WEBVTT - Venom Tech 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:07.200 Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to 0:00:07.400 --> 0:00:14.640 Forward Thinking there, and welcome to Forward Thinking, the podcast 0:00:14.680 --> 0:00:17.360 that looks at the future and says you're toxic. I'm 0:00:17.400 --> 0:00:22.160 slipping under. I'm Joe McCormick, I'm Lauren, and our regular 0:00:22.160 --> 0:00:24.880 host Jonathan Strickland is not with us this week. He 0:00:25.000 --> 0:00:27.960 is having a wonderful time somewhere other than the office, 0:00:28.480 --> 0:00:31.040 which is a good thing to do occasionally, or so 0:00:31.080 --> 0:00:34.239 I've heard. But if you've been listening to this podcast 0:00:34.280 --> 0:00:36.240 for a while, you probably know Lauren and I sort 0:00:36.280 --> 0:00:39.880 of have a tradition that when Jonathan's away, the Scorpions 0:00:39.880 --> 0:00:43.440 will play, or or the creepy Crawley's of some kind. 0:00:43.640 --> 0:00:46.080 Whenever Jonathan is out, we tried to do a podcast 0:00:46.120 --> 0:00:52.240 about bugs, and it's surprisingly fruitful in terms of future technology. Yeah, 0:00:52.680 --> 0:00:56.000 who knew. Um, So today we're going to talk about 0:00:56.040 --> 0:00:58.720 something that was an idea Lauren had and I think 0:00:58.720 --> 0:01:03.120 it actually turned out really cool, the potential for future 0:01:03.120 --> 0:01:09.160 technologies and current developing medical technologies based on positive uses 0:01:09.319 --> 0:01:13.399 of venom venom animal venom. Yes, Lauren, do you have 0:01:13.440 --> 0:01:16.000 a venom story? Have you ever been stung or bitten? 0:01:16.040 --> 0:01:19.560 By any kind of creature that put poison under your skin. Uh, No, 0:01:21.640 --> 0:01:26.800 that's a boring answer. No good spiderbytes, scorpion stings, anything like. Um, 0:01:26.840 --> 0:01:28.919 I mean, I guess I've gotten like a tiny spider 0:01:28.959 --> 0:01:31.120 bite once or twice, but I mean, you know, or 0:01:31.319 --> 0:01:34.399 like an ant bite. Our ants venomous? Yes, yes, they 0:01:34.440 --> 0:01:39.840 are many creatures that inject some kind of poison into 0:01:39.880 --> 0:01:44.080 your body are venomous. Wait a minute, now, I think 0:01:44.080 --> 0:01:46.920 we're having a little vocabulary mix up because I think 0:01:46.959 --> 0:01:50.440 you just said poison, and that's not exactly the same 0:01:50.480 --> 0:01:53.480 thing as venom, is it. No, it's not, though in 0:01:53.720 --> 0:01:57.640 sort of popular parlance it might be. But let's let's 0:01:57.640 --> 0:02:00.520 talk the science talk what does it actually mean? And when, 0:02:00.600 --> 0:02:04.920 like a biologist says venom versus poison? Well, I was 0:02:04.960 --> 0:02:08.160 curious about this, so I looked it up and there 0:02:08.200 --> 0:02:12.639 there's a paper called complex Cocktails, the Evolutionary Novelty of Venoms. 0:02:12.680 --> 0:02:16.840 That was it was report in Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 0:02:17.080 --> 0:02:20.680 and this gave the following definition of venoms. Specifically, they 0:02:20.680 --> 0:02:24.480 said it's a secretion produced in a specialized gland in 0:02:24.560 --> 0:02:27.960 one animal and delivered to a target animal through the 0:02:28.000 --> 0:02:31.760 infliction of a wound, regardless of how tiny it could be, 0:02:32.280 --> 0:02:37.720 which contains molecules that disrupt normal physiological or biochemical processes 0:02:38.040 --> 0:02:42.120 so as to facilitate feeding or defense by the producing animal. 0:02:42.760 --> 0:02:45.960 That's kind of a mouthful, but it has a lot 0:02:45.960 --> 0:02:48.360 of detail there. That's kind of a good MEATIA definition. 0:02:48.440 --> 0:02:53.560 So it it includes that it's not a passive distribution 0:02:53.880 --> 0:02:57.120 of the chemical. It's produced by the host animal. Uh. 0:02:57.160 --> 0:03:01.120 The animal delivers it to another animals somehow through like 0:03:01.120 --> 0:03:05.320 a bite. There's some kind of injection and it facilitates 0:03:05.320 --> 0:03:10.480 either defense or or predatory behavior. And this sort of 0:03:10.480 --> 0:03:13.200 goes in line with a popular definition just for the 0:03:13.240 --> 0:03:15.560 common speech level. I looked it up in Mariam Webster. 