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Androctonus Toxins Targeting Voltage-Gated Sodium Channels

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Scorpion Venoms

Part of the book series: Toxinology ((TOXI,volume 4))

Abstract

The Androctonus genus constitutes a serious threat to human health in Northern Africa and Southwest Asia because some of the Androctonus subspecies produce the most dangerous venoms for mammals. These venoms have provided several high selective affinity ligands, which specifically interact with sodium, potassium, chloride, and calcium channels. However, the vast majority of lethal toxins, even present in the venom at few percent, is active on voltage-gated sodium (Nav) channels and is responsible of almost the whole venom toxicity in mice by subcutaneous injection. During the last four decades, an increasing amount of data was published on the isolation, chemical, pharmacological, and immunological characterization of several structurally distinct families of these extremely active Androctonus toxins, which induce different biological answers when applied to Nav channels. These toxins have been further extensively used to study the functioning and decipher the topology of Nav channels.

This chapter reviews the current knowledge on Androctonus toxins active on Nav channels only, at the structural, biological, and immunological level. The organization of their gene and mRNA precursor will also be approached.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Aix Marseille Université, CNRS, CRN2M UMR7286, CS80011, Bd Pierre Dramard, 13015, Marseille, France

    Marie-France Martin-Eauclaire, Najwa Abbas, Brigitte Céard, Jean-Pierre Rosso & Pierre E. Bougis

Authors
  1. Marie-France Martin-Eauclaire
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  2. Najwa Abbas
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  3. Brigitte Céard
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  4. Jean-Pierre Rosso
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  5. Pierre E. Bougis
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Correspondence to Marie-France Martin-Eauclaire .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Venom and Toxin Research Programme Department of Anatomy, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

    P. Gopalakrishnakone

  2. Departamento de Medicina Molecular y Bioprocesos, Instituto de Biotecnologı´a Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico (UNAM), Cuernavaca, Morelos, Mexico

    Lourival D. Possani

  3. Departamento de Ciências Fisiológicas -, Universidade de Brasília Laboratório de Toxinologia, Brasilia, DF, Brasília, Brazil

    Elisabeth F. Schwartz

  4. Laboratoire Ecologie, Systématique et Evolution Université Paris-Sud, CNRS, ORSAY, France

    Ricardo C. Rodríguez de la Vega

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Martin-Eauclaire, MF., Abbas, N., Céard, B., Rosso, JP., Bougis, P.E. (2015). Androctonus Toxins Targeting Voltage-Gated Sodium Channels. In: Gopalakrishnakone, P., Possani, L., F. Schwartz, E., Rodríguez de la Vega, R. (eds) Scorpion Venoms. Toxinology, vol 4. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6404-0_28

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