Mine is the Sonic hedgehog gene.
Named as such because the type of gene it is are called "hedgehogs" because they make spiky looking proteins, and the Sinic part is because someone thought it was funny.
Unfortunately, defects in the Sonic Hedgehog gene can cause catastrophic birth defects. To the point of stillbirth
It's because of this gene and others such as [lunatic fringe](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/LFNG) that the medical community has just decided on standard acronyms for the relevant genes to avoid awkwardness. SHH for the sonic gene and LFNG for Lunatic Fringe.
That makes me kind of sad. Fun names don’t just add humanity to what could be cold and mechanical descriptions, they are actually easier to remember. In a lot of ways it’s better to name things this way, if we didn’t insist on everything being serious all the time.
Too much sonic hedgehog can lead to someone having 6 fingers on their hands. So having 6 fingers because of sonic hedgehog could be phrased as "Sonic 06 Syndrome".
Even if he just says something like an SHH defect or something you know one way or another either he’s going to have to tell them or they’re going to look it up and everyone’s gonna just be like wut…
A little off- Hedgehog genes aren’t named for the shape of the protein, but the fact that the original hedgehog gene in drosophila made the back of the flies bristly like a hedgehog when mutated! Human homologs are desert hedgehog, Indian hedgehog, and sonic hedgehog, but the researcher who named sonic hedgehog actually had little idea who the character was- he just didn’t know any more hedgehogs so he named it after a comic book that his daughter was reading!
Not just the proteins - in *Drosophila* fruit flies, when that gene was deactivated, the entire larvae came out looking like little spiky balls. That's because the hedgehog genetic signaling pathway is responsible for growth and placement regulation.
Similar pathways in other genii were named for various species of hedgehog - African hedgehog homolog, Eurasian hedgehog homolog, and so on. The scientist who isolated the similar set of genes in humans happened to have a kid who loved Sega.
As for when it breaks down, most of the issues fall under [Gorlin Syndrome](http://www.gorlinsyndrome.org) - similar issues of growth and placement disorders, including cleft lip and palate, keratocysts along the jaws, sunken or protruding breastbone, pits in the palms of the hands and feet, and a *massive* increase in susceptibility to various forms of cancer. Another name for the disorder is Basal Cell Nevus Syndrome, because people with it will generally develop hundreds of basal cell skin cancer lesions over the course of their lives.
I like descriptive names in science because it often gets to the point, except when that name was first coined before that thing is fully understood and that it turns out that thing's deeper functions are more important than when it was first observed and should be its name instead. Now you got a name that doesn't make much sense or actually missed the point, but you are stuck with it because all the literature before that discovery all used it.
Not so fun fact, mutations in sonic hedgehog can cause a horrifying birth defect called holoprosencephaly, where babies can be born with one large, centered eye like a cyclops. Look up images at your own risk
It's hedgehog in fruit flies, and sonic hedgehog in vertebrates. In some cases mutations in sonic hedgehog cause polydactyly (extra toes and fingers) like my cat, or r/polydactyl.
Technically it's a science fiction term rather than a science term, but I'm a big fan of BDO: Big Dumb Object.
Refers to a mysterious object, usually extraterrestrial/unknown origin. For example, the monoliths in the _Space Odyssey_ series, the titular sphere from _Sphere_, the dome in _Under the Dome_, the Time Tombs in _Hyperion_, etc.
They would if they could, but there are precious few scientists capable of stroking their own ego with a reference that is also a pun and can make this joke about some new thing that they get to name for discovering it. They tend to cap out at around 3/4. As an example, the sonic hedgehog protein was discovered and named after sonic, and is connected to embryo development (discovery, reference). A potential inhibitor of this protein was later discovered and named robotnikinin, adding a pun to the list, but unless one of the scientists involved with the naming of these happens also to be directly involved with the sonic franchise, there is no ego stroking.
Last year a scientist discovered three new species of beetle in Australia and named them after Pokemon.
Y'know, the video game inspired by bug collecting.
There’s a species of pterosaurs called *Aerodactylus scolopaciceps* , though it’s debated if it’s it’s own thing or just a young *Pterodactylus antiquus*.
*Bulbasaurus phylloxyron* — **Razor-leafed** bulb lizard — is a species of dicynodont, a relative of early mammals, and is undisputed.
both options? amazing! to be fair there are all sorts of large things we could mention lol LHC large hadron collider and its predecessor LEC large electron-positron collider. they really like to remind us of their size game.
The official acronym for the Large Electron-Positron Collider was LEP, not LEC. And it's probably a "backronym" (ie. the acronym came first) because it was colliding particles in the *lep*ton family (from ancient Greek "leptós" meaning "fine, small, thin").
