“Serendipity is a real grabbing force of science,” says Léo Laborieux as he shares his experience describing his new species of scorpion. While at a remote research station in the Colombian rainforest, Léo found a handful of scorpions that exhibited a unique venom ‘flicking’ behavior. Armed only with his phone and a few basic supplies, Léo documented the behavior, diagnosed the scorpions as being a new species, and came to fascinating conclusions about venom biomechanics. In this episode he brings us deep into the world of scorpion venoms and shares his love of these creatures and their startling diversity.
Léo Laborieux’ paper “Biomechanics of venom delivery in South America’s first toxungen-spraying scorpion” is in the December 2024 edition of the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society.
It can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1093/zoolinnean/zlae161
A transcript of this episode can be found here: Léo Laborieux - Transcript
New Species: Tityus achilles
Episode image credit: Léo Laborieux
Léo’s first new species from a mountain near his hometown: https://doi.org/10.57800/faunitaxys-10(47)
Follow Léo on Instagram @lhommedesboas
Or connect on Bluesky @6legsandup.blsky.socialRead his papers on Researchgate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Leo_Laborieux?ev=hdr_xprf
Scrappy Science: https://www.scrappyscience.org
Global Alliance of Community Science Workshops: https://www.communityscienceworkshops.org
Other scorpion episodes from this podcast:
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Music in this podcast is "No More (Instrumental)," by HaTom (https://fanlink.to/HaTom)
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