Intra-Specific Venom Variation in the Australian Coastal Taipan Oxyuranus scutellatus.

ABSTRACT: Intra-specific venom variation has the potential to provide important insights into the evolution of snake venom, but remains a relatively neglected aspect of snake venom studies. We investigated the venom from 13 individual coastal taipans Oxyuranus scutellatus from four localities on the north-east coast of Australia, spanning a distance of 2000 km. The intra-specific variation in taipan venom was considerably less than the inter-specific variation between it and the other Australian elapids to which it was compared. The electrophoretic venom profile of O. scutellatus was visually different to six other genera of Australian elapids, but not to its congener inland taipan O. microlepidotus. There was minimal geographical variation in taipan venom, as the intra-population variation exceeded

SUBMITTER: Tasoulis T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7472000 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature