Abstract
I HAVE already recorded in a series of memoirs published since 1892 in the Annales de I' Institut Pasteur and in the Comptes rendus de l' Académie des Sciences, the results of my researches on the venom of snakes, on the immunisation of animals against this venom, and upon the production of an anti-venomous serum. Prof. Fraser has confirmed the facts that I have published, and has successfully repeated almost all my experiments. I bring before you, to-day, a series of new facts relative to the same question. I may say at the outset, in contradiction of the opinion recently expressed by certain physiologists, that it is fully proved that the venoms of the various species of snakes produce physiological phenomena which have certain features common to all, and that the actions of these venoms only differ as regards their local effects. It is now possible to separate, artificially, the substances which produce the local phenomena from those which produce the bulbar intoxication. This separation may be effected by means of heat. If any sample of venom be thrown into watery solution and heated at 85° C. for a period of fifteen minutes, the albumin contained in the solution is coagulated and the phlogogenic substances are destroyed, whilst the toxicity of the substance is entirely unaffected. MM. Phisalix and Bertrand have already demonstrated this fact in the case of the venom of the viper found in France. After heating at 85°C. and filtration., all venoms, both viperine and colubrine, produce the same effects; they only differ as to the degree of their toxic activities. Similarly all are destroyed by the hypochlorites of the alkalis and by chloride of gold, the use of which substances I have suggested—particularly the hypochlorite of lime in a solution of 1 in 60—for the local treatment of snake bites, to prevent the absorption of the venom.
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Snake Venom and Anti-Venomous Serum1. Nature 54, 380–382 (1896). https://doi.org/10.1038/054380a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/054380a0