Proteomic and Transcriptomic Techniques to Decipher the Molecular Evolution of Venoms

Abstract

Nature’s library of venoms is a vast and untapped resource that has the potential of becoming the source of a wide variety of new drugs and therapeutics. The discovery of these valuable molecules, hidden in diverse collections of different venoms, requires highly specific genetic and proteomic sequencing techniques. These have been used to sequence a variety of venom glands from species ranging from snakes to scorpions, and some marine species. In addition to identifying toxin sequences, these techniques have paved the way for identifying various novel evolutionary links between species that were previously thought to be unrelated. Furthermore, proteomics-based techniques have allowed researchers to discover how specific toxins have evolved within related species, and in the context of environmental pressures. These techniques allow groups to discover novel proteins, identify mutations of interest, and discover new ways to modify toxins for biomimetic purposes and for the development of new therapeutics.

A Spider Toxin Exemplifies the Promises and Pitfalls of Cell-Free Protein Production for Venom Biodiscovery

“…Our mass spectrometry analysis revealed that the expression batch of USCTX was almost exclusively composed of peptide pairs displaying aberrant cysteine crosslinking or peptides that lack disulfide bonds. Only a single peptide with m / z 1215.56, matching the C2-C5 crosslink of native USCTX, was identified via MALDI and even more sensitive Orbitrap experiments [ 27 , 28 , 29 ]. Our data suggest that the cell-free system faces difficulties in facilitating the correct disulfide bond formation in such heavily cysteine-crosslinked peptides.…”

“…For mass spectrometry, we used the highly sensitive Orbitrap instrument on which we previously identified other ICK components [ 28 , 29 ]. Briefly, 0.5 µg of each sample in 0.1% formic acid (Sigma-Aldrich) was loaded onto a 50 cm µPAC C18 column (Pharma Fluidics, Gent, Belgium) mounted on an UltiMate 3000RSLCnano (Thermo Fisher Scientific).…”

Game-Theoretic Dynamic Procedure for a Power Index under Relative Symmetry

“…The scientific community is capitalizing on many innovations to transform traditional approaches used for numerous toxic mitigation measures under aquatic environments. Related investigations have been introduced, such as Habschied [14], Mouchbahani-Constance et al [15], Peles et al [16], Reichwaldt et al [17], Sotnichenko et al [18], and so on.…”

Old World Vipers—A Review about Snake Venom Proteomics of Viperinae and Their Variations

“…The investigation of venom diversity is strongly multidisciplinary, in which omics technologies, including genomics, transcriptomics, and proteomics, play an increasingly large role in the field of venom research [ 43 , 44 ]. Nowadays, the bottom-up (BU) and the top-down (TD) approach have become the gold standard in snake venom proteomics and the advantages and disadvantages of both have been extensively discussed [ 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 ]. The integration of high-resolution mass spectrometry (MS)-based workflows, mostly in combination with preceding decomplexation steps, plays a decisive role and has continuously developed over the past decades [ 51 ].…”