Inter-individual variability in equine antibody responses to African snake venoms follows heavy-tailed distributions with implications for antivenom production

  Inter-individual variability in equine antibody responses to African snake venoms follows heavy-tailed distributions with implications for antivenom production Abstract Variability in the antibody response of horses used for snake antivenom manufacture is well recognized, yet its statistical structure and implications for industrial productivity remain poorly characterized. In this study, we quantified antivenom antibody titers by ELISA in a cohort of 14 horses immunized with venoms from the clinically most important snakes in sub-Saharan Africa. To integrate antibody levels with plasma availability, we calculated the Cumulative Plasma Productivity (CPP) by converting individual plasma volumes into titer-corrected equivalents and sequentially pooling these volumes according to their corrected contribution. Distributional analysis revealed right-skewed, heavy-tailed patterns better approximated by a log-normal model than by a strict Pareto (power-law) form, with approximately 20–3...

A new species of Acanthoscurria Ausserer, 1871: proposal of the theraphosoides species-group and first published record of the genus from Colombia (Araneae: Theraphosidae)

 


A new species of Acanthoscurria Ausserer, 1871: proposal of the theraphosoides species-group and first published record of the genus from Colombia (Araneae: Theraphosidae)

Abstract
A remarkable new species of Acanthoscurria Ausserer, 1871, is described from Colombia, Acanthoscurria armasi sp. nov., representing the first published record of the genus from this country. New insights into palpal bulb morphology and biogeography of the newly-proposed theraphosoides species-group are provided. 

Sherwood, Danniella & Gabriel, Ray & Peñaherrera-R, Pedro & García, Giraldo. (2025). A new species of Acanthoscurria Ausserer, 1871: proposal of the theraphosoides species-group and first published record of the genus from Colombia (Araneae: Theraphosidae). Zootaxa. 5563. 237-254. 10.11646/zootaxa.5563.1.16.