Today (December 15) is Clash member Paul Simonon's 58th birthday, but another party is being thrown for the band's late singer-guitarist Joe Strummer. The punk icon has officially made a mark on the animal kingdom, since a newly discovered species of snail was recently named after him.
The snail is called A. strummeri, the Santa Cruz Sentinel reports. According to scientists, they look a bit like punk rock mollusks because their spiky shells resemble mohawks or spiked jackets.
"Because they look like punk rockers in the '70s and '80s and they have purple blood and live in such an extreme environment, we decided to name one new species after a punk rock icon," said scientist Shannon Johnson of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute.
These snails are the size of golfballs and can be found thousands of feet below sea level, near hydrothermal vents. They belong to the genus Alviconcha. Their yellow colouring means they don't particularly look like the dark-haired Strummer, but naming it after Johnny Rotten might not have the same ring to it.
This is hardly the first time that a newly found creature has been named after a musician. There's a Beyoncé fly, a Lou Reed spider, a Neil Young spider and a Greg Graffin prehistoric bird, among others.
The snail is called A. strummeri, the Santa Cruz Sentinel reports. According to scientists, they look a bit like punk rock mollusks because their spiky shells resemble mohawks or spiked jackets.
"Because they look like punk rockers in the '70s and '80s and they have purple blood and live in such an extreme environment, we decided to name one new species after a punk rock icon," said scientist Shannon Johnson of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute.
These snails are the size of golfballs and can be found thousands of feet below sea level, near hydrothermal vents. They belong to the genus Alviconcha. Their yellow colouring means they don't particularly look like the dark-haired Strummer, but naming it after Johnny Rotten might not have the same ring to it.
This is hardly the first time that a newly found creature has been named after a musician. There's a Beyoncé fly, a Lou Reed spider, a Neil Young spider and a Greg Graffin prehistoric bird, among others.
