Researchers have named a sonically super-powered shrimp after Pink Floyd, because of its bright colour and pistol-quick ability to blast enemies with sound.
The newly-discovered species of pistol shrimp, dubbed Synalpheus pinkfloydi, uses a big, bright-pink claw to shoot shockwaves at its foes, in its habitat off the Pacific coast of Panama.
Pistol shrimp are just about the baddest little gunslingers in the ocean. Each one has an enlarged right claw that snaps shut with incredible speed, generating a momentary bubble that implodes with a blast of sound. The heat generated by the bubble's collapse is hotter than the surface of the sun.
The Pink Floyd pistol shrimp was discovered by a team of scientists from universities in Brazil, the United States and the U.K., who named the creature after their favourite band.
Their findings are published in the Apr. 12 edition of the journal Zootaxa.
The following video includes slowed-down video of the pistol shrimp's claw in action. Note that the shrimp in the video is not one of the Pink Floyd pistol shrimp.
