Australian Funnel-Web Spider Venom Analyzed With On-Line RP-HPLC Techniques.

Venoms have attracted significant study in recent years as a reservoir of complex libraries of natural products possessing a wide range of biological activities. Moreover, venoms contain specific and potent molecules that may be utilized in pharmaceutical development and in the production of environmentally friendly insecticides. The compositions of venoms are typically highly complex and contain a variety of molecules including proteins, peptides, and numerous types of small molecules. This complexity requires highly sensitive techniques to allow separation of these components for study. The techniques should also be able to accommodate large variations in sample size to account for the differences in venom available from different creatures (e.g., some snakes can supply up to 500 mg of crude venom from a single milking, whereas some small insects, such as ants, supply submicrogram amounts [1]). These qualities have been found and continue to be advanced in the technique high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), in particular reversed-phase HPLC (RP-HPLC). This technique combined with a variety of detection methods can allow the collection of a significant amount of data from very small venom samples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]