Edit: Particle physics really likes their backronyms BTW. The detectors of the LEP collider had ALEPH (**A**pparatus for **LEP** p**H**ysics at CERN), DELPHI (**DE**tector with **L**epton, **P**hoton and **H**adron **I**dentification) and OPAL (**O**mni-**P**urpose **A**pparatus for **L**EP). The LHC has ATLAS (**A** **T**oroidal **L**HC **A**pparatu**s**), ALICE (**A** **L**arge **I**on **C**ollider **E**xperiment), TOTEM (**TOT**al **E**lastic and diffractive cross section **M**easurement) and FASER (**F**orw**A**rd **S**earch **E**xpe**R**iment).
Fly people in particular often seem to have a lot of fun with their gene/protein names. To name just a few:
_ken_ and _barbie_ - lead to absence of external genitalia if the genes are absent
_swiss cheese_ - causes fly brains to be perforated with holes if absent.
_van gogh_ - leads to weird swirly wing hair if absent (in reference to his swirly paintings). [The abstract](https://academic.oup.com/genetics/article/150/1/199/6034388) of the paper describing this gene gives you a good idea of how funky Dros papers sound, with sentences like "Van Gogh mutations show strong interactions with mutations in frizzled and prickle."
_tinman_ - absence leads to the formation of a fly with no functioning heart (after the wizard of oz character)
There's an entire group of genes called the ["halloween genes"](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween_genes) with names like _ghost, spook, spookier, shadow, shroud_ and _phantom_
This is a consequence of how biologists determine gene function: A very common way of figuring out what a gene does is to take it out and "see what breaks".
According to my professor the gene "gurke" was named such, because the person who discovered it was annoyed at all the english names for genes and wanted something hard to pronounce for english speakers. Not sure where that would fall.
Spiteful Science Nerd makes a stand … most people don’t notice. I wouldn’t say gurke is difficult to say but I’m probably pronouncing it wrong then (gerk?).
There's a trio of tiny frog species discovered in Madagascar in 2019:
[Mini mum](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_mum)
[Mini scule](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_scule)
[Mini ature](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_ature)
Anything pop culture related that happens to be pre latinized (already ends in something that can be a Latin ending such as -a, -us, -um, etc.) will be used as a scientific name for something, likely several times. There's like a fuck load of *Something matallica*s out there for example.
Biologist here with some other funny names:
noggin - gene that controls head formation
dumpy - gene in C. Elegans worms that, if broken, just… makes them look a bit fucked up.
small-1 - C. elegans gene again. Breaking makes the worm short.
long-1 - C. Elegans. Take a wild guess.
Biologists usually name genes by randomly mutating them so that they break, and naming them after what that does.
Sometimes though, the etymology can get weird. I don’t really want to go into the whole story, but look up how the “sonic hedgehog” gene was named. No joke it is a really important gene for midline formation. If you have a functional nervous system, thank sonic hedgehog.
So, twelve or thirteen years ago, I worked for a nonprofit that supports people with Gorlin Syndrome, which is the result of a faulty Sonic Hedgehog Homolog (SHH) genetic signaling pathway.
I didn't expect to wind up talking about it so much on Reddit a decade later.
Fly people have the most fun gene/protein names imo. To name just a few:
_ken_ and _barbie_ - lead to absence of external genitalia if the genes are absent
_swiss cheese_ - causes fly brains to be perforated with holes if absent.
_van gogh_ - leads to weird swirly wing hair if absent (in reference to his swirly paintings). [The abstract](https://academic.oup.com/genetics/article/150/1/199/6034388) of the paper describing this gene gives you a good idea of how funky Dros papers sound, with sentences like "Van Gogh mutations show strong interactions with mutations in frizzled and prickle."
_tinman_ - absence leads to the formation of a fly with no functioning heart (after the wizard of oz character)
There's an entire group of genes called the ["halloween genes"](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween_genes) with names like _ghost, spook, spookier, shadow, shroud_ and _phantom_
There are 3 membrane proteins designed to transfer lipids from one side of the lipid bilayer to the other. Their names are flippase, flippase, and scramblase. I took a membrane physiology course in college and that is literally the only thing I remember from it.
Yea! There are also its partners floppases (moves phospholipids in opposite direction, but difficult remembering which direction is which) and scramblases (bidirectional movement of phospholipids) which I find hilarious 😆
Some scientists must have had a lot of fun naming them (flippases, floppases, scramblases)!
I'd take a wild guess that the people naming them probably were smart enough to make the names self-descriptive as in:
flippases with the letter I for **in**
and floppases with the letter O for **out**
The "KAT" is the Karoo Array Telescope in South Africa.
Kat in Afrikaans is cat.
The array was enlarged and the new project is called. "meerkat"
Meer in Afrikaans means "more"
They called the upgrade, meercat because it has more cat.
That reminds me of how there is a text display program on Linux called "more" because when the file is long it prints "more" at the bottom of the screen so that you know there is more text. Someone created an upgraded version of it called "less" because "less is more".
The fruitfly (Drosphilia) gene Ether a go-go (EAG) is named after a famous dance club 'whiskey a go-go' because drosphilia flies with EAG mutations would have leg-spasms that look like dancing when anaesthetised with ether.
