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For some people, this room might be | |
the scariest place on Earth. | |
Behind these black curtains are deadly spiders. | |
Hundreds of them. | |
And what we're gonna do is poke them, make them angry, | |
and then suction the venom that appears | |
at the end of their really long fangs. | |
This is about as close as I ever want to get to a funnel. | |
And we're doing it for a very good reason. | |
This is a funnel web spider. | |
They live around Sydney, | |
which just happens to be one of Australia's biggest cities. | |
And they build underground burrows, | |
which are distinctive because of the funnel shape | |
of the web at the entrance, hence the name funnel web. | |
But because they feel safe in dark, cool places, | |
they can end up having unexpected run-ins with people. | |
What happens is during the breeding season, | |
the male funnel web will leave his burrow | |
and he moves around only at night | |
looking for the females. | |
But sometimes he gets a bit adventurous | |
and he might leave his burrow, go too far from it. | |
And so in the morning, once the sun starts to come up, | |
he's too far from his burrow to go back to it. | |
So he kind of has a little freak out | |
and has to find somewhere temporary | |
to hide out during the day. | |
And so what he'll do is he'll head into a nice, dark, | |
safe spot like a pile of clothing | |
or a pair of shoes on the ground. | |
You'll often see Australians bang their shoes together | |
before putting them on just in case. | |
If you are unlucky enough to get bitten, | |
it'll be painful because their fangs | |
can be up to one centimeter long. | |
That's longer than many snake fangs. | |
And the venom delivered is fast acting and deadly. | |
We only milk the males | |
because they are six times more toxic. | |
So the male's venom actually produces | |
a higher quality antivenom. | |
So the fastest time that we've seen an adult die | |
from a male funnel web spider was about 76 minutes. | |
So just over an hour. | |
So it's a very fast acting, rapid venom. | |
Ideally, you wanna stay calm, still | |
and apply a pressure immobilization bandage | |
and then get to the hospital as soon as possible. | |
The venom contains a mixture of proteins, | |
notably the Delta hexatoxin. | |
As it travels through your bloodstream, | |
you'll begin to sweat, twitch, salivate and get goosebumps. | |
This is because the venom acts on nerve cells, neurons. | |
Under normal conditions, | |
neurotransmitters trigger neurons to open ion gates | |
and positively charged sodium ions flood in. | |
The dramatic swing from negative to positive | |
triggers the release of neurotransmitters to the next neuron. | |
And then the ion gates close | |
and the cell returns to its resting state. | |
But funnel web venom stops the ion channels from closing. | |
So the neuron unleashes a flood of neurotransmitters | |
like adrenaline throughout the nervous system. | |
So muscles normally under precise control | |
receive rapid chaotic signals, | |
causing them to tense up or spasm, | |
which is a big problem for the heart, | |
which begins to pump faster, raising blood pressure | |
and spreading the venom further around the body. | |
And eventually your body runs out of neurotransmitters. | |
Without them, nerve cells can no longer tell muscles | |
what to do, so you're effectively paralyzed. | |
And it's only a matter of time before your heart | |
or your lungs give out. | |
Humans are particularly unlucky. | |
Funnel web venom is not that deadly to most mammals. | |
If something like your dog or your cat or a rabbit | |
gets bitten by a male funnel web spider even, | |
even the male, they'll show very few symptoms. | |
And then you could also be bitten by the exact same spider | |
and be in a very severe way. | |
And that's because the effects of venom | |
are very species specific. | |
Delta hexatoxin binds to a specific site | |
of the sodium ion channels in primates, which causes chaos. | |
But that same spot isn't there in other mammals. | |
The lethality of this venom in humans | |
seems to be an accident. | |
It only affects invertebrates, which are their prey, | |
and also primates. | |
So it's really toxic to monkeys and apes. | |
And of course we are extremely badly affected by that. | |
The first people arrived on the continent | |
around 70,000 years ago. | |
But this spider evolved 40 million years ago. | |
And it just happens to be extremely deadly to people. | |
So it seems like an unfortunate coincidence | |
that venom originally evolved for effectiveness | |
against insects turns out to be deadly for us. |
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