发现：婆罗洲岛竹节虫为世界最长昆虫

A stick bug from the island of Borneo measuring well over a foot in length has been identified by researchers as the world's longest insect, British scientists said Thursday.

The specimen was found by a local villager and handed to Malaysian amateur naturalist Datuk Chan Chew Lun in 1989, according to Philip Bragg, who formally identified the insect in this month's issue of peer-reviewed journal Zootaxa. The insect was named Phobaeticus chani, or "Chan's megastick," in Chan's honor.

Paul Brock, a scientific associate of the Natural History Museum in London unconnected to the insect's discovery said there was no doubt it was the longest still in existence. That assessment was also confirmed by Marco Gottardo, an entomologist at Italy's Natural History Museum and Aaron T. Dossey, a researcher at the University of Florida in Gainesville who studies the insects.

Looking like a pencil-thin shoot of bamboo, the dull-green insect measures about 22 inches, if its twig-like legs are counted. Its body length is 14 inches, beating the previous record held by Phobaeticus kirbyi, also from Borneo, by about an inch.

Stick bugs have some of the animal kingdom's cleverestcamouflage. Although some use noxious sprays or prickly spines to deter their predators, generally the bugs assume the shape of sticks and leaves to avoid drawing attention.

"Their main defense is basically hanging around, looking like a twig," Brock said. "It will even sway in the wind."

英国科学家于上周四称，在婆罗洲群岛发现的一种身长超过1英尺的竹节虫为目前世界上最长的昆虫。

据研究人员菲利浦．布拉格称，这个竹节虫标本于1989年被当地的一个村民发现，并被交给了马来西亚籍业余自然科学家陈爵伦拿督。为了纪念陈爵伦，这个标本被命名为“陈氏竹节虫”。布拉格撰写的鉴定报告在本月的《Zootaxa》学术期刊上发表。

伦敦自然历史博物馆的研究员保罗．布洛克称，毫无疑问，这种竹节虫是目前世界上最长的昆虫。意大利自然历史博物馆的昆虫学家马可．戈塔多和盖恩斯维尔市佛罗里达大学的昆虫学家亚伦．T．多塞也对这一鉴定结果表示认可。

“陈氏竹节虫”呈深绿色，外形像一节铅笔粗细的竹子，如果算上枝形腿，它的总长达22英寸（约55厘米）。它的体长为14英寸（约35厘米），比此前的记录保持者、同样来自婆罗洲岛的“富氏竹节虫”长1英寸。

竹节虫是动物王国中的“伪装大师”。它们通常会伪装成树枝或树叶逃避敌害；有时它们也会利用毒气或多刺的节肢来对付天敌。

布洛克说：“竹节虫的主要自卫手段是装成树枝挂在树上，有时甚至还能随风摇摆。”

Vocabulary: 

camouflage:伪装；采用伪装手段