Scorpions could hold a key to development of new antibiotics, ECSU researchers discover
Scorpions have long been perceived as creepy anchariids that hide in places like bedding, ready to deliver an excruciating and venomous sting.
But new research at Eastern Connecticut State University that shows an antibiotic property in their stingers could help turn that image around.
New research at ESCU has discovered that novel bacteria exist in the stingers of scorpions, along with a “diverse microbiome,” that could aid in the development of new antibiotic medicines, according to ECSU.
There is potential in that to help alleviate the global issue of antibiotic resistance, the university’s statement says.
In other words, that characteristic, scary-looking stinger may contain a lot of good.
“The research shows that scorpions contain vast types of bacteria in their venom-producing organ, the telson,” biology Professor Barbara Murdoch says in the ECSU statement. ”This contradicts central dogma, since the telson has been previously thought to be a sterile environment, devoid of bacteria.”
The research is published on Jan. 17 in the peer-reviewed scientific journal PLOS One, and is titled “A first molecular characterization of the scorpion telson microbiota of Hadrurus arizonensis and Smeringurus mesaensis.”
Murdoch conducted the research along with Professor Matthew Graham and former biology students Christopher Shimwell and Lauren Atkinson.
“Scorpions represent an ancient lineage of arachnids that have permeated throughout the world and are incredibly resilient,” the ECSU statement says. “Given the harsh environments that many scorpions live in, scientists have speculated about the organism’s microbiome in its evolutionary success.”
Graham said they were curious to see if the stingers of scorpions, ‘an incredibly old group’ with origins more than 440 million years ago, “possessed unique bacteria adapted to these ancient venomous environments.”
The researchers isolated telson DNA from two scorpion species from the American Southwest-the giant sand scorpion and the desert hairy scorpion, and identified the collection of bacteria present.
The results confirmed that the telsons contain bacteria and that each of the two scorpion species possessed unique combinations of bacteria, and that some of the bacteria represent new lineages, according to ECSU
“We hypothesize that some of these bacteria may contribute to the immune function of the scorpion or the venom’s toxicity,” Graham said in the statement.
He said it may change the way the biology of scorpions is viewed.
The study’s greater implications, according to the university, concerns the global health crisis of antibiotic resistance, in which drugs meant to treat bacterial infections are becoming increasingly ineffective at killing bacteria, the statement says.
“Combatting antibiotic resistance is one of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations,” the statement says.
Funding for the research came from a grant by the NASA Connecticut Space Grant Consortium in December 2017 and the project was completed in 2022, the statement from ECSU says.