0:03:15.919 --> 0:03:18.400 They said venom was a poison that's produced by an 0:03:18.440 --> 0:03:20.720 animals such as a snake, used to kill or injure 0:03:20.760 --> 0:03:24.960 another animal through biting or stinging. Uh So, basically, the 0:03:25.000 --> 0:03:28.360 difference between a venom and a poison is the delivery 0:03:28.480 --> 0:03:33.480 vector of the icky stuff, and venoms are injected by 0:03:33.520 --> 0:03:37.560 like specialized usually like hypodermic needle like teeth or stingers, 0:03:38.080 --> 0:03:44.160 and poisons are just secreted, uh like in lazy lazy frogs, oh, 0:03:44.240 --> 0:03:46.400 the poison dart frogs. Yeah. Yeah, they're the hippies of 0:03:46.440 --> 0:03:49.600 the animal kingdom. I'm telling you right right, because they 0:03:49.640 --> 0:03:52.160 just wait for you to come up and handle them. Yeah, 0:03:52.480 --> 0:03:56.960 and that's how they get you. Yeah. So the easy 0:03:57.040 --> 0:03:59.920 rubric I guess is that if you seese up an 0:04:00.160 --> 0:04:03.800 die after an animal bites you or stings you, that 0:04:03.880 --> 0:04:07.920 animal was venomous. But if you die after you eat 0:04:07.960 --> 0:04:10.440 an animal or you catch it and rub it all 0:04:10.440 --> 0:04:14.640 over your naked flesh, that animal was probably poisonous. Probably, 0:04:14.680 --> 0:04:17.080 Although it's a good rule of thumb to not go 0:04:17.160 --> 0:04:19.440 around eating animals if you're not sure that they don't 0:04:19.600 --> 0:04:24.960 contain little sacks of really potent neurotoxins I, unless you're 0:04:24.960 --> 0:04:27.600 really sure of what you're doing. Um, eating a venomous 0:04:27.600 --> 0:04:31.599 snake is really just as bad as eating a poisonous snake. 0:04:32.080 --> 0:04:35.040 And there are poisonous snakes. Some snakes are both venomous 0:04:35.040 --> 0:04:38.080 and poisonous. Really, like a snake that would be poisonous 0:04:38.120 --> 0:04:41.200 to eat or handle? Yeah, bad times, Stay away from 0:04:41.240 --> 0:04:44.120 that guy. I always thought that the use of poisonous 0:04:44.120 --> 0:04:46.880 snake was just kind of like people using the word wrong. 0:04:47.640 --> 0:04:50.719 So different different animals have all kinds of different stuff 0:04:50.720 --> 0:04:52.880 going on. How true that is? And in fact, I 0:04:52.920 --> 0:04:55.480 came across a really interesting little fact on the side 0:04:55.480 --> 0:04:59.680 while I was researching for this episode. So, some poisonous animals, 0:04:59.720 --> 0:05:03.480 like the family of poison dart frogs, don't actually make 0:05:03.600 --> 0:05:06.960 their own poison, but they acquire it from the environment 0:05:07.000 --> 0:05:10.039 they live in. So it's thought that they eat some 0:05:10.120 --> 0:05:14.400 kind of poisonous prey and then they appropriate that poison 0:05:14.640 --> 0:05:17.039 into the poison that they wear on their skins. So 0:05:17.800 --> 0:05:19.919 you rubbed the frog all over you and then you 0:05:19.920 --> 0:05:23.400 get sick or die, that's actually because of something that 0:05:23.440 --> 0:05:27.440 the frog itself acquired from nature. Okay, so let's do 0:05:27.480 --> 0:05:29.960 a few quick Venom facts before we get into the 0:05:30.040 --> 0:05:33.120 Venom tech. Joe and I might be really excited about this. 0:05:33.200 --> 0:05:36.080 If you cann't tell listeners, well, I just yeah, I 0:05:36.160 --> 0:05:39.600 love venom wisdom Venom is that? Does that have something 0:05:39.600 --> 0:05:41.280 to do as Spider Man, because I don't feel like 0:05:41.360 --> 0:05:44.600 Venom had a lot of going on in the wisdom category. 