VENOM-BASED TAXONOMY OF Scolopendromorpha (CENTIPEDE, ARTHROPODA)

RATES B. (1, 2), BARBOSA  B. (3), MELO R. C. (4), BARBARO K. (5), KNYSAK I. (6),  SILVA L. P. (7), BLOCH JR. C. (7), MORALES R. A. V. (8), BIONDI I. (9), DE LIMA M. E. (1, 2), PIMENTA A. M. C. (1, 2).

(1) Lab. de Venenos e Toxinas Animais, (2) Núcleo de Estudo de Estrutura e Função de Biomoléculas, (3) Lab. de Biodados, Biologia Celular e Desenvolvimento, (4) Lab. de Enzimologia e Fisico-Química de Proteínas, Dept. de Bioquímica e Imunologia, ICB, UFMG, Belo Horizonte, MG, Brasil. (5) Lab. de Imunopatologia, (6) Lab. de Artrópodes, Instituto Butantan, São Paulo, SP, Brasil. (7) Lab. de Espectrometria de Massa, EMBRAPA-CENARGEN, Brasília, DF, Brasil. (8) Institute for Molecular Biosciences - The University of Queensland - Brisbane, Australia. (9) Lab. de Animais Peçonhentos e Herpetologia, Departamento de Ciências Biológicas, UEFS, Feira de Santana, BA, Brasil.

Scolopendromorphs are wide-spread venomous arthropods which are responsible for a significant number of non-lethal human envenomations. Despite this, there are few specialists dedicated to the taxonomy of this group. Venom-based biochemical taxonomy has been applied to a number of animal groups. In this study, we have established a venom-based taxonomical methodology, applicable to the Scolopendromorph order. The venoms of Scolopendra viridicornis nigra, S. viridicornis, S. sp., S. angulata, Dinocryptops miersii, Cryptops inheringi and Otostigmus pradoii were fractionated by RPC-HPLC, and each fraction was analyzed by ESI-Q-TOF. Some fractions were also analyzed by MALDI-TOF-TOF. The data were translated into a table which contained the %ACN necessary for elution and the MW of each peptide. We have tested the feasibility of two bioinformatic approaches to extract taxonomical information from the LC/MS data: dissimilarity searching through image-analysis and machine learning-based data clustering (MLBDC) analysis. The species could be precisely grouped by the MLBDC pipeline. Therefore, this approach may complement the morphology-based taxonomy of the scolopendromorphs.

KEY WORDS: venom-based taxonomy, scolopendromorpha, LC/MS.

FINANCIAL SUPPORT: FAPEMIG, CNPq, CAPES, FAPESP.

CORRESPONDENCE TO: Adriano Pimenta. LVTA, Bloco O4, Sala 125. ICB/UFMG, Av. Antônio Carlos, 6627, 31270-901, Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brasil. Tel: + 55 031 3499-2638. Email: apimenta@icb.ufmg.br.