Amazing discovery about snake and spider venom

Bacteria can live in some of the strangest and most inhospitable places on our planet - arid deserts, toxic acid lakes, and even deep in the Earth's crust below the ocean floor.

But scientists have just discovered a new, highly unexpected habitat for powerful little microbes: the venom of snakes and spiders.

This contradicts what we thought we knew;

These toxins contain antimicrobial compounds, which scientists theorized meant sterile environments in which microbes could not thrive.

The discovery of the opposite means that the bacteria causing the infection could already be present in the venom before the victim is bitten, suggesting that anyone bitten by a snake or spider may also need to be treated for the infection.

Molecular biologist Stergius Moskos, from Northumbria University in the UK, notes: “We found that all venomous snakes and spiders we tested had bacterial DNA in their venom. Common diagnostic tools failed to correctly identify these bacteria - if you were infected with this bacteria, it would be over. Telling the doctor to give you the wrong antibiotics, it could make things worse."

And although we believed for a long time that poison should be sterile, infected bites are not.

up to three quarters of snakebite victims develop a bite wound infection;

These are usually attributed to a secondary infection from bacteria that live in the snake's mouth, and are left in the poop of its prey.

However, recent studies have revealed that non-venomous snakes' mouths were more sterile than those of venomous snakes - due to the antimicrobial compounds present in the venom - and that the bacteria present in them are likely native rather than colonized by prey spores.

Moscus and his colleagues wanted to find out if the venom and venom glands could be a source of additional bacteria, and if so, how the microbes have adapted to live in an environment so hostile to them.

They took samples of venom and poisoning devices from five types of snakes, and samples from two types of spiders, and proceeded to isolate and examine the microbes from the venom.

It is possible that some of the microbes in snake mouths are oral or environmental, but some have been found in both venom and venom glands, including, in one species of snake, a common bacterium found in the human digestive system, Enterococcus faecalis.

This was fascinating, because the team was able to compare it to samples of E. faecalis found in hospitals.

"When we sequenced its DNA, we clearly identified the bacteria and discovered that it had mutated to resist the toxin," Moscus says. "This is unusual because the toxin is like a mixture of antibiotics."

Given how quickly a colony of bacteria can develop resistance to antibiotics, and how long microbes do, this probably shouldn't be surprising.

However, surprising or not surprising results suggest that treating bites may not be as simple as treating a secondary infection, due to the adaptations of the microbes.

However, these modifications may also give us a new tool for understanding antibiotic resistance and how to circumvent it in other circumstances.

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