Tuukka Rask, the star goalie of Boston Bruins hockey team, has a new honor he can tack up in his locker next to his stick and gloves -- he's had a newly identified species of East African wasp named after him.
The new species, now named Thaumatodryinus tuukkaraski, has been found in Kenya by a research team including entomologist Robert S. Copeland, a fervent fan of Boston sports teams who has kept up with them despite relocating to Africa some two decades ago.
Rask, who usually sees his name in the sports pages, will now get a mention in the Acta Entomologica Musei Nationalis Pragae science journal.
"This species is named after the acrobatic goaltender for the Finnish National ice hockey team and the Boston Bruins, whose glove hand is as tenacious as the raptorial fore tarsus of this dryinid species," the researchers wrote in their journal submission.
There were some more reasons for the honor, they said; the research effort that led to the species discovery was funded by the government of Rask's home country of Finland; the wasp's coloration is a mix of yellow and black, evoking the Bruins' colors; and the front legs of the species' females possess claspers that vaguely resemble goalie gloves.
Copeland, with the International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology in Nairobi, was raised in Newton, Massachusetts.
He says he named the wasp for Rask to show admiration for the goalie and his "outstanding career in one of the most difficult positions in sports."
When asked how he felt about his latest accolade, Rask replied he has heard about cats and dogs in New England being named Tuukkaa, but not any species, insect or otherwise.
"That's funny," he said. "That's pretty neat."
The entomologists described the new species, T. tuukkaraski, as an "ectoparasitoid" that lives off other insect species. The female wasp lays her eggs on host bug's larvae, and when the eggs hatch the larval wasp burrows inside its host and eats it.
Despite that less-than-appealing behavior, Copeland says, he was pleased to be able to name the species after one of his sports heroes.
"You get a little bit of immortality if someone names a species after you, because species will always have the name after you're gone," he explains.
The International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature provides specific guidelines concerning the naming of species in published studies.
The name should be at least pronounceable and chosen in good taste, it says.
"Authors should exercise reasonable care and consideration in forming new names to ensure that they are chosen with their subsequent users in mind and that, as far as possible, they are appropriate, compact, euphonious, memorable, and do not cause offence," the guidelines state.
Rask, for his part, says he's not offended, and he's happy to be a kind of wasp as well as a Boston Bruin.
"We're the B's," he says. "It's flattering, I guess."
