Toxins nonprotein

It is unlikely that chemical synthesis of complex nonprotein toxins will become significantly easier... 

With a lethal dose (LD50) of 50ngkg , maitotoxin is currently the most potent nonprotein toxin. BotuUnum toxin is more toxic it is a protein with an LD50 of about 5 ngkg (see Chapter 11). 

Between October 30 and November 4, 2000, 11 persons were intoxicated due to ingestion of a serranid fish Epinephelus sp. in Kochi Prefecture, Japan. Their symptoms included severe muscle pain, low back pain, and discharge of black urine. The causative agent was identified as palytoxin on the basis of delayed haemolytic activity, which was inhibited by an anti-palytoxin antibody and ouabain (Taniyama et al. 2002). Although the toxic dose of palytoxin in humans could not be determined, extrapolation of the data available in animals will give a toxic dose in a human of about 4 pg. This fact places palytoxin among the most toxic nonproteinic animal toxins known to date (Taniyama et al. 2002) however, its mechanisms of toxicity remain to be elucidated. 

An unusual purine base, saxitoxin (40), has been isolated from several marine dinoflagellates (Atta-ur-Rahman and Choudhary, 1990). Saxitoxin inhibits Na" channels. This compound is considered to be the most toxin nonprotein compound known it has an LD50 i.p. in mouse of 10 p-g/kg (Wink, 1993). 

Toxins are chemical substances of biological origin, although synthesis procedmes for some nonprotein... 

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