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Curiosities of Biological Nomenclature
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Misc.: Things Named after Scientific Names

9860 Archaeopteryx A main-belt asteroid named after the famous fossil bird.
Archelon Weiland, 1896 (Cretaceous turtle) This turtle was 15 feet long, 4500 lbs., possibly the largest chelonian ever. In the 1966 film "One Million Years B.C.," fur-bikini-clad Raquel Welch encounters a stop-motion giant turtle lumbering toward the sea. She alerts her fellow tribesmen by yelling "Archelon!", the animal's true scientific name and the only 'real' word said by any of the movie's cast. All of the rest of the cavepeople's language was completely made up.
Balaenoptera Musculus Brand name of a radio remote control racing boat from Syma. It is 22 inches long, somewhat smaller than the blue whale for which it is named.
Charlotte A. Cavatica The heroine of E. B. White's Charlotte's Web is named after the orb-weaver Araneus cavaticus.
Haikouella A brand of women's laptop bags, presumably named after Haikouella Chen, Huang and Li, 1999, an early Cambrian fossil chordate.
jinx Jynx L., 1758 is the wryneck, a perching bird, which was used charms and spells. The word "jinx" came to refer to the spells, and later to any cause of misfortune.
Pilobolus A dance company, first performing in 1971, named after the fungus genus Pilobolus Tode (1784).
Robur the Conqueror (French, Robur-le-Conquérant, an 1886 Jules Verne novel) The title character gets his name from the English oak, Quercus robur, suggesting strength.
Spyro Gyra (an American jazz fusion band) When a club owner asked bandleader Jay Beckenstein for a name to put on a sign, Beckenstein jokingly suggested Spirogyra, a filamentous green alga (a.k.a. pond scum), which he remembered from a biology class. The name was then misspelled Spyro Gyra on the sign.
Subbuteo (a British table soccer game) named after the small bird of prey Falco subbuteo. Peter Adolph, the game's inventer, wanted to call the game "Hobby", which is the bird's common name.
Sylvester the Cat (Warner Brothers cartoon character; Tweety Birds' lisping nemesis) He might be named after the European wildcat Felis sylvestris sylvestris.

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