0:05:44.839 --> 0:05:48.520 You are much more the comic book nerd around here. 0:05:48.560 --> 0:05:50.440 I think you know more about venom than I do. 0:05:50.760 --> 0:05:53.560 As we've established, I'm sort of a fake geek he's 0:05:53.640 --> 0:05:58.479 he's he's kind of a raging i'd sort of so, yeah, 0:05:58.279 --> 0:06:01.760 okay at any rate? Yeah, no, no no, no, just so 0:06:01.880 --> 0:06:05.400 venom facts. Yeah. Yeah. So the obvious question that always 0:06:05.440 --> 0:06:08.960 comes up, it's like it's sort of the kids playground argument, right, 0:06:09.200 --> 0:06:12.159 what's the most venomous animal in the world. But actually 0:06:12.240 --> 0:06:14.920 that's a question that's kind of hard to answer because 0:06:15.120 --> 0:06:18.280 you can't measure it by which ones kill the most 0:06:18.360 --> 0:06:20.960 animals or humans, because this might be based more on 0:06:21.040 --> 0:06:24.400 like which ones were exposed to the most options, number 0:06:24.440 --> 0:06:27.479 of bytes, access to healthcare, and anti venom after you 0:06:27.520 --> 0:06:31.160 get bittendis lots of these things. And it's not like 0:06:31.279 --> 0:06:35.440 a venom has a base level of toxicity that there's 0:06:35.480 --> 0:06:38.920 an easy litmus test for. It's it's really just how 0:06:38.960 --> 0:06:41.760 does it interact with cells? And and most venoms are 0:06:41.800 --> 0:06:45.000 made up of multiple proteins and peptides that have different 0:06:45.000 --> 0:06:48.400 effects on different cell structures, right, So one venom might 0:06:48.440 --> 0:06:51.960 have a bunch of different toxins in it, right. Um. 0:06:52.080 --> 0:06:55.320 The old method for measuring toxicity is called a substances 0:06:55.520 --> 0:06:58.360 l D fifty, which is the lethal dose l D 0:06:58.760 --> 0:07:03.000 of a substance that will kill of test animals. It's 0:07:03.040 --> 0:07:05.720 measured by the weight of the substance needed per one 0:07:06.720 --> 0:07:10.640 or one m, depending on how big of a critter 0:07:10.680 --> 0:07:14.200 you're talking about of the test animals body weight, so 0:07:14.440 --> 0:07:17.000 low numbers are more deadly. For for example, a box 0:07:17.080 --> 0:07:20.520 jellyfish's venom has an l D fifty of zero point 0:07:20.640 --> 0:07:26.240 zero four. Uh, don't eat their stingers, that would be bad. Um. 0:07:26.240 --> 0:07:30.920 A coral snakes LD fifty is one point three um. 0:07:30.960 --> 0:07:34.080 And now if this method sounds like a lot of 0:07:34.160 --> 0:07:37.920 animals were harmed in the making of this this research, 0:07:38.240 --> 0:07:41.000 you're correct, and that's why people don't use it so 0:07:41.080 --> 0:07:43.040 much anymore because it involves killing a whole lot of 0:07:43.080 --> 0:07:47.840 test animals. Really yeah, bad times. So a lot of 0:07:47.880 --> 0:07:50.800 times you'll see animals when when we're setting up these 0:07:50.840 --> 0:07:55.720 great venom competitions separated into different animal groups. So some 0:07:55.760 --> 0:07:58.600 people say, for example, that the most venomous snake might 0:07:58.640 --> 0:08:02.080 be the inland type hand snake of Australia. A lot 0:08:02.080 --> 0:08:04.440 of these things hang out in Australia and they really do. 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:07.560 Like these funnel web spiders like those those are just 0:08:07.600 --> 0:08:10.560 like these little eight like a Darth vaders that live 0:08:10.600 --> 0:08:13.680 on the ground in Australia. I feel bad for If 0:08:13.720 --> 0:08:16.520 we have any Australian listeners, please right in tell us 0:08:16.520 --> 0:08:18.560 about all the venomous creatures that you find in your 0:08:18.560 --> 0:08:23.760 bed at night. Uh but yeah, so the inland type hand. Supposedly, 0:08:23.800 --> 0:08:27.200 the amount of venom usually delivered in one bite by 0:08:27.240 --> 0:08:31.480 this snake is enough to kill a hundred adult men. Fortunately, 0:08:31.600 --> 0:08:33.560 we have ways of treating this. We have an effective 0:08:33.559 --> 0:08:37.840 anti venom. By the way, do a quick Google image 0:08:37.880 --> 0:08:40.760 search if you're listening on a computer of the inland 0:08:40.800 --> 0:08:44.720 type hand. It does this thing where it raises a 0:08:44.920 --> 0:08:48.560 coiled section of its upper body up off the ground, 0:08:49.080 --> 0:08:53.280 and it looks so intimidating it's almost funny. It looks 0:08:53.280 --> 0:08:55.880 like it's some kind of like snake shaped airplane. In 0:08:56.000 --> 0:09:00.160 mid take off, it's like winding up into the sky. 0:09:00.160 --> 0:09:03.320 In the next frame, it'll be off the ground, all right. 0:09:03.840 --> 0:09:08.880 Also another fact, taipan apparently means something like big shot 0:09:09.160 --> 0:09:13.080 or tycoon in Chinese. That's beautiful, that's that. And the 0:09:13.120 --> 0:09:14.760 spelling of that, if you're trying to look it up, 0:09:14.840 --> 0:09:18.640 is t A I P A N. So go go 0:09:18.760 --> 0:09:22.280 check that out. Um. But uh yeah, other other creatures, 0:09:22.320 --> 0:09:23.480 I mean, you know, a lot. Lots of things are 0:09:23.559 --> 0:09:26.839 venomous that you probably already know about, but some really 0:09:26.880 --> 0:09:29.280 interesting ones. We wanted to hit on a couple. Yeah. One, 0:09:29.320 --> 0:09:31.880 I really like our cone snails. You know about these 0:09:32.040 --> 0:09:34.720 cone snails? Cone snails? Look them up? They live under 0:09:34.760 --> 0:09:38.600 the ocean. Uh. Some cone snails shoot prey with these 0:09:38.679 --> 0:09:43.120 bio harpoons they have containing neurotoxins. Snails have a lot 0:09:43.160 --> 0:09:46.079 of have a lot of harpoons going on, guys, anyway, 0:09:46.160 --> 0:09:49.240 go ahead. Yeah, there are also species of cone snail 0:09:49.400 --> 0:09:51.679 that I just read about this today. They attack their 0:09:51.679 --> 0:09:56.640 prey with blasts of insulin, which cripples fish by drastically 0:09:56.720 --> 0:09:59.480 lowering their blood sugar, and then the snails can just 0:09:59.559 --> 0:10:02.960 kind of lurp them up. Yeah. Yeah, there's apparently a 0:10:03.000 --> 0:10:05.320 couple of different species of kinds down. Some of them 0:10:05.360 --> 0:10:07.200 have these little harpoons, and others have this kind of 0:10:07.240 --> 0:10:10.960 area effect. They they sort of let loose this this 0:10:11.160 --> 0:10:15.080 miasma of toxin stuff. And one of those toxins is insulin, 0:10:15.520 --> 0:10:18.840 And that's crazy to me. They're they're looking into using, um, 0:10:18.880 --> 0:10:22.200 the production of this insulin for like diabetes research. Yeah, 0:10:22.280 --> 0:10:24.720 and that highlights something we're going to talk about in 0:10:24.800 --> 0:10:27.360 the medical tech part of this episode, which is that 0:10:27.440 --> 0:10:30.679 a lot of these toxins can have a positive effect 0:10:30.679 --> 0:10:32.680 on the body in one way or another if you 0:10:32.720 --> 0:10:34.880 have a specific kind of thing you need to do, 0:10:34.960 --> 0:10:39.839 because these toxins are designed by evolution to be efficacious 0:10:39.920 --> 0:10:43.880 to create some kind of change in animal bodies, right, 0:10:44.040 --> 0:10:46.120 and if that's the kind of change you want to 0:10:46.160 --> 0:10:49.360 create to help somebody's medical condition, it can be good news. 0:10:49.440 --> 0:10:54.240 Oh yeah, absolutely. Um. One more that is not useful 0:10:54.320 --> 0:10:58.520 as far as we know is platypus venom Did you guys, 0:10:58.600 --> 0:11:02.800 were you aware that platypuses are venomous? I did not 0:11:02.880 --> 0:11:05.640 know this before today. Is this common knowledge? I thank 0:11:05.640 --> 0:11:08.560 you for not using the word platypie. That's not a word. 0:11:10.400 --> 0:11:11.800 I don't I don't think it is correct. I think 0:11:11.800 --> 0:11:15.480 it's like octopuses, Like people have slowly started losing that 0:11:15.640 --> 0:11:19.320 bizarre poor latin um. I think I might have heard 0:11:19.360 --> 0:11:22.199 that platypuses are venomous. But tell me about it, Okay. So, 0:11:22.480 --> 0:11:26.600 male platypuses specifically have spurs on their hind legs, like 0:11:26.679 --> 0:11:29.680 one on each hind leg that can provide a sting um. 0:11:29.840 --> 0:11:33.079 Females are born with these spurs, but they fall off 0:11:33.160 --> 0:11:36.160 before they reach adulthood. Um. And these spurs are used 0:11:36.200 --> 0:11:40.120 in defense against predators because I mean, I would not 0:11:40.240 --> 0:11:43.160 attack a platypus because it's really cute. But I understand 0:11:43.200 --> 0:11:47.920 that not everything in the wild has those reluctances. But um, 0:11:48.280 --> 0:11:50.520 they can also be used. The spurs can also be 0:11:50.640 --> 0:11:56.480 used used offensively during mating season against against platypuses competitors 0:11:56.840 --> 0:12:01.080 for a specific mate. I'm yeah, yeah. Um. They deliver 0:12:01.280 --> 0:12:03.480 enough of a punch to to kill something the size 0:12:03.520 --> 0:12:06.360 of a of a platypus or say a dog, but 0:12:06.480 --> 0:12:09.400 not a human, although their venom does cause a great 0:12:09.440 --> 0:12:12.439 deal of pain in humans, and it does so by 0:12:12.480 --> 0:12:18.840 some neurotoxin mechanism that is not regulated by morphine. So 0:12:18.840 --> 0:12:21.199 so if you get stung by a platypus and you 0:12:21.280 --> 0:12:26.080 go ow lots of ow, and a normal doctor response 0:12:26.080 --> 0:12:28.600 would be to be like, well, oh, here's some morphine 0:12:28.600 --> 0:12:31.640 that will help you feel not ow anymore. Doesn't work? 0:12:31.960 --> 0:12:36.120 Oh wow, Yeah, that's crazy. It's like they thought of everything, 0:12:37.040 --> 0:12:40.760 you know, though, I do have to imagine in the wild, 0:12:40.920 --> 0:12:45.160 most platypus deaths are the result of over zealous nineteenth 0:12:45.240 --> 0:12:49.560 century naturalists from like the Great London Society that that 0:12:49.679 --> 0:12:52.960 sounds likely. It's a very sad there should really be 0:12:53.040 --> 0:13:02.800 a conservancy group, Pip Pip. Yeah. But despite all this, 0:13:03.160 --> 0:13:05.080 I want to highlight that it's really important not to 0:13:05.160 --> 0:13:09.120 demonize venomous animals, especially platypus. Is right, we don't need 0:13:09.160 --> 0:13:11.319 to wipe platypuses off the face of the earth. We 0:13:11.360 --> 0:13:13.400 don't need to get rid of the inland type. And 0:13:13.559 --> 0:13:17.199 generally these animals are not very threatening to humans. They 0:13:17.240 --> 0:13:19.760 just want to be left alone. Venom is a strength 0:13:19.800 --> 0:13:23.400 trait that these creatures possessed to survive, just like your 0:13:23.559 --> 0:13:27.800 dogs teeth and jaw muscles, or your meaty hands which 0:13:27.880 --> 0:13:30.600 I point out are perfect for punching and strangling, or 0:13:30.679 --> 0:13:33.680 your big mutant brain. I mean, all kinds of creatures 0:13:33.720 --> 0:13:38.120 have defense and predation mechanisms. Just because it's scary to 0:13:38.160 --> 0:13:42.199 you doesn't mean that these creatures are worth being looked 0:13:42.240 --> 0:13:46.240 at a scance, right right, And as we mentioned briefly 0:13:46.280 --> 0:13:49.840 earlier and are about to go into in detail, a 0:13:49.880 --> 0:13:53.240 lot of the venoms that these things produce have these 0:13:53.360 --> 0:13:57.080 awesome medical uses, another reason not to demonize them. Yes, 0:13:57.720 --> 0:14:00.480 a lot of time venoms are neurotoxins. These see, they 0:14:00.480 --> 0:14:03.800 affect the nervous system and can cause on on the 0:14:03.840 --> 0:14:06.719 negative end, anything from like dizziness to difficulty breathing, to 0:14:06.760 --> 0:14:09.599 blurred vision to muscle seizure. And and that idea in 0:14:09.720 --> 0:14:13.440 nature is generally to either paralyzed prey so that you 0:14:13.440 --> 0:14:17.360 can eat it yea um, or to hurt predators enough 0:14:17.400 --> 0:14:21.160 so that you can escape from them. And uh. Other 0:14:21.200 --> 0:14:23.840 toxins might like affect other types of cells like blood 0:14:23.880 --> 0:14:26.800 or skin cells, which um you know, usually by killing 0:14:26.840 --> 0:14:29.480 them by like rupturing the cell walls or something like that. 0:14:30.040 --> 0:14:32.480 One really common one, um you might have heard of 0:14:32.480 --> 0:14:35.480 it before, is using a proteins from snake venoms to 0:14:36.120 --> 0:14:40.160 help dissolve blood clots in patients experiencing a heart attack 0:14:40.240 --> 0:14:42.760 or a stroke. I think that's kind of the the 0:14:43.320 --> 0:14:48.800 commonly heard of venom technology. Um, but lots of toxins 0:14:48.840 --> 0:14:51.120 can be very useful. Yeah, And in fact, we already 0:14:51.160 --> 0:14:56.080 use all kinds of toxins from venom in medical research today. 