REVERSE BIOLOGY APPLIED TO MICRURUS-CORALLINUS, A SOUTH-AMERICAN CORAL SNAKE

Little is known about the coral snakes venom components. Clarification of the primary structure of polypeptidic toxins was hampered until no w by the lack of enough venom for protein purification and chemistry. Using the Reverse Biology approach, several potential Micrurus coralli nus toxins were characterized by cDNA cloning. The deduced proteins sh ared homology with known snake toxins, such as a-neurotoxins, phosphol ipase A(2), natriuretic peptides and lectins. To our knowledge, these are the first complete primary structure characterization of coral sna ke venom toxins.