This week, we’re coming at you with a classic TPWKY episode on one of the most notorious poisons out there: strychnine. Although strychnine might not flash across too many headlines these days, it was once imported by the ton in certain regions of the world. What did people want with so much strychnine? Depends on who you ask. Maybe it was for a revitalizing tonic, maybe a rat poison, or maybe it was to murder the founder of a famous university. Tune in to learn how this deadly poison acts on the body and keep listening for a very special musical treat.
| History | Biology |
| Buckingham, John. Bitter nemesis: the intimate history of strychnine. CRC press, 2007. | Patocka, J., 2020. Chapter 16: Strychnine. In Handbook of toxicology of chemical warfare agents (pp. 239-247). Academic Press. |
| White, Richard. Who Killed Jane Stanford?: A Gilded Age Tale of Murder, Deceit, Spirits and the Birth of a University. WW Norton & Company, 2022. | Palatnick, W., Meatherall, R., Sitar, D. and Tenenbein, M., 1997. Toxicokinetics of acute strychnine poisoning. Journal of Toxicology: Clinical Toxicology, 35(6), pp.617-620. |
| Simon, Jonathan. “Naming and toxicity: a history of strychnine.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 30.4 (1999): 505-525. | Smith, B.A., 1990. Strychnine poisoning. The Journal of emergency medicine, 8(3), pp.321-325. |
| Christie, Agatha. The Mysterious Affair at Styles. 1920. | Hardin, J., Galust, H., Bensel, A., Bierly, S., Seltzer, J., Friedman, N., Clark, R.F. and Campbell, C., 2023. Taking the bait: Strychnine poisoning. The American Journal of Emergency Medicine, 74, pp.197-e5. |
| Hong, B., Grzech, D., Caputi, L., Sonawane, P., López, C.E.R., Kamileen, M.O., Hernández Lozada, N.J., Grabe, V. and O’Connor, S.E., 2022. Biosynthesis of strychnine. Nature, 607(7919), pp.617-622. | |
| Paradis, C., Dondia, D., Nardon, A., Blanc-Brisset, I., Courtois, A., Vaucel, J.A., French PCC research group and Labadie, M., 2022. Strychnine, old still actual poison: description of poisoning cases reported to French Poison Control Centers over the past thirteen years. Toxin Reviews, 41(4), pp.1172-1178. | |
| Prat, S., Hoizey, G., Lefrancq, T. and Saint‐Martin, P., 2015. An unusual case of strychnine poisoning. Journal of forensic sciences, 60(3), pp.816-817. | |
| Negin, B. and Jander, G., 2023. Convergent and divergent evolution of plant chemical defenses. Current opinion in plant biology, 73, p.102368. | |
| Gummin, D.D., Mowry, J.B., Beuhler, M.C., Spyker, D.A., Rivers, L.J., Feldman, R., Brown, K., Pham, N.P., Bronstein, A.C. and DesLauriers, C., 2023. 2022 Annual report of the national poison data system®(NPDS) from America’s Poison Centers®: 40th annual report. Clinical Toxicology, 61(10), pp.717-939. | |
| Gummin, D.D., Mowry, J.B., Beuhler, M.C., Spyker, D.A., Rivers, L.J., Feldman, R., Brown, K., Pham, N.P., Bronstein, A.C. and DesLauriers, C., 2024. 2023 Annual Report of the National Poison Data System®(NPDS) from America’s Poison Centers®: 41st Annual Report. Clinical Toxicology, 62(12), pp.793-1027. |
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One thought on “Episode 176 Strychnine: The WD-40 of Victorian Medicine”
Many thanks, I enjoyed the latest episode (as always)! As an ecologist, I would like to share an additional perspective on strychnine. I remember reading the book Coyote America by Dan Flores years ago, and being moved by the descriptions of the results of mass strychnine poisoning of wild canids across the US. I highly recommend the book; it is fascinating to learn how the use of strychnine, cyanide, and arsenic to eradicate predators led the formation of the Biological Survey, now USFWS. Unfortunately it is a heartbreaking story, with millions of coyotes and tens of thousands of other animals poisoned in such a brutal way. I am still haunted by the imagery of distorted coyote carcasses after strychnine seizing. Sorry for the less-than-uplifting share!