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Centipedes subdue giant prey by blocking KCNQ channels
Centipedes can subdue giant prey by using venom, which is metabolically expensive to synthesize and thus used frugally through efficiently disrupting essential physiological systems. Here, we show that a centipede (Scolopendra subspinipes mutilans, ∼3 g) can subdue a mouse (∼45 g) within 30 seconds....
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
National Academy of Sciences
2018
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5816164/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29358396 http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1714760115 |
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author | Luo, Lei Li, Bowen Wang, Sheng Wu, Fangming Wang, Xiaochen Liang, Ping Ombati, Rose Chen, Junji Lu, Xiancui Cui, Jianmin Lu, Qiumin Zhang, Longhua Zhou, Ming Tian, Changlin Yang, Shilong Lai, Ren |
author_facet | Luo, Lei Li, Bowen Wang, Sheng Wu, Fangming Wang, Xiaochen Liang, Ping Ombati, Rose Chen, Junji Lu, Xiancui Cui, Jianmin Lu, Qiumin Zhang, Longhua Zhou, Ming Tian, Changlin Yang, Shilong Lai, Ren |
author_sort | Luo, Lei |
collection | PubMed |
description | Centipedes can subdue giant prey by using venom, which is metabolically expensive to synthesize and thus used frugally through efficiently disrupting essential physiological systems. Here, we show that a centipede (Scolopendra subspinipes mutilans, ∼3 g) can subdue a mouse (∼45 g) within 30 seconds. We found that this observation is largely due to a peptide toxin in the venom, SsTx, and further established that SsTx blocks KCNQ potassium channels to exert the lethal toxicity. We also demonstrated that a KCNQ opener, retigabine, neutralizes the toxicity of a centipede’s venom. The study indicates that centipedes’ venom has evolved to simultaneously disrupt cardiovascular, respiratory, muscular, and nervous systems by targeting the broadly distributed KCNQ channels, thus providing a therapeutic strategy for centipede envenomation. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-5816164 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2018 |
publisher | National Academy of Sciences |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-58161642018-02-21 Centipedes subdue giant prey by blocking KCNQ channels Luo, Lei Li, Bowen Wang, Sheng Wu, Fangming Wang, Xiaochen Liang, Ping Ombati, Rose Chen, Junji Lu, Xiancui Cui, Jianmin Lu, Qiumin Zhang, Longhua Zhou, Ming Tian, Changlin Yang, Shilong Lai, Ren Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A Biological Sciences Centipedes can subdue giant prey by using venom, which is metabolically expensive to synthesize and thus used frugally through efficiently disrupting essential physiological systems. Here, we show that a centipede (Scolopendra subspinipes mutilans, ∼3 g) can subdue a mouse (∼45 g) within 30 seconds. We found that this observation is largely due to a peptide toxin in the venom, SsTx, and further established that SsTx blocks KCNQ potassium channels to exert the lethal toxicity. We also demonstrated that a KCNQ opener, retigabine, neutralizes the toxicity of a centipede’s venom. The study indicates that centipedes’ venom has evolved to simultaneously disrupt cardiovascular, respiratory, muscular, and nervous systems by targeting the broadly distributed KCNQ channels, thus providing a therapeutic strategy for centipede envenomation. National Academy of Sciences 2018-02-13 2018-01-22 /pmc/articles/PMC5816164/ /pubmed/29358396 http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1714760115 Text en Copyright © 2018 the Author(s). Published by PNAS. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ This open access article is distributed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License 4.0 (CC BY-NC-ND) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) . |
spellingShingle | Biological Sciences Luo, Lei Li, Bowen Wang, Sheng Wu, Fangming Wang, Xiaochen Liang, Ping Ombati, Rose Chen, Junji Lu, Xiancui Cui, Jianmin Lu, Qiumin Zhang, Longhua Zhou, Ming Tian, Changlin Yang, Shilong Lai, Ren Centipedes subdue giant prey by blocking KCNQ channels |
title | Centipedes subdue giant prey by blocking KCNQ channels |
title_full | Centipedes subdue giant prey by blocking KCNQ channels |
title_fullStr | Centipedes subdue giant prey by blocking KCNQ channels |
title_full_unstemmed | Centipedes subdue giant prey by blocking KCNQ channels |
title_short | Centipedes subdue giant prey by blocking KCNQ channels |
title_sort | centipedes subdue giant prey by blocking kcnq channels |
topic | Biological Sciences |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5816164/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29358396 http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1714760115 |
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