{"doi":"10.1101/2020.10.29.361212","title":"Sodium channel toxin-resistance mutations do not govern batrachotoxin (BTX) autoresistance in poison birds and frogs","abstract":"Abstract Poisonous organisms carry small molecule toxins that alter voltage-gated sodium channel (Na✓) function. Among these, batrachotoxin (BTX) from Pitohui toxic birds and Phyllobates poison frogs, stands out because of its lethality and unusual effects on Na v function. How these toxin-bearing organisms avoid autointoxication remains poorly understood. In poison frogs, a Na v DIVS6 pore-forming helix N→T mutation has been proposed as the BTX resistance mechanism. Here, we show that this variant is absent from Pitohui and poison frog Na v s, incurs a strong cost that compromises channel function, and fails to produce BTX-resistant channels when tested in the context of poison frog Na v s. We further show that captive-raised poison frogs are BTX resistant, even though they bear BTX-sensitive Na v s. Hence, our data refute the hypothesis that BTX autoresistance is rooted in Na v mutations and instead suggest that more generalizable mechanisms such as toxin sequestration act to protect BTX-bearing species from autointoxication.","journal":"bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory)","year":2020,"id":131520,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":0,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9586,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2020-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":585561,"name":"Nathan D. Rossen","orcid":"0000-0002-1103-0833","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":585562,"name":"Megan E. Kobiela","orcid":"0000-0002-0710-1643","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":585563,"name":"Robert A. Craig","orcid":"0000-0002-2435-1564","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":586303,"name":"Catherine E. Garrison","orcid":null,"position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":405015,"name":"Lauren A. O’Connell","orcid":"0000-0002-2706-4077","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":336181,"name":"J. Du Bois","orcid":"0000-0001-7847-1548","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":226106,"name":"John P. Dumbacher","orcid":"0000-0001-8942-1554","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":283123,"name":"Daniel L. Minor","orcid":"0000-0002-5998-4214","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":283879,"name":"Fayal Abderemane-Ali","orcid":null,"position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":78,"raw_metadata":{"citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:16:03.875886Z","pmid":null,"pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}