Venom-Sweet-Venom: N-Linked Glycosylation in Snake Venom Toxins

Abstract

Protein glycosylation represents one of the most important post-translational events, and is a mean of diversifying a protein without recourse to the genome. The venoms produced by snakes contain an abundance of glycoproteins with N-linked carbohydrates. N-linked glycosylation can ensure the correct folding of important functional domains. Characterization of carbohydrates structures aids in development of human therapeutics by snake venom toxins.

Cobra venom proteome and glycome determined from individual snakes of Naja atra reveal medically important dynamic range and systematic geographic variation

“…Thus, accumulating evidence indicates that the glycan moieties in snake venom proteins appear to be formed by a common mammalian N-glycan core with biologically important carbohydrate terminals [24]. Since carbohydrate modification can easily enhance venom complexity without changing the genome and glycans are known to have a direct impact on immunogenicity and antibody recognition [22,27], the presence of complex glycans on geographic samples is equally worthy of investigation to understand snake venom biodiversity [28]. To the best of our knowledge, there is no report on the individual snake venom glycome.…”

An Unusual Family of Glycosylated Peptides Isolated from Dendroaspis angusticeps Venom and Characterized by Combination of Collision Induced and Electron Transfer Dissociation

“…D-amino acids are also present in toxins [19]. Phosphorylation of animal toxins has not been described in the literature so far, in contrast to glycosylation for which few articles were published [20]. Regarding only snake venoms, several high mass enzymes have been found to be glycosylated.…”

“…Regarding only snake venoms, several high mass enzymes have been found to be glycosylated. For example, L-amino acid oxidase from the venom of Malayan pit viper Calloselasma rhodostoma is remarkably homogeneously N-glycosylated at Asn172 and Asn361 [20,21]. Many of these glycosylated snake toxins belong to serine protease group.…”

“…The glycosylated cytotoxin, discovered in the venom of the Tai cobra Naja kaouthia, weighs around 9-10 kDa instead of 7 kDa due to its carbohydrate micro heterogeneity [23]. Other glycosylated snake toxins have been described and reported in 2009 in a review by Soares and Oliveira [20].…”

Global insight into N-glycome and N-glycoproteome of three most abundant snake venoms in Asia

“…An abundance of glycoproteins with N-linked carbohydrates are contained in snake venoms. N-Linked glycosylation can ensure the correct folding of important functional domains and has considerable influence on the biological and toxicological functions of active proteins [1][2][3] . In recent years, an increasing number of proteomics studies have been carried out to explore the protein composition of snake venoms.…”