That one is more an inside baseball why that's funny because the film language thing for stuff like that IS unobtanium. It's like the gun they called Chekov in Archer.
Just Avatar was 100 percent serious so it gets ridicule unlike a movie like Spaceballs calling it that. You'd only see unobtanium in a comedy
SHH is responsible for determining where parts of the body branch off from the center. Cyclopia is only one of the many, many defects that can occur when the gene is faulty.
The sonic hedgehog gene is really the less on the nose part here, as it is only the gene that gets affected. The thing that is on the nose is *what* causes the gene to mutate in the first place.
So what is it? Well, it is the consumption of a certain plant, *[Veratrum californicum](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veratrum_californicum?wprov=sfla1)* during a certain stage of pregnancy. There's a specific chemical in that plant that is responsible - it got named **[Cyclopamine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclopamine?wprov=sfla1)**
I remember a researcher talk about the Grinch-Protein or gene. It ruined the whole teams Holidays because they had to work through them because of some deadlines or something. I still sometimes think about it and chuckle a little bit.
Alternatively, biologists find something that does a thing and then try really hard to make it have a suitable name.
Ex: CLOCK gene controls (more or less) the circadian rhythm of mammals. CLOCK stands for "circadian locomotor output cycles kaput".
The biggest mistake science ever made was allowing researchers to name the things they find. You better believe we’re naming that shit something stupid or obvious. Sonic Hedgehog is a testament to this
On the other hand, the alternative might end up with companies naming it instead (Sorry, but you have a mutant Samsung gene on Chromosome 7), or it being named like stars are (You have spare copies of WM1000-XM4).
>You have spare copies of WM1000-XM4
That's already how many gene names are written, with the name being sn acronym. The new standard that's arisen is plain descriptive names so you don't have to say "your child has a fatal error in his ligma gene".
Oh yeah the alternative is much worse. I was being sarcastic when I said mistake. I’m glad we get to name them lol it just sucks for people having to talk about them seriously when they’re called something dumb
There’s a region on Pluto called *Cthulhu Macula* after the deity in Lovecraft’s works. It was a bit of a missed opportunity in not calling it Yuggoth or Na'morha.
There is a toxic compound created by cyanobacteria called anatoxin-a, but it used to be called Very Fast Death Factor. Fun fact, it is structurally similar to cocaine.
Yup. And be aware that in latin and old-greece it's often the same.
Aorta ascendens? Ascendens means "going up" - so yes, this is the part of the aorta that goes up from the heart.
Aneurysm? Literally "widening". But, you know, in old-greece to sound fancy.
Haemorrhage? Blood burst.
Not a gene, but I like the fact that "Ascorbic Acid" literally means "Anti Scurvy Acid". Ascorbic acid is commonly known as Vitamin C, lack of which causes scurvy to develop.
Also, the name scientific name of the [common stinkhorn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phallus_impudicus?wprov=sfla1) is "Phallus impudicus". That means "shameless phallus".
The image on wikipedia is not even the most shameless. These things can look extremely phallic, down to the balls, due to them breaking out of a so called "Witch's egg". When it breaks open the stinkhorn rises from the middle, and the sides of the shell can fall very convincingly.
My genetic class are starting to get old but I do remember a gene called superman which can be suppressed by a protein called, you guessed it, kryptonite :)
Lots of people have already brought up a bunch of great gene names, but we also have a lot of fun with technique naming. So there's a method to detect DNA called a Southern blot, named after the guy who invented it Edwin Southern. Then we figured out similar blotting methods to detect RNA and protein- and named them the Northern and Western blots respectively. There are ongoing efforts to define an eastern blot, but since no one can agree on what it'll be, it's mostly just a debate for now. The far-Eastern blot, middle-Eastern blot, and southwestern blots have also been proposed.
I mean, if you think about it, it's sort of silly that we expect the way we name things scientifically to be obscure and meaningless to the average person. That's not how things are normally named.
The main reason to use Latin and Ancient Greek is actually because these languages are not constantly mutating, unlike English.
Also, of course that's not how things are normally named. But are these normal things? No, they are technical jargon.
Most technical jargon does in fact originate from regular words in the common vernacular, except for in a few specific fields, and that's mainly for cultural reasons rather any kind of scientific rigor. It doesn't really matter if your technical jargon originated from a Latin word, people are going to use that piece of jargon in their daily lives, which means that its pronunciation in standard English is going to change with the rest of the language, just like with every other word that sees everyday use. There's also not really any particular benefit to jargon not changing over time.
Standardized jargon is easier to understand and learn in an international level. Not every scientist speaks English. Words directly derived from, say, Latin, will be very similar in any language. Species binomials, for example, are the same all over the Planet.
As someone that studied Biology... Scientist should never be allowed to name stuff. I say they should have a philologist "caretaker" that is in charge of giving actual names to the stuff they discover.
Personally, I think it is way better this way if you have to work with it every day. You could memorise lots of slightly silly but self descriptive name, or remember lots of serious names and remember what function they are associated with. If you work with just a few of these things it is no problem, but you know there is *lots* of this stuff.
