Comparing Traditional and Toxin-Oriented Approaches towards Antivenom Production against Bitis arietans Snake Venom.

ABSTRACT: Accidents with snakes are responsible for about 32,000 deaths annually in sub-Saharan Africa, caused mostly by snakes from the genus Bitis, in particular Bitis arietans. B. arietans venom is composed of a complex mixture of toxins, mainly metalloproteases, serine proteases, phospholipases, lectins, and disintegrins. In this work, we compared two approaches to anti-B. arietans antivenom production: immunization with crude snake venom ("traditional approach") and immunization with selected key toxins isolated from the snake venom ("toxin oriented" approach). Fractions from B. arietans venom were isolated by size exclusion chromatography. Crude venom and samples containing serine proteases or metalloproteases were selected for the immunization of BALB

SUBMITTER: Guidolin FR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10537286 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature