Thanks to the Foundation Science and Technology (FCT, Portugal) for support by national
funds to CIMO (UIDB/00690/2020). The project
PDR2020‑1.0.1‑FEADER‑031734: “DivInA‑Diversification
and Innovation on Beekeeping Production” and to the
European Regional Development Fund through the
Regional Operational Program North 2020, within the scope
of Project GreenHealth, Norte‑01‑0145‑FEDER‑000042. This
research was also funded by (UI0204): UIDB/00313/2020,
Center of Chemistry from Faculty of Sciences and
Technology of University of Coimbra, Portugal.
The discovery of new drugs has benefited significantly from the development of research
in venomics, increasing our understanding of the envenomation processes. It has been
previously reported that honeybee venom (HBV) exhibits several pharmacological
activities such as anti‑inflammatory, antibacterial, antimutagenic, radioprotective, and
anticancer activity and may inclusively act as a complementary treatment for SARS‑CoV‑2.
It composition consists mainly on melittin, phospholipase A2, and apamin but other
constituents such as hyaluronidase, mast cell degranulating peptide and secapin are also
relevant for its bioactivity. However, and because HBV is not officially recognized as a drug,
until now, the international community did not establish quality standards for it. To uncover
its exact composition, and boost the discovery of HBV‑derived drugs, a significant number
of techniques were developed. In this review, a relevant overview of the so far published
analytical methods for HBV characterization is organized with the aim to accelerate its future
standardization. The literature search was performed within PubMed, Google Scholar, and
Science Direct by selecting specific documents and exploring HBV evaluation.
