susan spencer explains. >> reporter: behold, if you dare. the israeli death stalker scorpion.s excruciating. its venom can kill. not much here to love. unless you're dr. jim olsen. this sounds terrifying. >> it's actually beautiful. >> reporter: beautiful because the death stalker's venom may revolutionize how cancer surgery is done. dr. olsen is a brain cancer physician and researcher at fred hutchinson cancer center in seattle, washington. >> we were inspired by a 16-year-old girl who had a brain tumor. after 12 hours of surgery the surgeons left behind a big piece, and we decided that day to find a way to make the cancer light up so that surgeons could see it while they're operating. >> reporter: the key is the scorpion venom, synthetically reproduced minus the poison. when injected into a patient's bloodstream it sticks to cancer cells but not to normal cells. combine that sticky molecule with fluorescent dye and you've got what olsen calls tumor paint. what problem does tumor paint solve? >> sometimes it's really hard for surgeons to tell what is cancer and what is normal

. >> lapook: susan spencer will be sampling some of them through the course of the morning. >> behold if you dare the death stalker scorpion. the venom can kill. not much here to love unless your dr. jim olson. this sound terrifying. >> it's beautiful. >> because the death stalker's venom may revolutionize how cancer surgery is done. dr. olson is a brain cancer physician and researcher at fred hutchinson cancer center in seattle, washington. >> we were inspired by a 16-year-old girl who had a brain tumor after 12 hours of surgery, surgeons left behind a big pie piece. we decided to find a way to make the cancer light up so the surgeons could see it. >> the key is a scorpion venom synthetically reproduced. it sticks to cancer cells but not to normal cells. combine that sticky molecule with florescent dye you have tumor paint. what problem does it solve? >> sometimes it's hard for surgeon to tell what is cancer what is normal. in the brain you can't take out a big chunk of normal. tumor paint distinguishes the difference between brain cancer and normal brain in all of our experiments th