0:14:56.160 --> 0:14:59.160 And we wanted to highlight a few of the strangest 0:14:59.320 --> 0:15:02.000 and cool idea as we came across, and especially the 0:15:02.120 --> 0:15:04.880 kind of upcoming ones things that are still being sort 0:15:04.880 --> 0:15:07.760 of ironed out. Yeah, so I want to talk about 0:15:08.200 --> 0:15:14.640 attacking brain tumors with scorpion venom. Okay, let's pretty weird idea. 0:15:14.760 --> 0:15:18.120 Uh yeah, I would not. I mean if I had 0:15:18.160 --> 0:15:20.400 a brain tumor and my first thought would not be 0:15:20.560 --> 0:15:23.360 let's get some scorpions, Well, it might be soon, and 0:15:23.680 --> 0:15:25.440 I want to paint a picture for you and help 0:15:25.480 --> 0:15:28.240 explain why this would be. So. So let's say you 0:15:28.280 --> 0:15:31.240 have a tumor in your brain. Obviously you want to 0:15:31.280 --> 0:15:34.440 get that tumor out of there. Yes, So you need 0:15:34.480 --> 0:15:37.120 to have a surgical procedure where they go in, they 0:15:37.120 --> 0:15:40.240 open up your skull and they remove all the tumor 0:15:40.280 --> 0:15:43.000 tissue so that it doesn't spread to other parts of 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:45.680 your body or keep growing and eventually kill you. So 0:15:45.760 --> 0:15:48.320 you want to cut out all of the cancer cells 0:15:48.640 --> 0:15:52.560 while we're moving as little healthy tissue as possible. But 0:15:52.640 --> 0:15:55.480 especially in the brain, that's really tricky. Yeah yeah, yeah, 0:15:55.520 --> 0:15:57.920 Well it's not always as easy to tell the difference 0:15:58.000 --> 0:16:00.480 as you might think. So you can take a pre 0:16:00.560 --> 0:16:02.520 op m r I. You can put somebody in an 0:16:02.560 --> 0:16:04.440 m r I machine and get a picture of the 0:16:04.440 --> 0:16:07.280 inside of their head to try to get some idea 0:16:07.360 --> 0:16:10.280 of what the edges of the tumor look like. But 0:16:10.520 --> 0:16:15.080 this isn't perfect and you can miss sections and that's 0:16:15.120 --> 0:16:17.680 really bad. This often happens. You hear about this, people 0:16:17.720 --> 0:16:20.160 going to have a brain tumor removed, and it only 0:16:20.200 --> 0:16:23.920 turns out later like, oh no, right, we didn't get 0:16:23.960 --> 0:16:25.880 all of it, and then they might have to have 0:16:25.880 --> 0:16:30.360 another surgery, and uh, it's a very bad thing. On 0:16:30.400 --> 0:16:32.840 the other hand, if you cut too much, we're talking 0:16:32.880 --> 0:16:35.800 about the brain here, it's pretty obvious why that is 0:16:35.840 --> 0:16:39.680 not a good option. You don't want to remove healthy tissue. 0:16:40.280 --> 0:16:44.040 You can have debilitating effects. So there's a guy named 0:16:44.120 --> 0:16:48.960 Jim Olson who's a pediatric oncologist, mean he treats cancer 0:16:49.000 --> 0:16:52.600 and children and a clinical researcher at the Fred Hutchinson 0:16:52.760 --> 0:16:56.040 Cancer Research Center in Seattle, And for a while now 0:16:56.080 --> 0:16:58.960 he's been leading research on a medical technology to help 0:16:58.960 --> 0:17:03.680 with this problem. And it's called tumor paint. Tumor paint, 0:17:04.720 --> 0:17:07.520 weird name, but hold on for a second here and 0:17:07.880 --> 0:17:10.919 we'll we'll explain how it works. So, tumor paint is 0:17:10.960 --> 0:17:15.159 a protein linked fluorescent dye and it's derived from a 0:17:15.200 --> 0:17:17.359 toxin that you find in the venom of a death 0:17:17.440 --> 0:17:22.119 stalker scorpion. Death stalker scorpion. Best name for an animal 0:17:22.560 --> 0:17:26.080 ever come up with by anyone, the death stalker scorpion. 