Science / Medicine : Catfish Slime Speeds Healing of Wounds

Venomous Persian Gulf catfish excrete a gel-like slime that dramatically speeds the healing of cuts and might spur development of a new preparation to treat wounded humans, a UC Davis researcher believes.

“I used it on me. It works great,” said Richard Criddle, a professor of biochemistry and biophysics. “If you put it on a wound, you can actually see the wound start to close over in the next two or three minutes.”

Criddle and Kuwait University biochemist J.M. Al-Hassan spent part of the last five years catching and scraping the slime coating off Arius bilineatus, a species of saltwater catfish that grows up to three feet in length, sports venomous spines and scavenges the muddy bottom of the Persian Gulf.

Their research started after they heard that Arab fishermen rub catfish on their wounds to speed healing.

Criddle said he doubts that the slime itself could be marketed for human use because of the difficulty in catching enough of the catfish and because the gel contains many substances, some of which may not be desirable. He is analyzing the makeup of the slime in hopes of developing a similar substance that could be used on humans.