An internet database of crotaline venom found in the United States

Many snake venoms have been shown to be complex mixtures of pharmacological ly important molecules, some of which have potential therapeutic value in t he treatment of clot-induced ischemia, cancer and other human disorders. Th e literature contains many references on how venom and/or venom components are being used in medicine. Within the United States, there are 44 subspeci es of poisonous snakes. Despite this rather vast diversity, 90% of the veno m-related biomedical research conducted on native snakes found in the Unite d States has been done on a limited number of the more common species. Sinc e the venoms from most of the native species are not available or character ized, their composition and potential usefulness in medicine and applied bi omedical research has not been explored. The Natural Toxins Research Center (NTRC) at Texas A&M University-Kingsville has developed a serpentarium tha t presently houses a population of over 250 snakes composed of 11 species a nd 20 subspecies. These snakes are cataloged on the Internet database along with their geographical location data, proteolytic activities, high perfor mance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and electrophoretic titration (ET) profi les. Many of these snake: venoms have never been characterized and few loca le-specific differences within a species have been examined. These venoms c an he queried through an on-line search routine. The database will be a use ful starting point for anyone interested in isolating fibrinolytic enzymes, specific toxins, hemorrhagins, or other pharmacologically active proteins from snake venoms. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.