Animal and plant toxins

Name animal venoms and poisons Use medicinal uses 

Source spiders, insects, snakes, lizards, fish, and frogs Recommended daily intake none (not essential) 

Absorption varies but can be very fast, e.g. bites Sensitive individuals children (small size), previously sensitized Toxicity/symptoms varies Regulatory facts none 

General facts long history of use and desire to avoid 

Environmental global distribution, concern about expanding distribution to new areas 

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Web site contains presentation material related to the health effects of animal and plant toxins. 

Sharma RP, Salimkhe DK Animal and plant toxins in Gupta PK, Salunkhe DK (eds) Modem Toxicology. New Delhi, Metropolitan Book Co, 1985, vol 1, pp 252—316. 

Franke S (1976). Bacterial, Animal and Plant Toxins as Combat Agents, Manual of Military Chemistry, Vol. 2. Militaerverlag der DDR., Berlin, Germany, pp. 484, 485, 488-496. 

Transfers of materials across tissue surfaces exposed to the atmosphere are critical to life processes for humans, other animals, and plants. Thus, living things are particularly susceptible to harm by airborne irritants or toxins. The risk of such harm has been a major motivation for the development of techniques for the analysis of atmospheric dispersion. 

Olsnes, S., and Pihl, A. (1976) Abrin, ricin, and their associated agglutinins. In The Specificity of Animal, Bacterial and Plant Toxins. Receptors and Recognition (P. Cuatrecasas, ed.), Series B, Vol. 1, pp. 129-173. Chapman Hall, London. 

The creatures of the world, both animals and plants, produce a wide range of biologically active substances. Biologically active substances produced by animals or plants that cause an adverse effect are called toxins. Toxins refers only to toxic agents produced by animals and plants, not toxic substances such a lead or pesticides. The classification of a substance as a toxin tends to be in the eye of the beholder. Is caffeine, a naturally occurring agent in many plants, a toxin or just a pharmacologically active compound or both ... 

Aplin, R. T. and Rothschild, M. (1972). Poisonous alkaloids in the body tissues of the garden tiger moth (Arctia caja L.) and the cinnabar moth (Tyria (= Callimorpha) jacobaeae L.) (Lepidoptera). In Toxins of Animal and Plant Origin, eds. A. de Vries and K. Kochva. pp. 579-595. London Gordon and Breach. 

Environmental toxicology is defined as the study of the fate and effects of chemicals in the environment. Although this definition would encompass toxic chemicals naturally found in the environment (i.e., animal venom, microbial and plant toxins), environmental toxicology is typically associated with the study of environmental chemicals of anthropogenic origin. Environmental toxicology can be divided into two subcategories ... 

S. Olsnes and A. Pihl, in Receptors and Recognition Series The Specificity and Action of Animal, Bacterial and Plant Toxins, Chapman and Hall, London, 1976. 

How can this scattered taxonomic occurrence of the picrotoxanes be explained Many of the apparent chemical convergences in animal toxins have been explained as toxins received via the food chain e.g. brevetoxin, pederin, saxitoxin, tetrodo-toxin, and the toxins of the arrow-poison frogs). This may explain the occurrence of picrotoxanes in both parasitic animals and plants, but further research will be necessary for a better understanding of this phenomenon. 

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