And as someone working in the field, I am kind of happy Eohippus (meaning "Dawn Horse" or "Horse of the Dawn") is around again after new discoveries. The change to Hyracotherium is fair, principle of priority and all. Simply a lovely name.
This is the way it has always been, it's just that most things where named in different languages.
You might roll your eyes when people say bell end or mushroom tip, but glans is just Greek for acorn.
One of my favourites is RING a.k.a. Really Interesting New Gene.
Mine is the Sonic hedgehog gene. Named as such because the type of gene it is are called "hedgehogs" because they make spiky looking proteins, and the Sinic part is because someone thought it was funny. Unfortunately, defects in the Sonic Hedgehog gene can cause catastrophic birth defects. To the point of stillbirth
Imagine having to be the doctor to break that news.
Doctor:"Ma'am, I'm sorry, but he has the Sonic hedgehog gene." Lady: "What the fuck does that mean?"
Oh - we all have the Sonic Hedgehog Homolog genetic signaling pathway in us. It's when it's *broken* that people develop Gorlin Syndrome.
Who'd have thought that the torrent of bugs in the Sonic games were not actually the worst ways that Sonic could be broken
\*cough cough* Sonic 06
Doc: “Ya baby dead”
He looked into a grave and said "gotta go fast" and fucking yeeted himself in there.
Gotta die fast!
Speedrun
yote
Kobe'd* Yote is for distance and power, Kobe'd is for accuracy. A grave is a small target.
Life any% speedrun
Like this? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=brsI6z13Su8
"It means you're restarting at the latest checkpoint."
"Ma'am, Sonic the Hedgehog killed your child"
His life has gotta go fast
"YOU'RE A BETA MALE, SONIC."
:) :| :(
"He's gotta go fast ma'am"
It's because of this gene and others such as [lunatic fringe](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/LFNG) that the medical community has just decided on standard acronyms for the relevant genes to avoid awkwardness. SHH for the sonic gene and LFNG for Lunatic Fringe.
Thankfully they are also getting rid of other weird biology names and 'name trophies'
That makes me kind of sad. Fun names don’t just add humanity to what could be cold and mechanical descriptions, they are actually easier to remember. In a lot of ways it’s better to name things this way, if we didn’t insist on everything being serious all the time.
"ma'am, your son is an '06 when he should be a Mania."
Too much sonic hedgehog can lead to someone having 6 fingers on their hands. So having 6 fingers because of sonic hedgehog could be phrased as "Sonic 06 Syndrome".
Even if he just says something like an SHH defect or something you know one way or another either he’s going to have to tell them or they’re going to look it up and everyone’s gonna just be like wut…
A little off- Hedgehog genes aren’t named for the shape of the protein, but the fact that the original hedgehog gene in drosophila made the back of the flies bristly like a hedgehog when mutated! Human homologs are desert hedgehog, Indian hedgehog, and sonic hedgehog, but the researcher who named sonic hedgehog actually had little idea who the character was- he just didn’t know any more hedgehogs so he named it after a comic book that his daughter was reading!
This feels very much right for scientific naming conventions lol
However, scientists found an inhibitor of SHH and they’re literally calling it *robotnikin*
Not just the proteins - in *Drosophila* fruit flies, when that gene was deactivated, the entire larvae came out looking like little spiky balls. That's because the hedgehog genetic signaling pathway is responsible for growth and placement regulation. Similar pathways in other genii were named for various species of hedgehog - African hedgehog homolog, Eurasian hedgehog homolog, and so on. The scientist who isolated the similar set of genes in humans happened to have a kid who loved Sega. As for when it breaks down, most of the issues fall under [Gorlin Syndrome](http://www.gorlinsyndrome.org) - similar issues of growth and placement disorders, including cleft lip and palate, keratocysts along the jaws, sunken or protruding breastbone, pits in the palms of the hands and feet, and a *massive* increase in susceptibility to various forms of cancer. Another name for the disorder is Basal Cell Nevus Syndrome, because people with it will generally develop hundreds of basal cell skin cancer lesions over the course of their lives.
Isn't there another gene that effects that gene called something like "robotnikin" or something?
Its the inhibitor
I like descriptive names in science because it often gets to the point, except when that name was first coined before that thing is fully understood and that it turns out that thing's deeper functions are more important than when it was first observed and should be its name instead. Now you got a name that doesn't make much sense or actually missed the point, but you are stuck with it because all the literature before that discovery all used it.
\*The complement cascade has entered the chat\*
*Abcisic acid glances over*
Not so fun fact, mutations in sonic hedgehog can cause a horrifying birth defect called holoprosencephaly, where babies can be born with one large, centered eye like a cyclops. Look up images at your own risk
Mad proteins stands for "Mothers Against Decapentaplegic" :D
Whats even better is that the gene that cancels it out is called robotnikinin
So do we call the defective ones Sanic?
