Yes, black widows are found in Connecticut.
NPR's Living on Earth recently featured a story on black widow spiders.
An excerpt: "By the time I saw the doctor I was feeling really queasy. He explained the hospital had antivenin but it's expensive, and they reserve it for the worst reactions. He said that when the pain arrived, even opiates were not going to help. He gave me some anti-convulsant and he sent me home. What happened next, I can only compare with childbirth . . ." Read the full story link here.)
Professor Glenn King, formerly of the University of Connecticut, recently joined The University of Queensland's Institute for Molecular Bioscience, (IMB, Australia) where he will further develop his pioneering approach to insecticide discovery.
“Since spiders have been developing insecticidal compounds for almost 400 million years, I decided to study venoms to find natural toxins that might kill insects without harming vertebrates,” Professor King said.
He has since described three families of insecticidal compounds, and moved back to Australia with the help of a $576,000 Australian Research Council grant entitled “Safeguarding Australia against invasive arthropod pests."
“An increasingly serious public health issue for Australia is the emergence of infectious diseases spread by insects such as ticks and mosquitoes,” Professor King said.
Venomix is a company is based on the work of Dr. King. Under development are new insecticidal compounds targeted at the agricultural, specialty non-crop, and animal health markets, which have a combined market value (for insecticides only) of $15 billion. Venomix has a cooperative research agreement with Chemtura Corporation, a $3 billion specialty chemical company. Recently, Venomix completed a Series A financing with SWMF Life Science Venture Fund, LP for $2.25 million. See UConn R & D for more information.
For more about spiders and how to identify them, here.