0:17:27.040 --> 0:17:30.840 So the relevant toxin is called chloro toxin, and this 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:35.400 is a toxin that works by blocking chloride ion channels 0:17:35.440 --> 0:17:39.040 and cells. And the death stalker scorpion uses the toxin 0:17:39.080 --> 0:17:41.960 to paralyze its prey, which would be you know, tasty 0:17:42.000 --> 0:17:45.359 insects like cockroaches or something, to paralyze them, not not 0:17:45.400 --> 0:17:49.600 monom eatum up. The thing about chlorotoxin is that it's 0:17:49.640 --> 0:17:52.320 not toxic to humans. Side note, this does not mean 0:17:52.359 --> 0:17:55.240 that death stalker venom is harmless to humans. There is 0:17:55.280 --> 0:17:57.119 other stuff in there that will get you. Don't go 0:17:57.280 --> 0:17:59.840 playing with those things in general, do not go play 0:17:59.880 --> 0:18:04.000 with scarpions. No. But when applied to humans, chlorotoxin actually 0:18:04.040 --> 0:18:07.199 tends to bind or it's sort of like prefers to 0:18:07.280 --> 0:18:10.680 bind to glioma cells. And that's one type of it's 0:18:10.680 --> 0:18:14.520 a particular type of brain cancer cell. So you make 0:18:14.560 --> 0:18:17.399 the tumor paint by joining two ingredients, you've got a 0:18:17.480 --> 0:18:22.520 chlorotoxin based substance that does what it does. It binds 0:18:22.560 --> 0:18:24.960 to these tumor cells in the body. It seeks out 0:18:24.960 --> 0:18:28.760 the cancer cells and it penetrates them and then linked 0:18:28.760 --> 0:18:31.480 to that, you've got to die. That lights up when 0:18:31.680 --> 0:18:35.480 viewed under a special camera and lit up with a 0:18:35.520 --> 0:18:39.920 near infrared laser. So in the surgical context, what you 0:18:40.000 --> 0:18:41.840 do is you have someone with a brain tumor and 0:18:41.840 --> 0:18:44.320 you're about to go in for surgery, and you inject 0:18:44.400 --> 0:18:48.359 some tumor paint into the patient. It binds to the 0:18:48.400 --> 0:18:50.840 cancer cells in the brain tumor, and then the surgeon 0:18:50.920 --> 0:18:54.120 can shine that near infrared laser at the brain section 0:18:54.560 --> 0:18:57.480 to make a hidden tumor into a glow in the 0:18:57.560 --> 0:19:00.520 dark tumor, and it's easy to disting ship from the 0:19:00.520 --> 0:19:03.439 surrounding tissue, and viewed through that special camera that they 0:19:03.440 --> 0:19:06.399 have right next to the operating table, it glows this 0:19:06.640 --> 0:19:11.360 blue green. Therefore, it's easier for the surgeon to manage 0:19:11.400 --> 0:19:13.919 the margins with precision, you know, getting all of the 0:19:13.960 --> 0:19:17.560 cancer with without removing too much healthy tissue around the sides. 0:19:18.000 --> 0:19:22.359 According to s September press release from the Fred Hutchinson Center, 0:19:22.720 --> 0:19:25.600 version of tumor paint called b l Z one hundred 0:19:26.160 --> 0:19:29.720 was approved for clinical trials in the United States. And 0:19:29.800 --> 0:19:32.800 that's really exciting news, but it's also a reminder that 0:19:33.000 --> 0:19:35.440 you know, the safety and efficacy of this method is 0:19:35.480 --> 0:19:37.600 not fully proven yet and the treatment has a lot 0:19:37.640 --> 0:19:40.840 of testing left to undergo, so we don't know everything 0:19:40.880 --> 0:19:44.400 about it yet. But it's really interesting and exciting that 0:19:44.440 --> 0:19:46.960 this could be a big breakthrough and how to help 0:19:47.000 --> 0:19:50.400 people with brain tumors. But as great as it sounds, 0:19:51.040 --> 0:19:54.119 it might not be the only application of tumor paint. 0:19:54.359 --> 0:19:57.720 In addition to these brain cancer cells the glioma, it 0:19:57.800 --> 0:20:00.760 might be useful in pinpointing other can't your cells like 0:20:00.960 --> 0:20:06.840 lung cancer, breast cancer, prostate cancer, colorectal and sarcoma's. They've 0:20:06.880 --> 0:20:11.399 even talked about using it to pinpoint non pigmented skin 0:20:11.520 --> 0:20:14.920 cancer cells that are hard to see. Wow. Yeah, yeah, 0:20:14.920 --> 0:20:18.080 Oh that's terrific. None, none of the things that I 0:20:18.080 --> 0:20:22.000 have been researching for for this podcast are quite at 0:20:22.000 --> 0:20:24.760 the clinical trial stage yet. They're all still being done 0:20:25.280 --> 0:20:31.240 in in animal testing, but are nonetheless pretty exciting. Um 0:20:31.400 --> 0:20:35.880 there there's some indication that a particular type of spider 