Snakebite envenomation is a neglected global health problem, causing substantial mortality, disability, and psychological morbidity, especially in rural tropical and subtropical zones. Antivenin is currently the only specific medicine for envenomation. However, it is restricted by cold storage, snakebite diagnosis, and high price. Snake venom phospholipase A2s (svPLA2s) are found in all kinds o...

The prognostic factors for amputation following envenoming by snakes of the Bothrops genus were identified from the medical records of 3139 patients. Each of these patients had been bitten by Bothrops sp. and treated in the Hospital Vital Brazil, in São Paulo, Brazil, between 1981 and 1990. The 21 (0.67%) of the patients who had undergone amputation were compared with the 3118 who had not, with...

Most reptiles and mammals, with the exceptions of crocodilians, aquatic mammals and some primates, have a functional vomeronasal organ that detects and perceives semi-volatile chemicals in the environment. This organ is used in detection of prey and is also important for recognition of conspecifics and potential predators. We tested eight species of North American pit vipers for behavioural res...

7 Incorrect snake identification from the observable visual traits is a major reason of death resulting from snake bites. So far no automatic classification method has been proposed to distinguish snakes by deciphering the taxonomy features of snake for the two major species of snakes i.e. Elapidae and Viperidae. We present a parallel processed inter-feature product similarity fusion based auto...

Snake venom is a complex mixture of proteins and peptides which in the Viperidae is mainly hemotoxic. The diversity of these components causes the venom to be an extremely interesting object of study. Discovered components can be used in search for new pharmaceuticals used primarily in the treatment of diseases of the cardiovascular system. In order to determine the protein composition of the s...

The major viperid snakes present in Taiwan today are: Daboia russelli siamensis, Deinagkistrodon acutus, Protobothrops mucrosquamatus, Trimeresurus stejnegeri, Ovophis monticola and Ovophis gracilis. As suggested by the species trees deduced from mtDNA sequences of the family Viperidae, these species apparently belong to five different genera. Molecular cloning, N-terminal sequencing, and mass ...

Cobra venoms contain heat stable, basic, proteins that inhibit iodide accumulation by thyroid slices. Activity is not related to the content of phospholipase A or various other enzymatic activities. These proteins are present only in Elapid venoms and not in snakes of the Crotalidae or Viperidae families. Two such basic proteins, named cobramines A and B, have been purified from the crude venom...