I have a molecule tat on my right arm as well, though it has nothing to do with venom (though it does have components of the molecule in the picture below).

Brian's tattoo really doesn't either...it's adrenaline, if I remember correctly.

Venoms are composed of proteins, which are generally quite large molecules...it is unlikely you could find a venom component small enough that would make a suitable tattoo. For example, the image below is the molecular structure for a single amino acid (in this case, tryptophan). Now imagine 50-100 of those strung together, and you would have a small protein...kinda difficult to fit that on an arm Even if you did do that...you'd still only have the primary structure (the amino acid sequence)of the protein...the true structure of a protein is comprised of it's secondary, tertiary, and possibly quaternary structures (in the case of multi-protein complexes).

You could probably find a tattoo artist who could ink a globular protein for you, but I'm not sure how many snake or animal venoms have had protein structures solved for them...and in any case, it would take a lot of time and a ton of money to find a tattoo artist who could accurately depict the crystal structure of a protein for you.

Sorry to burst your bubble...it's a good idea though~

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Abhishek Prasad

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