0:20:35.960 --> 0:20:44.000 venom could be the viagra of the future. Really now, see, okay, 0:20:44.040 --> 0:20:48.639 I have to reveal here. Oh this that sounds weird No, 0:20:48.840 --> 0:20:51.080 I was just going to say that, I am. I 0:20:51.119 --> 0:20:55.480 don't like spiders, okay, I mean, I really appreciate them 0:20:55.480 --> 0:20:58.000 as animals. Actually, I love looking like at pictures of 0:20:58.040 --> 0:21:02.000 spiders on the computer and stuff. I don't like it 0:21:02.040 --> 0:21:04.600 when they're in my house. They kind of freaked me out. 0:21:04.640 --> 0:21:07.320 I think that's that's completely understandable. There's a whole science 0:21:07.359 --> 0:21:11.080 behind why we find spiders super creepy. Um. They they 0:21:11.200 --> 0:21:14.080 set off all of these evolutionary things that are like, 0:21:14.320 --> 0:21:16.320 why is that thing moving that way? And why is 0:21:16.359 --> 0:21:19.720 it scuttling towards me? Um, scuttling. The scuttling has a 0:21:19.720 --> 0:21:22.840 lot to do with it. They do seem like, even 0:21:22.840 --> 0:21:26.480 though they're quite common on Earth, they seem like aliens. Yeah. No, 0:21:26.560 --> 0:21:29.600 I'm with you. They're super creepy. I think they're very beautiful. 0:21:29.640 --> 0:21:33.680 But um, okay. So one side effect of some arthur 0:21:33.720 --> 0:21:40.119 pod venoms is priapism, which is after the gods, right, 0:21:40.480 --> 0:21:43.160 is it is that? How that gets there? That's cool? 0:21:43.320 --> 0:21:48.000 I believe I believe he was a an amorous deity 0:21:48.040 --> 0:21:53.240 of Greek origin. Okay, yes, so, so priapism is a 0:21:53.600 --> 0:21:58.280 painfully extensive erection, all right, um of the penile tissue 0:21:58.880 --> 0:22:03.159 and uh specifically two or three Arthur pods, all of 0:22:03.200 --> 0:22:07.680 them from Brazil. We've got the extremely toxic Brazilian wandering 0:22:07.720 --> 0:22:11.240 spider and the Brazilian yellow scorpion um have been the 0:22:11.280 --> 0:22:14.800 two that I've seen most commonly researched for this. Um 0:22:14.840 --> 0:22:19.120 that they have venoms containing chemicals that can cause priapism 0:22:19.640 --> 0:22:23.600 in their victims. Now, obviously that's not a condition you 0:22:23.640 --> 0:22:27.439 want to seek out actually occurs, No, I would not. 0:22:27.560 --> 0:22:31.360 I mean they're also pretty deadly and that is awful. Yes, 0:22:31.720 --> 0:22:35.280 uh so, okay, it was a good while before anyone 0:22:35.280 --> 0:22:39.560 really tracked down what these chemicals are. But because erectile 0:22:39.600 --> 0:22:43.720 dysfunction is a shall we say, fertile business is a 0:22:43.840 --> 0:22:47.600 multibillion dollar industry, UM researchers have been working on it, 0:22:47.640 --> 0:22:50.080 and to be serious, it really is a very important 0:22:50.119 --> 0:22:53.040 quality of life issue, especially in men who have lost 0:22:53.080 --> 0:22:55.920 function as a side effect of, you know, receiving really 0:22:56.040 --> 0:23:00.280 important treatment for serious diseases like prostate cancer. UM So, 0:23:00.359 --> 0:23:04.320 it's it's not all goofy ha ha, penis times um 0:23:04.720 --> 0:23:07.720 so so around though, a group out of the Medical 0:23:07.760 --> 0:23:11.399 College of Georgia, which is here in Georgia. It's down 0:23:11.440 --> 0:23:15.159 in augusta UM started isolating a peptide called p n 0:23:15.240 --> 0:23:18.000 t X two dash six. Okay, so this is a 0:23:18.040 --> 0:23:23.439 specific peptide found in the venom of these Brazilian Yes, 0:23:23.840 --> 0:23:28.240 and I do not understand how this process works. UM. 0:23:28.400 --> 0:23:34.880 According to studies that these researchers released, the peptide effects 0:23:34.880 --> 0:23:39.800 excitable ion channels, mainly sodium channels. So I'm pretty sure 0:23:39.800 --> 0:23:44.399 it has to do with the chemical activation of electromuscular responses. UM. 0:23:44.480 --> 0:23:46.920 And furthermore, it happens to target or or I guess 0:23:46.960 --> 0:23:52.080 more precisely preferentially localize in penile tissues, sort of the 0:23:52.160 --> 0:23:56.040