Bioactivity profiling of spider venoms reveals predominant hyaluronidase activities

Josephine Dresler; Volker Herzig; Lennart Schulte; Tim Lüddecke

doi:10.1016/j.toxicon.2025.108667

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Bioactivity profiling of spider venoms reveals predominant hyaluronidase activities

Journal article

Open access

Peer reviewed

Bioactivity profiling of spider venoms reveals predominant hyaluronidase activities

Josephine Dresler, Volker Herzig, Lennart Schulte and Tim Lüddecke

Toxicon, Vol.269, pp.1-5

2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.toxicon.2025.108667

PMID: 41274584

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Abstract

Arachnids

Venomics

Biocatalysis

Tarantulas

Toxinology

Hydrolases

Evolutionary Ecology

Spider venoms are primarily composed of small neurotoxic peptides. However, recent studies suggested a hitherto overlooked diversity of spider venom enzymes, although their functional space still remains largely unexplored. We tested 10 spider venoms for enzymatic activities covering six enzyme classes and found that all tested enzymatic activities can be detected in at least some of the venoms and that hyaluronidases exhibit particularly high enzymatic activities. With this, our study provides functional evidence for the proposed biological significance of enzymes in spider venoms, but more detailed investigations are required.

Details

Title: Bioactivity profiling of spider venoms reveals predominant hyaluronidase activities
Authors: Josephine Dresler - Fraunhofer Institute for Molecular Biology and Applied Ecology
Volker Herzig - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Centre for Bioinnovation
Lennart Schulte - LOEWE Centre for Translational Biodiversity Genomics
Tim Lüddecke (Corresponding Author) - Fraunhofer Institute for Molecular Biology and Applied Ecology
Publication details: Toxicon, Vol.269, pp.1-5
Publisher: Elsevier Ltd
Date published: 2026
DOI: 10.1016/j.toxicon.2025.108667
ISSN: 1879-3150; 0041-0101
PMID: 41274584
Data Availability: All data available as a supplement.
Grant note: The authors thank the German Arachnological Society (Deutsche Arachnologische Gesellschaft, DeArGe e.V.) for supporting this study via their young investigators grant awarded to J.D. We also thank the members of the DeArGe e.V. for providing access to the spiders to enable venom collections. T.L. and L.S were funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation, ref. 505696476).
Organisation Unit: School of Science, Technology and Engineering; Centre for Bioinnovation
Language: English
Record Identifier: 991184286902621
Output Type: Journal article

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