Cloning of cDNAs encoding neurotoxic peptides from the spider Phoneutria nigriventer

• Published in: Toxicon (Oxford) Vol. 36; no. 12; pp. 1843 - 1850
• Main Authors: Kalapothakis, Evanguedes, Penaforte, Claudia L, Beirão, Paulo S.L, Romano-Silva, Marco A, Cruz, Jader S, Prado, Marco A.M, Guimarães, Pedro E.M, Gomez, Marcus V, Prado, Vania F
• Format: Journal Article Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford Elsevier Ltd 01.12.1998; Elsevier Science
• Subjects: Amino Acid Sequence; Animal poisons toxicology. Antivenoms; Animals; Base Sequence; Biological and medical sciences; Blotting, Northern; Cloning, Molecular - methods; DNA, Complementary - chemistry; Gene Library; Medical sciences; Molecular Sequence Data; Neurotoxins - chemistry; Phoneutria nigriventer; Protein Sorting Signals - chemistry; Recombinant Proteins; Spider Venoms - genetics; Spiders; Toxicology; Polymerase chain reaction; Arachnida; Complementary DNA; Peptides; Arthropoda; Venom; Neurotoxin; Animal origin; Invertebrata; Aminoacid sequence; Structural analysis
• ISSN: 0041-0101; 1879-3150
• DOI: 10.1016/S0041-0101(98)00105-6

A cDNA library made from venom glands of the spider Phoneutria nigriventer was constructed and used to clone neurotoxic peptides. A cDNA of about 360 nucleotides encoding the precursor for the toxin Tx2-1 active on mammals has been isolated. The deduced amino acid sequence for the mature polypeptide confirms the polypeptide sequence previously published. In addition, two new putative toxins called Pn2-1A and Pn2-5A have been characterized and their complete amino acid sequence show 92% similarity to Tx2-1 and 94% similarity to Tx2-5 respectively. The cDNAs revealed that the precursors contain signal peptides characterized by a very hydrophobic core and a propeptide interposed between the signal sequence and the peptide toxin.