Journal article
Venom Down Under: Dynamic Evolution of Australian Elapid Snake Toxins
Timothy NW Jackson, Kartik Sunagar, Eivind AB Undheim, Ivan Koludarov, Angelo HC Chan, Kate Sanders, Syed A Ali, Iwan Hendrikx, Nathan Dunstan, Bryan G Fry
TOXINS | MDPI | Published : 2013
Abstract
Despite the unparalleled diversity of venomous snakes in Australia, research has concentrated on a handful of medically significant species and even of these very few toxins have been fully sequenced. In this study, venom gland transcriptomes were sequenced from eleven species of small Australian elapid snakes, from eleven genera, spanning a broad phylogenetic range. The particularly large number of sequences obtained for three-finger toxin (3FTx) peptides allowed for robust reconstructions of their dynamic molecular evolutionary histories. We demonstrated that each species preferentially favoured different types of α-neurotoxic 3FTx, probably as a result of differing feeding ecologies. The ..
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Awarded by F.C.T (Fundacao para a Ciencia e a Tecnologia)
Funding Acknowledgements
BGF was funded by the Australian Research Council and the University of Queenland. EABU would like to acknowledge funding from the University of Queensland (International Postgraduate Research Scholarship, UQ Centennial Scholarship, and UQ Advantage Top-Up Scholarship) and the Norwegian State Education Loans Fund. SAA was the recipient of postdoctoral fellowship (PDRF Phase II Batch-V) from Higher Education Commission (HEC Islamabad) Pakistan. KS was funded by the PhD grant (SFRH/BD/61959/2009) from F.C.T (Fundacao para a Ciencia e a Tecnologia). TNWJ was funded by an Australian Postgraduate Award.