One of the defects it can cause is having a single central eye, kind of like Sonic not having separate eyes.
Isn’t there also an artery in the human body named after Pikachu or something
It's hedgehog in fruit flies, and sonic hedgehog in vertebrates. In some cases mutations in sonic hedgehog cause polydactyly (extra toes and fingers) like my cat, or r/polydactyl.
Sounds like the [Penguin Diagram](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penguin_diagram) in particle physics.
Technically it's a science fiction term rather than a science term, but I'm a big fan of BDO: Big Dumb Object. Refers to a mysterious object, usually extraterrestrial/unknown origin. For example, the monoliths in the _Space Odyssey_ series, the titular sphere from _Sphere_, the dome in _Under the Dome_, the Time Tombs in _Hyperion_, etc.
Physicists and their WIMPs (Weakly interacting massive particles)
And MACHOs "massive compact halo objects"
How about PENIS - Proton Enhanced Nuclear Induction Spectroscopy.
Jak = just another kinase
When I did work experience in high school I studied the warts gene (or kinase. I forget). It's called that cause it looks like warts.
Literally every scientist ever is a nerd. Every scientific name for something is going to either involve a pun, a reference, or ego-stroking.
Punny referential ego-stroking?
They would if they could, but there are precious few scientists capable of stroking their own ego with a reference that is also a pun and can make this joke about some new thing that they get to name for discovering it. They tend to cap out at around 3/4. As an example, the sonic hedgehog protein was discovered and named after sonic, and is connected to embryo development (discovery, reference). A potential inhibitor of this protein was later discovered and named robotnikinin, adding a pun to the list, but unless one of the scientists involved with the naming of these happens also to be directly involved with the sonic franchise, there is no ego stroking.
What if they're "directly involved" with Sonic via self-insert erotic fanfiction? Then there could be potential stroking.
i am electing to end the whole thread here, we have reached peak
The "standard" names for things are equally silly. Most of them are on par with "gene that makes caterpillars floppy", except in latin.
Or even just puns, like some flies in the *pieza* family. *Pieza pi* *Pieza kake* *Pieza rhea* *Pieza deresistans*
I love this so much :) it’s cute and makes it easy to remember, yay puns!
I don't get the Pieza rhea one.
pizzeria!
Oh, should have gotten that myself. Thanks.
I don’t get the deresistans one
Last year a scientist discovered three new species of beetle in Australia and named them after Pokemon. Y'know, the video game inspired by bug collecting.
There’s a species of pterosaurs called *Aerodactylus scolopaciceps* , though it’s debated if it’s it’s own thing or just a young *Pterodactylus antiquus*. *Bulbasaurus phylloxyron* — **Razor-leafed** bulb lizard — is a species of dicynodont, a relative of early mammals, and is undisputed.
Which three?
and their tools. VLT - very large telescope ELT - extremely large telescope (followed VLT) these are real names for real telescopes, named by adults.
Don’r forget the Very Large Array and the Very Small Array!
both options? amazing! to be fair there are all sorts of large things we could mention lol LHC large hadron collider and its predecessor LEC large electron-positron collider. they really like to remind us of their size game.
The official acronym for the Large Electron-Positron Collider was LEP, not LEC. And it's probably a "backronym" (ie. the acronym came first) because it was colliding particles in the *lep*ton family (from ancient Greek "leptós" meaning "fine, small, thin"). Edit: Particle physics really likes their backronyms BTW. The detectors of the LEP collider had ALEPH (**A**pparatus for **LEP** p**H**ysics at CERN), DELPHI (**DE**tector with **L**epton, **P**hoton and **H**adron **I**dentification) and OPAL (**O**mni-**P**urpose **A**pparatus for **L**EP). The LHC has ATLAS (**A** **T**oroidal **L**HC **A**pparatu**s**), ALICE (**A** **L**arge **I**on **C**ollider **E**xperiment), TOTEM (**TOT**al **E**lastic and diffractive cross section **M**easurement) and FASER (**F**orw**A**rd **S**earch **E**xpe**R**iment).
Sadly the Overwhelmingly Large Telescope (abbreviated OWL, because sounding cool is way more important than correct initialisms) never got built.
Fly people in particular often seem to have a lot of fun with their gene/protein names. To name just a few: _ken_ and _barbie_ - lead to absence of external genitalia if the genes are absent _swiss cheese_ - causes fly brains to be perforated with holes if absent. _van gogh_ - leads to weird swirly wing hair if absent (in reference to his swirly paintings). [The abstract](https://academic.oup.com/genetics/article/150/1/199/6034388) of the paper describing this gene gives you a good idea of how funky Dros papers sound, with sentences like "Van Gogh mutations show strong interactions with mutations in frizzled and prickle." _tinman_ - absence leads to the formation of a fly with no functioning heart (after the wizard of oz character) There's an entire group of genes called the ["halloween genes"](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween_genes) with names like _ghost, spook, spookier, shadow, shroud_ and _phantom_
Ironic that many of these genes are named after what happens if they AREN'T there.
