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Snake Anti-Venom From Chicken Eggs
Makarand writes "Scientists have found a way to collect snake anti-venom from chicken eggs
according to this
article in The Times Of India.
In this newly developed technique 12 week old birds injected with sub-lethal doses of venom followed by
a booster dose after 2-3 weeks started to lay eggs with anti-venom antibodies
concentrated in the yolk.
Anti-venom produced in horses sometimes has other proteins that can cause
allergic reactions, kidney failure and serum sickness in some people. Anti-venom
from chicken is expected to have no such side-effects.
This newly developed process is also an improvement
in the quantity of anti-venom produced -
antibodies produced by 1 litre of horse blood could be
obtained from just 50 chicken eggs."
If you're allergic to eggs, you can't take a flu shot. Same will apply to this, I'd expect, unless in the process a) they can isolate the actual allergen or b) the use of this causes unexpected side-effects rendering the product non-allergenic to those who are otherwise allergic to chicken eggs.
This sig no verb.
Okay, I'll risk a little bit of Karma on being a vocabluary pedant.
The word is antivenin. Think anti ven(o) (tox)in.
In a related story, the IRS has recently ruled that the cost of Windows upgrades can NOT be deducted as a gambling loss.
The word they are looking for is "antivenin," not "anti-venom." Sounds almost the same, but "anti-venom" isn't really a word. Antivenin is.
;)
My dad is a herpetologist, and antivenin is an important word to know.
No, and no with a but.
First the "no":
No, because, as you point out, it wouldn't get into your system. Anti-venom is in the form of antibodies, and these are nice big proteins. Intact protiens cannot pass through the epithelium lining your digestive tract, so the digestive system does a very thorough job of chopping up proteins up prior to absorption into the body.
Yes, some tiny amount of the protein may find its way into the bloodstream through a cut or hole in a membrane somewhere... But it doesn't matter, because exposure to anti-venom antibodies does not confer immunity. Anti-venom works when antibodies in the anti-venom bind to the toxic components in venom, thereby rendering the components inactive and targeting them for destruction by the immune system.
Which brings us to the "no with a but":
No, exposure to the antibodies won't help you to build up an immunity. But, if those eggs happen to have an amount of the original venom in them, things might be different. If the toxic components of the venom are small molecules (which are more likely to pass through the epithelial lining intact) rather than enzymes (I honestly don't remember what the active ingredients in snake hemo- and neurotoxins are), or even if enough venom enzyme make its way into the body, then the immune system would be exposed to the venom in non-lethal doses. Then the egg would serve as an innoculation, the individual's own immune system would have an opportunity to produce his or her own anti-venom antibodies, and immunity to the venom in question could be built up.
But those are big "if"s
The angel in the oatmeal.
Such antibody proteins are decomposed by the digestive tract before being absorbed into the bloodstream - just like snake venom. It's quite harmless to ingest snake venom as long as you don't have any openings in your GI tract, like a bleeding ulcer. Eating the eggs would have no particular effect, any more than the immunization state of any of the animal products you eat affects you.
For this same reason, you can't develop an immunity by swallowing venom - your digestive system neutralizes it before any significant amount of it enters your body. (You can still develop an allergic reastion to that insignificant amount, which is a Bad Thing.)
If you want to immunize yourself, you need to do like they do with the horses - inject yourself with increasing doses of venom. See the book Dancing With Demons for practical advice.