A1 Refereed original research article in a scientific journal
Protein Identification of Venoms of the African Spitting Cobras, Naja mossambica and Naja nigricincta nigricincta
Authors: Ottilie Katali, Loide Shipingana, Peter Nyarangó, Mirva Pääkkönen, Erastus Haindongo, Timothy Rennie, Peter James, John Eriksson, Christian John Hunter
Publisher: MDPI
Publication year: 2020
Journal:Toxins
Article number: 520
Volume: 12
Issue: 8
Number of pages: 11
eISSN: 2072-6651
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/toxins12080520
Self-archived copy’s web address: https://research.utu.fi/converis/portal/detail/Publication/48782740
Cobra snakes, including Naja mossambica and Naja nigricincta nigricincta,
 are one of the major groups of snakes responsible for snakebites in 
southern Africa, producing significant cytotoxicity and tissue damage. 
The venom of N. mossambica has been briefly characterised, but that of N. n. nigricincta is not reported. The current study identifies the venom proteins of N. mossambica and N. n. nigricincta.
 This is achieved using sodium dodecyl sulphate (SDS)-polyacrylamide gel
 eletrophroresis (PAGE), followed by high-performance liquid 
chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS/MS). Most of the 
proteins were less than 17 kDa in both snakes. N. mossambica was found to have 75 proteins in total (from 16 protein families), whereas N.n. nigricincta
 had 73 (from 16 protein families). Of these identified proteins, 57 
were common in both snakes. The proteins identified belonged to various 
families, including the three-finger toxins (3FTx), Cysteine-rich 
secretory proteins (CRiSP), Phospholipase A2 (PLA2) and Venom
 metalloproteinase M12B (SVMP). The current study contributes to the 
profile knowledge of snake venom compositions, which is of fundamental 
value in understanding the proteins that play a major role in 
envenomation
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