The Kunitz-type protease inhibitors are the best-characterized family of serine protease inhibitors, probably due to their abundance in several organisms. These inhibitors consist of a chain of ~60 amino acid residues stabilized by three disulfide bridges, and was first observed in the bovine pancreatic trypsin inhibitor (BPTI)-like protease inhibitors, which strongly inhibit trypsin and chymot...

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the causes of human fatalities in the United States from 1991 to 2001 that were caused by venomous and nonvenomous animal encounters exclusive of zoonotic infections or animal-vehicle collisions. METHODS An inquiry of CDC Wonder, a database for epidemiologic research, was used to provide information on animal-related fatalities on the basis of ICD-9 and ICD-10 codes. R...

Toxins are detected in sporadic species along the evolutionary tree of the animal kingdom. Venomous animals include scorpions, snakes, bees, wasps, frogs and numerous animals living in the sea such as the stonefish, snail, jellyfish, hydra and more. Interestingly, proteins that share a common scaffold with animal toxins also exist in non-venomous species. However, due to their short length and ...

Current hypotheses that use visually guided reaching and grasping to explain orbital convergence, visual specialization, and brain expansion in primates are open to question now that neurological evidence reveals no correlation between orbital convergence and the visual pathway in the brain that is associated with reaching and grasping. An alternative hypothesis proposed here posits that snakes...

As to the evidence of some venomous bite, a faint patch of the ecchymosis was seen mentioned in the accompanying report of the police, just on the inner side of the left anklejoint (about the internal inaleolus). This site of injury was cleansed, and haying failed to observe anything like the ecchymosis, I cut into the said part, which also did not reveal any extravasation of blood thereabout. ...

We suggest that some of the most avian dromaeosaurs, such as Sinornithosaurus, were venomous, and propose an ecological model for that taxon based on its unusual dentition and other cranial features including grooved teeth, a possible pocket for venom glands, and a groove leading from that pocket to the exposed bases of the teeth. These features are all analogous to the venomous morphology of l...

No fewer than 39 species of dangerously venomous snakes are currently known to inhabit Myanmar and the adjacent coastal waters. Of these, 15 are sea snakes and except for two, Laticauda colubrina and Laticauda laticauda, none voluntarily come onto land (occasionally, obligate marine species may be carried onto shore during severe weather by wave action or enter river deltas in brackish water). ...