Thrombin-like effect of an important green pit viper toxin, albolabrin: a bioinformatic study

Abstract

The green pit viper venom has a major effect on the hematological system. Clinical features of venomous snakebites vary from asymptomatic to fatal bleeding. The venom is found to have a thrombin-like effect in vitro. Here, the author performs a bioinformatic analysis on the green pit viper venom focusing on its thrombin-like effect. Sequence comparison between green pit viper venom, albolabrin and thrombin was performed. In addition, the author performed a search for other human proteins closely relating to the thrombin and created a multiple sequence alignment phylogenetic tree to present the family tree of the thrombin, albolabrin and those proteins recorded in the genomic database. In conclusion, the comparative sequence analysis between green pit viper venom and thrombin gives several identities. The reported relationship on the phylogenetic tree can match with the reported in vivo function of green pit viper. Explanations on the effect of green pit viper toxin on the hemostasis can be derived from this study. Furthermore, future researches based on the reported identities can be expected.