What potent alkaloid toxin is famously found in the skin of golden poison frogs?

The potent alkaloid toxin famously found in the skin of golden poison frogs is batrachotoxin.

Golden poison frogs are Phyllobates terribilis, a species native to the rainforests of Colombia. Their skin contains batrachotoxin, an exceptionally powerful natural poison that interferes with voltage-gated sodium channels in nerve and muscle cells. By keeping these channels open, the toxin can cause paralysis, cardiac disturbances, respiratory failure, and death.

The toxin is associated with the frog’s wild diet rather than simply being an unavoidable feature of every captive-bred frog. Golden poison frogs raised in captivity on ordinary feeder insects generally lose their toxicity, supporting the view that they obtain batrachotoxin or its chemical precursors from particular arthropod prey.

Batrachotoxin is often confused with tetrodotoxin or saxitoxin, which are also powerful neurotoxins but have different chemical structures and mechanisms. The frog is also commonly called the golden dart frog because Indigenous peoples of Colombia have traditionally used its secretions on hunting darts.