economically weak regions. Anthelmintic drugs to tackle this challenge remain scarce and their efficiency becomes increasingly endangered by the advent of drug resistance development.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF"True" cobras (genus ) are among the venomous snakes most frequently involved in snakebite accidents in Africa and Asia. The Cape cobra () is one of the African cobras of highest medical importance, but much remains to be learned about its venom. Here, we used a shotgun proteomics approach to better understand the qualitative composition of venom and tested its cytotoxicity and protease activity as well as its effect on intracellular Ca release and NO synthesis.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSnake venom is an ecologically relevant functional trait directly linked with a snake's fitness and survival, facilitating predation and defence. Snake venom variation occurs at all taxonomic levels, but the study at the intraspecific level is still in its early stages. The common adder () exhibits considerable variation in colour phenotypes across its distribution range.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSnakebite primarily impacts rural communities of Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The sharp-nosed viper (Deinagkistrodon acutus) is among the snakes of highest medical importance in Asia. Despite various studies on its venom using modern venomics techniques, a comprehensive understanding of composition and function of this species' venom remains lacking.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn a bioprospection for new antivirals, we tested nonribosomally biosynthesized polypeptide antibiotics in MDCK II cells for their actions on influenza A and B viruses (IAV/IBV). Only tolypin, a mixture of closely related 16-residue peptaibiotics from the fungus Tolypocladium inflatum IE 1897, showed promising activity. It was selected for further investigation and structural characterization by ultrahigh performance liquid chromatography coupled to high-resolution mass spectrometry (UHPLC-HR-MS/MS) and ultrahigh performance liquid chromatography coupled to in-source collision-induced dissociation tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC-isCID-HR-MS/MS), revealing 12 partially co-eluting individual peptides that were fully sequenced.
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