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RAJSHAHI, Mar 12: A teacher at Rajshahi University (RU) has created the country's first and only 'snake database' including snakes' venom and their toxicity.
Prof Dr Abu Reza of Genetic Engineering Department included domestic and international names of snakes, food habits, types, nature in the database.
The professor said that in the database various species of poisonous snakes found in Bangladesh have been described in detail.
Professor Reza started working on creating the database in 2013-14. The name of the database was established as www.snakebd.com.
The website narrates about 89 species snakes including Kalnagini, Gokhra, Black-Yellow Band Sticks, Sankhini, Dhaman and Panther snakes.
The professor has been conducting research on snake venom for the last nine years.
About the purpose of creating such a database, Dr Abu Reza said, "We usually go to the National Centre for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) to look for various aspects of snake protein. It is difficult to find specific venom from it."
"If you want to find cardio toxin at our database, it will be very easy. Here, we have demonstrated a structure by analysing proteins of venom of about 300 snakes", the professor further said.
He also said such a database would helpful for the researchers.
"Not only Bangladesh, it is the first such database in the world", he claimed.