Fig. 1

Reviewed venom proteins for hymenopteran taxa in respect to protein and species numbers from UniProt. Major hymenopteran clades are shown on the left (species numbers in circles). The second numbers in circles within the colour-coded lines indicate venom proteins (grouped according to their names). The twelve herein proposed prevalent bee venom protein families (PBVP) are illustrated on the right, together with the toxins proposed as “Aculeatoxins” (brown) according to Robinson et al. [29]. Novel, and further undescribed peptides and proteins are shown in grey. The hymenopteran groups are based on the recent phylogeny according to Peters et al. [33]. Please note that three melittin sequences from wasps are falsely annotated in UniProt as wasp melittins (marked by a black X). Our analyses clearly show that genes encoding peptides highly similar to honey bee melittin are not present in wasps, see also von Reumont et al. [22]. The phylogeny is pruned to the groups for which data is available based on Peters et al. [33]