Differential Hematotoxic Activity of Southeast Asian Pit Viper Venoms: The Cross-Neutralizing Effect of Available Antivenoms

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  Image Credit: Creative Commons (some rights reserved) CC BY-NC Photo 111998430, (c) Nicholas Hess Differential Hematotoxic Activity of Southeast Asian Pit Viper Venoms: The Cross-Neutralizing Effect of Available Antivenoms Abstract Background/Objectives : Pit vipers (subfamily Crotalinae) are responsible for a large proportion of snakebite envenoming cases in Southeast Asia. Envenomation by these snakes commonly causes hematotoxic effects, including platelet dysfunction and coagulation disturbances. Although antivenom remains the mainstay of treatment, species-specific antivenoms are not available for several regional pit viper species. This study evaluated the hematotoxic activities of selected Southeast Asian pit viper venoms and the cross-neutralizing capacity of commercially available antivenoms.  Methods : Venoms from five medically important pit viper species— Calloselasma rhodostoma ,  Trimeresurus albolabris ,  T. hageni ,  T. purpureomaculatus , ...

Sex-specific but not urbanisation-related behavioural differences in a wolf spider, Pardosa alacris

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http://wiki.spinnen-forum.de/index.php?title=Pardosa_alacris

Sex-specific but not urbanisation-related behavioural differences in a wolf spider, Pardosa alacris

Abstract

Urbanisation, one of the main driving forces of the decline in arthropod diversity, is a global environmental problem. Urbanisation causes changes to the size, connectivity, structure, and environmental parameters of their natural habitat. Due to a host of novel conditions and situations, high exploratory and risk-taking behaviours are beneficial traits to cope with urban environments. Therefore, we hypothesised that urban spiders should display more exploratory and risk-taking behaviour than their rural conspecifics. We tested 253 individuals of a widespread, forest-associated ground-dwelling wolf spider species, Pardosa alacris, sampled from rural and urban forest sites during their peak activity period, for their locomotory activity, exploratory and risk-taking behaviour by six frequently used behavioural measures. Combining the studied behavioural measures into composite scores using redundancy analysis, we identified two composite variables, the activity-exploration-boldness and the risk-taking behavioural ones. Behaviour measured by the composite activity-exploration-boldness score was significantly repeatable, but not the composite risk-taking behavioural one. There were no urbanisation-related differences in the composite behavioural scores, suggesting that higher exploratory or risk-taking behaviour may not yield fitness benefits in this generalist predator. We found, however, significant sex-specific differences in the composite activity-exploration-boldness behavioural scores. The higher activity, exploratory and boldness in males than females may be explained by their different life-history strategies and sex-specific selective pressures.

Magura, T., Horváth, R., Mizser, S., Tóth, M., Kozma, F. S., & Lövei, G. L. (2026). Sex-specific but not urbanisation-related behavioural differences in a wolf spider, Pardosa alacris. Scientific Reports. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-41239-2