Toxic culture: Where scorpion stings and tarantula bites are all in a day's work

The venom systems laboratory at the University of Galway’s Ryan Institute is involved in studying up to 150 species, from snakes to scorpions, centipedes to tarantulas, to test the pharmaceutical potential of their venom, writes Lorna Siggins

Dr Michel Dugon with Kunsha the Burmese python. Picture: Ray Ryan

Dr Michel Dugon knows what the bites of a tarantula, a giant centipede and a pit viper feel like, and he has also been stung by scorpions several times.

Yet he shows no hesitation in handling a noble false widow spider in his laboratory at the University of Galway (formerly NUIG), as it is all in a day’s work for a venom expert like him.