An international team of researchers has discovered ten new spider species in Madagascar. All ten belong to the genus Anelosimus, which is in the family Theridiidae.

The names of some of them are very recognizable. For example, Anelosimus darwini honors Charles Darwin, the father of evolutionary biology, and Anelosimus wallacei is named after Alfred Russel Wallace, a contemporary of Darwin and co-author of the first paper on natural selection.

The others are A. ata, A. buffoni, A. hookeri, A. huxleyi, A. lamarcki, A. moramora, A. tita, and A. torfi.

Read more at:

– Systematics of the Madagascar Anelosimus spiders: remarkable local richness and endemism, and dual colonization from the Americas