The peptide family identified in 2020 that helps cause the gympie-gympie plant’s intense sting is gympietides.
Researchers studying the Australian stinging tree Dendrocnide moroides identified previously unknown, pain-inducing peptides in its stinging hairs and named the family gympietides after the plant’s common name. These highly stable, disulfide-rich peptides affect sensory neurons by interacting with voltage-gated sodium channels, helping explain why the sting can be severe and persistent.
Gympietides are not the same as cyclotides, defensins, or conotoxins. Their structures can resemble toxin scaffolds found in spiders and cone snails, but the family was identified from Dendrocnide species. Related gympietides have also been reported in Dendrocnide excelsa.
The plant’s microscopic trichomes act like hypodermic needles, breaking off in skin and delivering their irritating contents. The 2020 discovery helped replace older, incomplete explanations of the pain, which had focused on compounds such as histamine and formic acid. The name gympie-gympie comes from the language of the Gubbi Gubbi people of Queensland.