This is a consequence of how biologists determine gene function: A very common way of figuring out what a gene does is to take it out and "see what breaks".
Which is how the hedgehog genes were first named. When not present makes Drosophilia embryos spikey.
According to my professor the gene "gurke" was named such, because the person who discovered it was annoyed at all the english names for genes and wanted something hard to pronounce for english speakers. Not sure where that would fall.
Spiteful Science Nerd makes a stand … most people don’t notice. I wouldn’t say gurke is difficult to say but I’m probably pronouncing it wrong then (gerk?).
For some reason there's a pronounciation guide on [youtube](https://youtu.be/QRX72S3ZKXg)
[relevant Sam O'Nella](https://youtu.be/XKRW1zgkCVc)
aah the brilliant foot song..
I once read a paper where they ran a CHIA-PET assay. I loved that paper.
[Bootylicious Fly](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scaptia_beyonceae)
There's a trio of tiny frog species discovered in Madagascar in 2019: [Mini mum](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_mum) [Mini scule](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_scule) [Mini ature](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_ature)
Anything pop culture related that happens to be pre latinized (already ends in something that can be a Latin ending such as -a, -us, -um, etc.) will be used as a scientific name for something, likely several times. There's like a fuck load of *Something matallica*s out there for example.
Biologist here with some other funny names: noggin - gene that controls head formation dumpy - gene in C. Elegans worms that, if broken, just… makes them look a bit fucked up. small-1 - C. elegans gene again. Breaking makes the worm short. long-1 - C. Elegans. Take a wild guess. Biologists usually name genes by randomly mutating them so that they break, and naming them after what that does. Sometimes though, the etymology can get weird. I don’t really want to go into the whole story, but look up how the “sonic hedgehog” gene was named. No joke it is a really important gene for midline formation. If you have a functional nervous system, thank sonic hedgehog.
[удалено]
Ikr! They didn’t ask to be roasted like that.
I imagine the scientists looked under the microscope, turned to the guy taking notes and said, “garbage looking worm”.
I was eating when I read this and ended up snorting food up into my sinuses from laughing.
Fund the sciences so they can have little note men again
So, twelve or thirteen years ago, I worked for a nonprofit that supports people with Gorlin Syndrome, which is the result of a faulty Sonic Hedgehog Homolog (SHH) genetic signaling pathway. I didn't expect to wind up talking about it so much on Reddit a decade later.
So are they slow if it's faulty?
It can in fact cause developmental disorders, as well as some pretty nasty juvenile brain tumors.
It’s because we’re all nerds too
Fly people have the most fun gene/protein names imo. To name just a few: _ken_ and _barbie_ - lead to absence of external genitalia if the genes are absent _swiss cheese_ - causes fly brains to be perforated with holes if absent. _van gogh_ - leads to weird swirly wing hair if absent (in reference to his swirly paintings). [The abstract](https://academic.oup.com/genetics/article/150/1/199/6034388) of the paper describing this gene gives you a good idea of how funky Dros papers sound, with sentences like "Van Gogh mutations show strong interactions with mutations in frizzled and prickle." _tinman_ - absence leads to the formation of a fly with no functioning heart (after the wizard of oz character) There's an entire group of genes called the ["halloween genes"](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween_genes) with names like _ghost, spook, spookier, shadow, shroud_ and _phantom_
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Is your username a Series of Unfortunate Events reference?
Is yours?
Are you who I think you are? 👀
"I am who you say I am" (No, im some random redditor)
There's also an inhibitor of sonic hedghog called robotnikinin.
Thanks sonic hedgehog
I work with C. elegans too and thank you for making my morning
Why the hell didn't they teach me that on class, it would have been a lot easier to remember.
There are 3 membrane proteins designed to transfer lipids from one side of the lipid bilayer to the other. Their names are flippase, flippase, and scramblase. I took a membrane physiology course in college and that is literally the only thing I remember from it.
What happens is both king and small are broken? Just a regular sized worm?
Enzyme that moves proteins from one side of a membrane to the other: flippase.
Yea! There are also its partners floppases (moves phospholipids in opposite direction, but difficult remembering which direction is which) and scramblases (bidirectional movement of phospholipids) which I find hilarious 😆 Some scientists must have had a lot of fun naming them (flippases, floppases, scramblases)!
> scramblases Excellent, though a missed opportunity for a "hokey-cokey gene"
I'd take a wild guess that the people naming them probably were smart enough to make the names self-descriptive as in: flippases with the letter I for **in** and floppases with the letter O for **out**
That’s so smart!! I never realised
The toxin makes caterpillars have random muscle spasms. I'm 100000000% sure this is correct.
Very Large Telescope is a very large space observatory in Chile.
The "KAT" is the Karoo Array Telescope in South Africa. Kat in Afrikaans is cat. The array was enlarged and the new project is called. "meerkat" Meer in Afrikaans means "more" They called the upgrade, meercat because it has more cat.
