Researchers studying a stinging tree from Australia discovered that it uses a neurotoxin similar to that of spiders. The tree produces a painful sting that can last for days or even weeks.

Unlike its American and European counterparts, being stung by a dendrocnide tree – which means “stinging tree” – can cause pain that lasts for days – or even weeks.

As they report Wednesday in the journal Science Advances, Australia’s stinging trees are packed with a toxin that, when injected, latches onto pain-detecting cells in the recipient and makes ...

University of Queensland image: The Gympie Gympie stinging tree has needle-like trichomes which inject toxins. view more Credit: Institute for Molecular Bioscience, University of Queensland ...

Australia is famous, among other things, for venomous animals. Its plants, it turns out, are just as hostile. Now, researchers at the University of Queensland have isolated “neurotoxic peptides from ...