Neutralizing potential of Rauvolfia serpentina root extract against Naja naja venom

Abstract

Snake bites are a serious health hazard occurs throughout the world especially in tropical countries like India. Anti-Snake Venom Serum is the only remedy available to treat snake bite victims successfully till date. Infusion of ASV may lead to adverse reactions ranging from severe itching of the skin, hives to potentially serious allergic reactions. Considering all above difficulties research workers all over the world is constantly in search of a cheap and readily available easy formulate remedy for treating snake bite victims. In present study aqueous extract of Rauvolfia serpentina root was checked for the antidote properties against Naja naja venom by in vitro and in vivo methods. Various in vitro neutralization tests like Acetyl cholinesterase, Protease and ATPase activity of Naja naja venom were carried out and the root extract was neutralized all the toxic effects induced by the venom. The in vivo assessment of venom lethality (LD 50) of Naja naja venom was found to be 0.301 µg. The aqueous root extract was effectively neutralized the venom lethality and effective dose (ED 50) was found to be 12.88 mg/ 3LD 50 of Naja naja venom. LC-MS analysis from root extract of Rauvolfia serpentina was done for confirmation of the bioactive compounds.

Anin vitroassay to investigate venom neurotoxin activity on muscle-type nicotinic acetylcholine receptor activation and for the discovery of toxin-inhibitory molecules

“…Samples of the various small molecule drugs used for screening were obtained by request from the Open Chemical Repository of the Developmental Therapeutics Program (https://dtp.cancer.gov) (Division of Cancer Treatment and Diagnosis, National Cancer Institute, Rockville, MD, USA), except for nicotine (see section 2.1.2) and varespladib (SML1100, Sigma-Aldrich, Gillingham, UK). These were selected based on their implied potential as α-NTx-inhibitors in previous studies [40][41][42]. Stock solutions of small molecules were created using dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) (D8418, Sigma-Aldrich, Gillingham, UK), and working solutions did not exceed 1% DMSO.…”

A Contemporary Exploration of Traditional Indian Snake Envenomation Therapies

“…Whole plant [69] Roots [18,[87][88][89][90] Roots, Leaves [91] Plant * [92,93] The alkaloid fraction of Rauvolfia serpentina leaves neutralized Crotalus adamanteus snake venom by reducing venom lethality, Superoxide dismutase activity and lipid peroxidation [17]. Aqueous extract of roots of Rauvolfia serpentina neutralized enzymes such as Acetylcholinesterase, ATPase and Protease and lethality of Naja naja snake venom when conducted by in vivo and in vitro methods [94].…”

“…Various researchers have used in vivo, in vitro, and in silico methods or their combination to assess the neutralization of snake venoms by plants. The most references are available for Naja naja venom [64,74,94,96,108,173,203,212,226], followed by Daboia russelii venom [42,44,77,104,106,107,109,110,144,145,156,173]. Both these snake species are perfect representatives of their families Elapidae and Viperidae, respectively, and are the most occurring venomous snake species in the Indian subcontinent.…”

“…Various references demonstrate its effectiveness as an antidote for snake venom. Azadirachta indica [17,64,69,74,151,[164][165][166][167][168][169][170][171][172][173] and Rauvolfia serpentina [17,18,69,[87][88][89][90][91][92][93][94][95][96] hold second place in pharmacological evidence. Figure 3 depicts the number of appearances in references for each plant species as a snake venom antidote (labels as mentioned in the earlier section).…”

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“…9 Moreover, many evidences support the pharmacological use of plants, its extracts and isolated compounds against snakebites as medicine. [10][11][12][13] This review intended to provide more systematic collection of information on various medicinal plants and their components reported or used for treatment of snakebite. A thorough survey highlights the fact about medicinal uses of plants which may further help to identify novel ingredients having action on snake poison, thereby increasing the perception about its advances besides various other toxins.…”