title: Venomous auger snail Hastula (Impages) hectica (Linnaeus, 1758): molecular phylogeny, foregut anatomy and comparative toxinology.
abstract: The >10,000 living venomous marine snail species [superfamily Conoidea (Fleming, 1822)] include cone snails (Conus), the overwhelming focus of research. Hastula hectica (Linnaeus, 1758), a venomous snail in the family Terebridae (Mörch, 1852) was comprehensively investigated. The Terebridae comprise a major monophyletic group within Conoidea. H. hectica has a striking radular tooth to inject venom that looks like a perforated spear; in Conus, the tooth looks like a hypodermic needle. H. hectica venom contains a large complement of small disulfide-rich peptides, but with no apparent overlap with Conus in gene superfamilies expressed. Although Conus peptide toxins are densely post-translationally modified, no post-translationally modified amino acids were found in any Hastula venom peptide. The results suggest that different major lineages of venomous molluscs have strikingly divergent toxinological and venom-delivery strategies.
authors: Department of Biology, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah 84112, USA.
authors: Julita S
authors: JS
authors: Imperial
authors: Yuri
authors: Y
authors: Kantor
authors: Maren
authors: M
authors: Watkins
authors: Francisco M
authors: FM
authors: Heralde
authors: Bradford
authors: B
authors: Stevenson
authors: Ping
authors: P
authors: Chen
authors: Karin
authors: K
authors: Hansson
authors: Johan
authors: J
authors: Stenflo
authors: John-Paul
authors: JP
authors: Ownby
authors: Philippe
authors: P
authors: Bouchet
authors: Baldomero M
authors: BM
authors: Olivera
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D018076:DNA, Complementary / Q000235:genetics; D041981:Gastrointestinal Tract / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D008978:Mollusk Venoms / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics / Q000633:toxicity*; D010802:Phylogeny; D012908:Snails / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D018076:DNA, Complementary; D008978:Mollusk Venoms