Intersex spider named after One Piece character

Scientists have named an intersex spider after genderfluid character Inazuma in animated pirate series One Piece .

It may not be the same as finding long-lost treasure, but a team of researchers at the Chulalongkorn University Museum of Natural History, in Thailand, discovered the new species of “half-male, half-female’ spider in Bangkok.

The new specimens, now known as Damarchus Inazuma, are gynandromorphic, meaning they display both male and female sexual characteristics.

Depending on the sexual dimorphism – the differences between males and females – of a species, gynandromorphic animals can look striking.

Damarchus Inazuma spiders, much like the outfit of their namesake, are distinctly “split” in half. Their cephalothorax – the head and thorax – displays female orange characteristi