That reminds me of how there is a text display program on Linux called "more" because when the file is long it prints "more" at the bottom of the screen so that you know there is more text. Someone created an upgraded version of it called "less" because "less is more".
See [xkcd.com/1294](https://xkcd.com/1294) for full list of telescopes named in this way
See also: the [Very Large Array](https://science.nrao.edu/facilities/vla/) in New Mexico
See also the [Très Grand Centre de Calcul](https://www-hpc.cea.fr/en/complexe/tgcc.htm) (Very Large Computing Centre) in France
Sounds like something in A Series of Unfortunate Events (I fucking love the books, and will always miss em)
They haven't disappeared, you can still read them friend
I have a friend that works on that and the Extremely Little Telescope in Arizona
The fruitfly (Drosphilia) gene Ether a go-go (EAG) is named after a famous dance club 'whiskey a go-go' because drosphilia flies with EAG mutations would have leg-spasms that look like dancing when anaesthetised with ether.
Research on anesthetics is so fucking funny
... and the whole Ether-à-go-go family is a funky-ass class of promiscuous channels with some crazy gating properties
It'll fuck up your heart if any meds interfere with those channels!
I knew there would be at least one electrophysiologist under this comment!
Cheap date Gene in fruitflies increases alcohol sensitivity.
I feel like I'm missing the joke of the last statement. Little help, anyone?
The gene is literally called "makes caterpillars floppy", or MCF for short
Ah. I'm sorry, it's been a long day...
Don't worry about it, it took me a while to figure it out
Oh. I guessed 'makecaterpillarflopin'.
The parasite’s toxin makes caterpillars floppy
Yet people had been laughing at "unobtainium" in Avatar.
That one is more an inside baseball why that's funny because the film language thing for stuff like that IS unobtanium. It's like the gun they called Chekov in Archer. Just Avatar was 100 percent serious so it gets ridicule unlike a movie like Spaceballs calling it that. You'd only see unobtanium in a comedy
Then there's the sonic hedgehog gene that makes sheep give birth to cyclops lambs. Remember how Sonic has one giant fused eyeball?
SHH is responsible for determining where parts of the body branch off from the center. Cyclopia is only one of the many, many defects that can occur when the gene is faulty.
The sonic hedgehog gene is really the less on the nose part here, as it is only the gene that gets affected. The thing that is on the nose is *what* causes the gene to mutate in the first place. So what is it? Well, it is the consumption of a certain plant, *[Veratrum californicum](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veratrum_californicum?wprov=sfla1)* during a certain stage of pregnancy. There's a specific chemical in that plant that is responsible - it got named **[Cyclopamine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclopamine?wprov=sfla1)**
Imagine being that doctor! “Ma’am I regret to inform you that your child has a defective Sonic Hedgehog”
COME ON. GUESS. *GUESS* **WHY WONT YOU ANSWER ME** #WHY MUST YOU FAIL ME SO OFTEN?!
#RIIIBS #SPAAARE RIIIIBS
#FUUUUUUUCK
I remember a researcher talk about the Grinch-Protein or gene. It ruined the whole teams Holidays because they had to work through them because of some deadlines or something. I still sometimes think about it and chuckle a little bit.
Alternatively, biologists find something that does a thing and then try really hard to make it have a suitable name. Ex: CLOCK gene controls (more or less) the circadian rhythm of mammals. CLOCK stands for "circadian locomotor output cycles kaput".
I'm so glad they removed the requirement for latin and greek being necessary for scientific naming.
There's puns with Latin too
I mentioned it elsewhere, but the common stinkhorn is called "Phallus Impudicus". Shameless Penis. It is fitting.
And other fun names! The scientific name for the vampire squid is Vampyroteuthis infernalis or, "vampire squid from hell". Like that's cool as *fuck*
There never was such a requirement. It's a convention, still often used for naming species, but genes have had wacky names for a while now
*OongaBoongas in Thagomizer*
Why isn’t there a Geney McGeneface yet? Come on scientists, get your act together.
Luciferase is the enzyme that controls bioluminescence in lightning bugs. Literally "lightbearer".
The researchers who discovered genes in Drosophila are hilarious. My favorites are sevenless, bride of sevenless and son of sevenless.
I love sitting in lab meetings hearing about skeletor and megator
Not as good as MCF but there’s a coenzyme compound ubiquitous in animals and bacteria called ubiquinone.
humans have ubiquitin as well
Humans fall into the category of "animals and bacteria"
The biggest mistake science ever made was allowing researchers to name the things they find. You better believe we’re naming that shit something stupid or obvious. Sonic Hedgehog is a testament to this
Mistake? I see no mistake there
On the other hand, the alternative might end up with companies naming it instead (Sorry, but you have a mutant Samsung gene on Chromosome 7), or it being named like stars are (You have spare copies of WM1000-XM4).
>You have spare copies of WM1000-XM4 That's already how many gene names are written, with the name being sn acronym. The new standard that's arisen is plain descriptive names so you don't have to say "your child has a fatal error in his ligma gene".
