Dear friends As a conus lover and a professional chemist, I have some knowledge on this issue that I would like to share with you. All this started following a paper by Eric Chivian, Callum Roberts and Aaron Bernstein published in Science in 2003. The title: "The threat to cone snails". On the contrary to some of the recent posts in the forum, is in this paper that making an estimation of the harvesting of conus for medical research mixed up with comments on global reef decline etc they suggested that one way for protection is to include the entire genus Conus under CITES. This means that the measure was suggested for protection AGAINST the pharmacological industry. However, there were some points raised which were very controversial from scientific point of view, and this letter was replied in another interesting letter by Conus and Conotoxin specialists like Thomas Duda, Jon Paul Bingham, Gabriella Raybaudi, Bruce Livett, Alan Kohn and some other specialists. Clearly, given the peptidic nature of the conotoxins is far more cheaper for the pharmaceutical industry to copy the natural conotoxins and then synthesize it at industrial level. It is not too complicated if you consider that the most complex conotoxin has far less aminoacids than insulin for instance! So the cones are just the template for copying. Not so many specimens are needed for this in a molecular biology or biochemical lab, and people like Jon Paul Bingham milk the venom from live Conus purpurascens on a weekly basis. Apparently these points were missed up by Chivian et al., which replied again in the same issue of Science in a much moderate manner. Also, the decline of the coral reef at global level is a big issue, but not for conus but for most marine organisms! Besides, many conus live far away from coral, not to mention those very deep water ones! The thing is that the controversial nature of the entire issue and the fact that potential medicaments are involved rapidly attracted the attention of media. I know that National Geographic covered this matter some time ago, but very recently also in National Geographic there was some sort of public debate between Chivian and Jon Paul Bingham. Apparently the issue is now being covered also by BBC. In any case, I do not think that there is a complot forfaited by multinational Pharmaceutical companies for this Conus pseudoprotection, nor there are any scientifically sound signs that the entire genus Conus is threatened up to the point of including it in CITES, at least as a whole. All this sounds more like the noise of the entire thing in the mass media appealing to a general public interested in health issues, and not in malacology. Warmest regards to all Manuel Jimenez Tenorio ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [log in to unmask] - a forum for informal discussions on molluscs To leave this list, click on the following web link: http://listserv.uga.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=conch-l&A=1 Type your email address and name in the appropriate box and click leave the list. ----------------------------------------------------------------------