Publication Date:
1992-10-30
Description:
Three passerine species in the genus Pitohui, endemic to the New Guinea subregion, contain the steroidal alkaloid homobatrachotoxin, apparently as a chemical defense. Toxin concentrations varied among species but were always highest in the skin and feathers. Homobatrachotoxin is a member of a class of compounds collectively called batrachotoxins that were previously considered to be restricted to neotropical poison-dart frogs of the genus Phyllobates. The occurrence of homobatrachotoxin in pitohuis suggests that birds and frogs independently evolved this class of alkaloids.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Dumbacher, J P -- Beehler, B M -- Spande, T F -- Garraffo, H M -- Daly, J W -- New York, N.Y. -- Science. 1992 Oct 30;258(5083):799-801.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Chicago, IL 60637.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1439786" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Keywords:
Animals
;
Anura
;
Batrachotoxins/*analysis
;
Biological Assay
;
Biological Evolution
;
*Birds
;
Chromatography, Thin Layer
;
Feathers/*chemistry
;
Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry
;
Mass Spectrometry
;
Mice
;
Muscles/*chemistry
;
Skin/*chemistry
Print ISSN:
0036-8075
Electronic ISSN:
1095-9203
Topics:
Biology
,
Chemistry and Pharmacology
,
Computer Science
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
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