Taking this into account, we designed a study to investigate
the ability of B. bilineata crude venom (BbV) to activate
isolated humanneutrophils since it has been shownthat this
venom causes inflammation and induces neutrophil
recruitment into the peritoneal cavity of mice 4 h after its
injection (Porto et al., 2007). First, the effect of BbVon human
neutrophil viability was evaluated. The results showed that
BbV did not affect neutrophil viability indicating its low
toxicity on this cell type. The effect of BbV on human
neutrophil viability was not demonstrated until now, but
literature shows that B. asper venom decreases the viability
of neutrophils isolated from mice (Moreira et al., 2009).