title: Omics meets biology: application to the design and preclinical assessment of antivenoms.
abstract: Snakebite envenoming represents a neglected tropical disease that has a heavy public health impact worldwide, mostly affecting poor people involved in agricultural activities in Africa, Asia, Latin America and Oceania. A key issue that complicates the treatment of snakebite envenomings is the poor availability of the only validated treatment for this disease, antivenoms. Antivenoms can be an efficacious treatment for snakebite envenoming, provided they are safe, effective, affordable, accessible and administered appropriately. The shortage of antivenoms in various regions, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa and some parts of Asia, can be significantly alleviated by optimizing the use of current antivenoms and by the generation of novel polyspecific antivenoms having a wide spectrum of efficacy. Complementing preclinical testing of antivenom efficacy using in vivo and in vitro functional neutralization assays, developments in venomics and antivenomics are likely to revolutionize the design and preclinical assessment of antivenoms by being able to test new antivenom preparations and to predict their paraspecific neutralization to the level of species-specific toxins.
authors.affiliation: Structural and Functional Venomics Lab, Instituto de Biomedicina de Valencia (CSIC), Valencia 46010, Spain. jcalvete@ibv.csic.es.
authors.forename: Juan J
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Calvete
authors.affiliation: Structural and Functional Venomics Lab, Instituto de Biomedicina de Valencia (CSIC), Valencia 46010, Spain. libia.sanz@ibv.csic.es.
authors.forename: Libia
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Sanz
authors.affiliation: Structural and Functional Venomics Lab, Instituto de Biomedicina de Valencia (CSIC), Valencia 46010, Spain. dpla@ibv.csic.es.
authors.forename: Davinia
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Pla
authors.affiliation: Instituto Clodomiro Picado, Facultad de Microbiología, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José 11501, Costa Rica. bruno.lomonte@ucr.ac.cr.
authors.forename: Bruno
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Lomonte
authors.affiliation: Instituto Clodomiro Picado, Facultad de Microbiología, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José 11501, Costa Rica. jose.gutierrez@ucr.ac.cr.
authors.forename: José María
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Gutiérrez
mesh_terms: D017954:Africa South of the Sahara; D000818:Animals; D000997:Antivenins / Q000494:pharmacology*; D001208:Asia; D004353:Drug Evaluation, Preclinical / Q000379:methods*; D040901:Proteomics; D012909:Snake Bites / Q000628:therapy; D012910:Snake Venoms / Q000737:chemistry; D012911:Snakes; D013045:Species Specificity
chemical_list: D000997:Antivenins; D012910:Snake Venoms