New snail species named in honor of a character from the “Dungeons and Dragons”
A group of biologists from the natural history Museum in Stuttgart and the Zoological Museum in são Paulo have discovered in Brazil a new species of snail.
Clam, described in a paper in the journal Zoosystematics and Evolution, was named after a character in the Board game “Dungeons and Dragons”.
Biologists discovered the snail during the exploration of the caves of Brazil. She is a member of the family Gastrocopta — micromolluscs that live on land. Her torso reaches a height of two millimeters, and a length of just one. A snail shell has a conical shape, while most other species in Brazil, have the shells of cylindrical or cocacobana (pupiform) form.
Researchers named the animal Gastrocopta sharae in honor of Shar, goddess of night and darkness from the Board game “Dungeons and Dragons”. “This is the most appropriate name for snail, which lives in dark caves” — comment on the news scientists.
Zoologists often called the new species the names of popular characters from books, games and films, and in honor of celebrities. So, scientists recently reported the discovery of a new species volozaninova clam, which was named in honor of the British rock musician David Bowie, and a new species of amoeba called Arcella gandalfi in honor of the wizard Gandalf from the novel “Lord of the rings”. In addition, researchers have discovered in China a new kind of Kulakov, which was named in honor of Luke Skywalker.
Last year, British scientists found spiral pond snails Lymnaea stagnalis genetic mechanism that is responsible for the asymmetrical location of internal organs of animals. In addition, engineers recently used the oral muscle of California sea snail Aplysia californica when creating biohybrid robot.
Christina Ulasovich