Sodium fluoroacetate

• much cooler name: Compound 1080
• naturally occurring poison found in a number of plants from around the world
• converted in the body to to fluorocitrate, which disrupts the citric acid cycle, thus impairing cellular respiration
  
• this is very bad
• since it messes up an essential component of metabolism, there is no known antidote and few people survive significant ingestion of this substance
• a single teaspoon can potentially kill dozens of people
  
• discovered by the Germans during World War II
• they were looking for new chemical warfare agents
• highly potent (0.1 g can theoretically kill a man) but requires ingestion or injection to be effective, so not quite what they were looking for (inhalation is where it's at!)
  
• independently discovered by the Americans during the war and was introduced as a rodenticide (kills...rodents) in the US in 1946
• currently is used by farmers and the US government to kill various crop- and livestock-eating mammals
• delivered via livestock protection collars placed on sheep or goats, which are punctured by coyotes as they go for the throat
  
• is also highly toxic to birds and insects

- Proudfoot AT, Bradberry SM, Vale JA. Sodium fluoroacetate poisoning. Toxicol Rev. 2006;25(4):213-9.
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_fluoroacetate
- http://texnat.tamu.edu/publications/B-1664/p6.htm