This snake is a freak. It boasts the largest venom glands in the world. It eats king cobras for breakfast. And it has a scorpion's sting. But that's not what has scientists excited.

"We have found the wildest snake toxin ever, from the venom of the most outrageous snakes," Bryan Fry said. "It does something no other snake has ever done."

The Queensland University venomologist is talking about the aptly named long-glanded blue coral snake of south-east Asia – and its unusual venom which takes hold with lightning efficiency.