Sciencemadness Discussion Board

LD50 for biotoxins

Quince - 20-10-2005 at 21:14

Looking at the table at the bottom of
http://www.ouhsc.edu/ibc/forms/combform.pdf
There are a number of things I don't understand that I'm hoping you guys can clear up.
1) What's the difference between "abrin" and "abrin reconstituted"?
2) Other references give very different numbers for abrin, several times lower than ricin, at about 500 ng/kg; what gives?
2) Why is "botulinum (natural product)" listed with a much lower LD50 than its constituents below? How is this possible? Or is something missing?
3) The number given for Ricin D is surely a typo; shouldn't it be 248 ng/kg instead of 0.248 ng/kg?
By the way, there are three notable omissions: tetanus toxin (2.5 ng/kg), diphtheria toxin (100 ng/kg), maitotoxin (100 ng/kg), and palytoxin (150 ng/kg).

[Edited on 21-10-2005 by Quince]

FPMAGEL - 21-10-2005 at 01:33

Number of rats killed per Ml. One Ml of say Bad chemical will kill so many rats. High the number the worst it is.

You will see fiqures like 200, OGPOSATE shit the 0.2 might be a 80% chance the rat will live.

[Edited on 21-10-2005 by FPMAGEL]

Quince - 21-10-2005 at 18:08

Er, no, the number means the amount of the poison that will kill with probability 50%.

FPMAGEL - 21-10-2005 at 19:49

LD50 1230mg ,good
LD50 200mg , bad

Quince - 21-10-2005 at 20:00

Well, depends on your definition of good and bad. A lower means it's more potent, since it takes less of it to kill.

In any case, I still didn't get any of my questions from the first post answered.