Natural Toxins and Venoms as Potential Drugs

Dear Colleagues,

The first accidents with poisonous animals and the action of toxins were recorded in cave paintings, showing honey collection and the resulting accidents.  The fascination with the action of toxins also goes back to the Italian Renaissance Giulia Tofana, in the 17th century, who helped hundreds of women get rid of their abusive husbands by using a mixture of toxins.  In the 19th century, the first pharmacology department was set up by Rudolf Buchheim in 1847, in recognition of the need to understand how therapeutic drugs and poisons produced their effects.  And in the 20th and 21st century we have advanced on many fronts, using various biochemical, molecular, physiological and pharmacological techniques.  So, as guest editor, I would like to encourage the various researchers, professors, students to write articles, which can be short, but which have a clear line of reasoning, with a clear contextualization within the chosen sub-theme and having as central theme "Natural Toxins and Venoms as Potential Drugs".

In this context small review articles on the action of toxins on renal, cardiovascular, neurological, immunological systems are welcome.  Furthermore, I would like to encourage colleagues to write papers on the use of toxins such as phospholipase A2 from snakes in inflammatory research, from mechanisms to the protective action of certain anti-inflammatory compounds. The use of toxins in studies of cancers, coagulation disorders, neurological and other disorders, explaining from the action of the toxins and how this is helping to find avenues for the development of new drugs with therapeutic potential.  I would also like to encourage new researchers working on new frontiers such as the use of algae against poisonous actions, for example. 

Prof. Dr. Marcos Hikari Toyama
Guest Editor

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• natural toxin
• venoms
• phospholipase A2
• inflammatory