I love fly gene names as they convey phenotype intuitively (mostly) and in fact I’ve learned a lot by tracking down the origins of names. E.g…..
Animals: I first learned what a pangolin was.
Vegetables: new to me prior to following up on the names were spatzle, spaghetti squash and zucchini (which I used to call a courgette).
Literary figs: Oskar turned out to be a diminutive figure from Günter Grass novel The Tin Drum (and Bruno his “repressor”) and Smaug a dragon in, well, you know.
And (not to be missed) ways of abusing diminutive people in other languages: pumilio, nanos, knirps. I draw the line at Kruppel.
All was right with the world until yesterday, when I bought a red Kuri, or Hokkaido squash (yes, the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness is apparently happening somewhere off Manhattan). To my shock, several internet recipes call it a Knirps. Which leaves me wondering what’s the mutant named after, squash or “squib” and can I still use knirps liberally on International Blasphemy Day?
By the way it was cooked up deliciously by my friend with some thyme, feta and a lotta garlic.
Some names are very inventive :) There’s also sonic hedgehog and his buddies desert and indian in the hedgehog signaling pathway
Do students of today even know who sonic hedgehog is? Some retro character!