A New Wasp Takes a Famous Literary Name

Tuesday is Ernest Hemingway's 127th birthday, and it turns out the author has picked up an unusual posthumous honor: A tiny iridescent wasp discovered in China now bears his name, per Phys.org. Researchers working in the Xinjiang region identified the new wasp species and dubbed it Chlorocytus papahemii—a nod to "Papa Hemingway." You can see photos here. The discovery came during research into a beetle that ravages sugar beet crops, and the Hemingway wasp plays a rather complex role in that.

In the journal Zookeys, the research team from Xinjiang University, France's CIRAD, and Russia's Academy of Sciences laid out the chain: The weevil beetle Lixus subtilis destroys sugar beet crops. A different wasp, Eurytoma curculionum, attacks the larvae of the beetle. And the Hemingway wasp attacks the Eurytoma wasp. While that seems to ultimately help the beetle, the researchers say it's vital they understand how all the pieces fit together if they hope to save the crops. As they write—in a very non-Hemingway-like sentence—"developing biological methods of controlling plant pests should be based on an understanding of real, comprehensive regulatory systems within complete food chains."