A comparison of polypeptide compositions of individual Agelena orientalis spider venoms

Spider venoms are peculiar combinatory libraries of polypeptide molecules that specifically affect various cell targets. However, the question has remained up to now regarding whether the observed diversity of the polypeptides results from the synthesis of the complete library of these molecules by each individual spider or is due to the peculiarity of each zooid producing a limited set of components. We studied the composition of the mixed venom taken from several dozens of zooids of the Central Asian species of the Agelena orientalis and compared it with the venoms of 20 individual spiders of this species. The venoms were qualitatively and quantitatively analyzed by HPLC, mass spectrometry, and amino acid sequencing. It was shown that the individual venoms contain a lesser number of polypeptide components in comparison with the mixed venom and, in addition, differ from each other by the component composition. The set of components produced by single zooids is relatively narrow, and on the whole is a set identical to that of the mixed venom. The polypeptides with a high content in the venom were structurally characterized and compared with the amino acid sequences deduced from the cDNA library of this species.