“…This packaging of toxins into individual nematocysts scattered throughout the animal impedes the ability to isolate crude venoms for downstream analysis, which is further exacerbated in smaller or rare species of cnidarians. There are several protocols for isolating venom from nematocysts (e.g., [ 59 , 60 , 61 , 62 ]), but these methods, as noted above, are typically restricted to larger or easy to obtain animals (e.g., corals and sea anemones, true jellies such as Chrysaora and Cyanea ), species of medical relevance (e.g., Physalia , box jellies), or those that can be easily maintained in a lab (e.g., Hydra [ 63 ], Nematostella [ 64 ]). Next generation sequencing technologies provide a solution to this problem, and have greatly increased the ability of researchers to screen the diversity of putative venom-like genes for neglected or poorly studied venomous species, including cnidarians [ 65 ].…”