Abstract
Victims of massive bee attacks become extremely ill, presenting symptoms ranging from dizziness and headache to acute renal failure and multiple organ failure that can lead to death. Previous attempts to develop specific antivenom to treat these victims have been unsuccessful. We herein report a F(ab)(´)(2)-based antivenom raised in horse as a potential new treatment for victims of multiple bee stings. The final product contains high specific IgG titers and is effective in neutralizing toxic effects, such as hemolysis, cytotoxicity and myotoxicity. The assessment of neutralization was revised and hemolysis, the primary toxic effect of these stings, was fully neutralized in vivo for the first time.
Publication types
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Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
MeSH terms
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Animals
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Antibodies, Neutralizing / immunology
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Antivenins / immunology*
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Antivenins / toxicity
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Bee Venoms / immunology*
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Bees / immunology*
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Dose-Response Relationship, Immunologic
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Hemolysis / immunology
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Horses
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Immunization
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Immunoglobulin Fab Fragments / immunology
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Immunoglobulin Fab Fragments / isolation & purification
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Immunoglobulin G / immunology
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Male
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Mice
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Neutralization Tests
Substances
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Antibodies, Neutralizing
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Antivenins
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Bee Venoms
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Immunoglobulin Fab Fragments
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Immunoglobulin G
Grants and funding
This work was supported by grants from FAPESP/BIOprospecTA (2011/51684-1), CNPq (INCT-iii) and FINEP (CT-BIOTEC- Anticorpos – MCT-FINEP 01/2003). JEK, OM and MSP were awarded a research grant from the National Research Council of Brazil–CNPq. KSS was awarded PhD fellowship from Butantan Institute, and VMRF has a PhD student fellowship from CAPES. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript