读者文摘:以米歇尔·奥巴马命名的蜘蛛(1)（在线收听）

FOR YEARS, people have been naming their pets—and their kids, in some cases—after pop icons they love.

多年来，人们一直用喜欢的流行偶像的名字来给他们的宠物和孩子取名。

In 2016, 370 people in the United States named their baby girls Khaleesi in honor of a Game of Thrones character.

2016年，为了纪念《权力的游戏》中的一个角色，370名美国人给他们的女儿取名为卡丽熙。

Scientists, too, are constantly naming newly discovered species after celebs.

科学家们也在不断地用名人的名字来命名新发现的物种。

But these names might carry a little bit more weight:

但这些名字可能更有分量：

While a baby named Khaleesi can get older and decide to legally change her name,

当一位名叫卡丽熙的婴儿长大后决定合法更改名字时，

scientific names go down in the history books.

卡丽熙的学名载入史册。

There's the Agra schwarzeneggeri beetle, named after Arnold Schwarzenegger's biceps;

一种名叫阿格拉·施瓦辛格甲虫以阿诺德·施瓦辛格的肱二头肌命名;

the Aleiodes shakirae wasp, named after Shakira's hip and belly dance movements; and the list goes on.

脊茧蜂属夏奇拉黄蜂以夏奇拉的臀部和腹部舞蹈动作命名；这样的例子不胜枚举。

Turns out, there is a method to this seemingly mad nomenclature.

事实证明，这种看似疯狂的命名法有一些作用。

Sometimes having a recognizable name attached to what might otherwise be an unremarkable little creature is the only way for the species to get widespread attention.

有时候，给一个不起眼的小生物起一个人们都知道的名字，是该物种获得广泛关注的唯一途径。

The latest case in point: In September 2017, researchers announced the discovery of 15 new species of spiders in the Caribbean.

最新的例子是：2017年9月，研究人员宣布在加勒比地区发现了15种新型蜘蛛。

They named three of them after Leonardo DiCaprio, David Bowie, and Michelle Obama.

这些蜘蛛中有三个命名为莱昂纳多·迪卡普里奥、大卫·鲍伊和米歇尔·奥巴马。

Spider expert Ingi Agnarsson is an associate professor of biology at the University of Vermont

蜘蛛专家Agnarsson 是佛蒙特大学生物学副教授

and was the lead researcher of the Caribbean study, published in Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society.

和加勒比海研究的首席研究员，他在林奈学会的动物学杂志上发表了这篇文章。