[Characterization of spider venom by mass spectrometry, construction of analytical system]

Spiders belonging to the genera, Nephila, Nephilengys, Araneus, etc., possess various polyamine toxins in their venom glands which paralyze insects by blocking the nerve-muscle signal transduction of glutaminergic synapses. More than 50 kinds of polyamine toxin analogs have been characterized which consist, in general, of the aromatic or heteroaromatic moiety connected with the combination of various types of polyamine chains. We are developing a new analytical system by means of a modern mass spectrometric technique which satisfies more rapid, highly sensitive and simple clean-up procedure without complicated chromatographic treatment. The trial of such approach has been performed by employing crude spider venom as the model material. This review article concerns with such proceeding of mass spectrometric analysis by microcolumn HPLC hyphenated FAB-MS system, continuous flow FAB-MS/MS system with high energy collision charge-remote fragmentation, solid and liquid matrix assisted laser desorption ionization (MALDI- and liquid MALDI-) technique connected with tandem mass spectrometer performing in the institute and in addition, femto-molar characterization of new spider venom spider polyamine toxins as a result of the application of such new techniques is addressed.