Mamba

Abstract: The third most abundant component of black mamba venom, named FS2, was sequenced with the aid of sequenator studies and peptides derived by tryptic and chymotryptic digestion. Cyanogen bromide digests provided extra information to support the proposed structure. This protein is a homologue of the short neurotoxins of snake venom, but is much less toxic. Its structure is quite different from both neurotoxins and the other mamba proteins, called angusticeps types (neurotoxin homologues). Comparison of the known angusticeps-type toxins from mamba venom with mamba neurotoxins and each other leads to proposals that these proteins of low toxicity are inventions of the group of mambas and that three different, as yet unknown, functions will be associated with the three subgroups that are discernable.

Abstract: The Mt Bruce Supergroup of the Pilbara Craton of Western Australia was laid down in the Hamersley Basin, unconformably over a basement of granite‐greenstone terrane, and consists of the Fortescue, Hamersley and Turee Creek Groups. The base of the ∼230 m‐thick Marra Mamba Iron Formation, the lowest formation of the Hamersley Group, marks the onset of the major banded iron‐formation deposition that characterises the group. Ion microprobe U‐Pb isotope analyses of zircons from a tuff band (NS3) within a high‐grade iron orebody in the uppermost (Mt Newman) member show two distinct, and non‐overlapping, age populations. Fifteen grains from the younger group of 16 have a pooled age of 2597±5Ma (95% confidence), interpreted as the age of syndepositional volcanism; individual grains of the older group of 8, with ages between ca 2950 Ma and ca 2820 Ma, are interpreted as xenocrysts derived from basement rocks transected by the rising magma. The conformably overlying Wittenoom Formation, ∼300–600 m thick, consists l...

Abstract: The bioaccumulation of chromium, copper, iron and manganese by Oreochromis mossambicus was investigated at two localities (Mamba and Balule) in the lower Olifants River, inside the boundaries of the Kruger National Park. The Cr, Cu, Fe and Mn concentrations, recorded in the tissues of O. mossambicus at Mamba and Balule, did not differ much from each other. However, it was generally found that the highest accumulation of metals by the fish occurred at Mamba, except for iron, where the opposite occurred. The metals investigated during this study mainly accumulated in the liver and gills, followed by the skin, and lastly the muscle.