I just got a text message from Steve (Bashsea) telling me that he was in the ER from polytoxin, If you don't already know what polytoxin is, you need to know, If your a reefer you might have already came into contact with this deadly stuff!!
Polytoxin come from polyp corals like Zoanthids, Below is some more information about Zoanthids and there polytoxin's.
Toxic flowers: Some zoanthids contain powerful toxins to protect themselves against predators. The most toxic marine poison, palytoxin, was discovered in a zoanthid. Minute quantities of palytoxin can paralyse and even kill. So don't handle zoanthids with open wounds on your hand or touch your mouth or eyes after handling them. It is believed that the toxins are not produced by the animal but by bacteria that live in symbiosis with the polyps.
How to stay safe: Wear covered shoes and long pants to cover all skin exposed to water. Do not touch zoanthids.I'll try and update this thread as I hear more...The crude ethanol extracts of the Palythoa toxica proved to be so toxic that an accurate LD50 was difficult to determine. More recently, the toxicity has been determined to be 50-100 ng/kg i.p. in mice. The compound is an intense vasoconstrictor; in dogs, it causes death within 5 min at 60 ng/kg. By extrapolation, a toxic dose in a human would be about 4 micrograms.
1 microgram (mcg/µg) = 0.001 milligram (mg)
1 microgram (mcg/µg) = 0.000001 gram (g)