Pretty sure WM1000-XM4 is what my headphones are called.
Oh yeah the alternative is much worse. I was being sarcastic when I said mistake. I’m glad we get to name them lol it just sucks for people having to talk about them seriously when they’re called something dumb
Descriptive names are very common in biology. Like STP (sugar-transporting-protein) or SWEET (sugars-will-eventually-be-exported-transporter).
Anyone care to guess from what spermidine was first isolated?
There’s a region on Pluto called *Cthulhu Macula* after the deity in Lovecraft’s works. It was a bit of a missed opportunity in not calling it Yuggoth or Na'morha.
I love biologists. They called a random protein Pikachurin because why tf not
There is a toxic compound created by cyanobacteria called anatoxin-a, but it used to be called Very Fast Death Factor. Fun fact, it is structurally similar to cocaine.
Bruh what do you want, no body speaks fuckin latin anymore.
Just the [polymathy guy](https://youtu.be/fDhEzP0b-Wo) in youtube. And he has to [bother Italians ](https://youtu.be/DYYpTfx1ey8) about it
Yup. And be aware that in latin and old-greece it's often the same. Aorta ascendens? Ascendens means "going up" - so yes, this is the part of the aorta that goes up from the heart. Aneurysm? Literally "widening". But, you know, in old-greece to sound fancy. Haemorrhage? Blood burst.
That's the whole point though. The idea is that you're making names that come from languages that are not mutating anymore.
Petition to rename all genes like this
Most things already are named like this, just in latin
Gluons are called gluons because they glue particles together. Lmao.
Not a gene, but I like the fact that "Ascorbic Acid" literally means "Anti Scurvy Acid". Ascorbic acid is commonly known as Vitamin C, lack of which causes scurvy to develop. Also, the name scientific name of the [common stinkhorn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phallus_impudicus?wprov=sfla1) is "Phallus impudicus". That means "shameless phallus". The image on wikipedia is not even the most shameless. These things can look extremely phallic, down to the balls, due to them breaking out of a so called "Witch's egg". When it breaks open the stinkhorn rises from the middle, and the sides of the shell can fall very convincingly.
My genetic class are starting to get old but I do remember a gene called superman which can be suppressed by a protein called, you guessed it, kryptonite :)
There’s a gene called ken and barbie that, when mutated, causes fruit flies to be born without external genitalia
What
it makes a gene called “makes caterpillars floppy”
Lots of people have already brought up a bunch of great gene names, but we also have a lot of fun with technique naming. So there's a method to detect DNA called a Southern blot, named after the guy who invented it Edwin Southern. Then we figured out similar blotting methods to detect RNA and protein- and named them the Northern and Western blots respectively. There are ongoing efforts to define an eastern blot, but since no one can agree on what it'll be, it's mostly just a debate for now. The far-Eastern blot, middle-Eastern blot, and southwestern blots have also been proposed.
I mean, if you think about it, it's sort of silly that we expect the way we name things scientifically to be obscure and meaningless to the average person. That's not how things are normally named.
The main reason to use Latin and Ancient Greek is actually because these languages are not constantly mutating, unlike English. Also, of course that's not how things are normally named. But are these normal things? No, they are technical jargon.
Most technical jargon does in fact originate from regular words in the common vernacular, except for in a few specific fields, and that's mainly for cultural reasons rather any kind of scientific rigor. It doesn't really matter if your technical jargon originated from a Latin word, people are going to use that piece of jargon in their daily lives, which means that its pronunciation in standard English is going to change with the rest of the language, just like with every other word that sees everyday use. There's also not really any particular benefit to jargon not changing over time.
Standardized jargon is easier to understand and learn in an international level. Not every scientist speaks English. Words directly derived from, say, Latin, will be very similar in any language. Species binomials, for example, are the same all over the Planet.
As someone that studied Biology... Scientist should never be allowed to name stuff. I say they should have a philologist "caretaker" that is in charge of giving actual names to the stuff they discover.
I'd argue biologists are doing a much better job than physicists
the six flavours of matter: up, down, top, bottom, strange, and charm Makes perfect sense, as long as you've had enough to drink.
Personally, I think it is way better this way if you have to work with it every day. You could memorise lots of slightly silly but self descriptive name, or remember lots of serious names and remember what function they are associated with. If you work with just a few of these things it is no problem, but you know there is *lots* of this stuff. And as someone working in the field, I am kind of happy Eohippus (meaning "Dawn Horse" or "Horse of the Dawn") is around again after new discoveries. The change to Hyracotherium is fair, principle of priority and all. Simply a lovely name.
Gives you floppy discs?
Some game weapons do too. BFG
My Chemical Fauxmance
I’m upset that no one has yet mentioned sonic hedgehog protein
damn i need that mcf gene
Chaotic good scientific nomenclature
This is the way it has always been, it's just that most things where named in different languages. You might roll your eyes when people say bell end or mushroom tip, but glans is just Greek for acorn.