Abstract
Research on venomous animals has mainly focused on the molecular, biochemical, and pharmacological aspects of venom toxins. However, it is the relatively neglected broader study of evolutionary ecology that is crucial for understanding the biological relevance of venom systems. As fish have convergently evolved venom systems multiple times, it makes them ideal organisms to investigate the evolutionary ecology of venom on a broader scale. This review outlines what is known about how fish venom systems evolved as a result of natural enemy interactions and about the ecological consequences of evolving a venom system. This review will show how research on the evolutionary ecology of venom in fish can aid in understanding the evolutionary ecology of animal venoms more generally. Further, understanding these broad ecological questions can shed more light on the other areas of toxinology, with applications across multiple disciplinary fields.
Highlights
Animal venoms have been the subject of much research, in reptiles, arachnids, insects, and cone snails [1,2,3,4,5,6]
The focus of this review is to summarize what is known about the evolution of fish venoms considered from an ecological perspective and, where possible, to place it in the context of the evolutionary ecology of other venomous/toxic taxa
Research regarding the evolutionary ecology of venom systems is scarce, not just in fish but across animals in general
Summary
Animal venoms have been the subject of much research, in reptiles, arachnids, insects, and cone snails [1,2,3,4,5,6]. The biological activity of venom components and their characterisation have been at the forefront of toxinology for many years. This has led to some ground-breaking biochemical, genetic, evolutionary, and pharmacological discoveries [7,8,9,10]. The evolutionary aspects of venom, their evolutionary ecology, remain poorly studied. Venomous fish have been relatively poorly studied, both with respect to the composition and evolution of their venoms [11,12,13]. The focus of this review is to summarize what is known about the evolution of fish venoms considered from an ecological perspective and, where possible, to place it in the context of the evolutionary ecology of other venomous/toxic taxa
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