ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors describe their methods and success, paying particular attention to points of philosophy that may be useful in the search for a shark repellent. Research directed toward the detection and isolation of shark repellents is being pursued in the Marine Bioactive Substances Program at the University of Southern California. The sea has provided us with a rich store of potentially useful bioactive substances. The authors look at extracts of marine organisms for substances possessing specific properties. Experience with a few previous marine extracts, with a toxin from a terrestrial beetle, and with the releasing activity in black widow spiders, suggests that many of the toxins of interest to us will be proteins. The samples in which activity resides in small molecules may contain either an inorganic ion or an organic toxin. L. V. Dunkerton and B. McKillican have fractionated some of the active samples of smaller molecular weight, and have partially purified small toxins from them.
