‘The Big Bang Theory’ season 6: Jim Parsons’ character inspires bee name

How’s this as a dose of flattery for the team over at “The Big Bang Theory”? As excited as they probably are to have the most-watched comedy on TV (and the highest-rated among adults 18-49, which matters more to advertisers), some scientists and Brazil apparently love the show so much that they were inspired to name a new special of bee after Dr. Sheldon Cooper.

The bee’s name is Euglossa bazinga, and it was discovered by a Brazilian scientist recently named Andre Nemesio from the nation’s Universidade Federal de Uberlandia. This was not just a mere tribute by name, though, as Memesio and his team of scientists also explained in a paper that there is some sort of practical connection when it came to the similarities between this bee and another species:

“Sheldon Cooper’s favorite comic word bazinga, used by him when tricking somebody, was here chosen to represent the character … Euglossa bazinga has tricked us for some time due to its similarity to E. ignita, what led us to use bazinga.”

One of the show’s executive producers in Steve Molaro also released a statement, and in it he expressed about as much gratitude as you can over something that is, at least in our mind, incredibly cool:

“We are always extremely flattered when the science community embraces our show … Sheldon would be honored to know that Euglossa bazinga was inspired by him. In fact, after Mothra and griffins, bees are his third-favorite flying creatures.”

There is one thing that we can say here without question about this discovery: had Sheldon been named after a bird, we have a feeling that he would not be nearly as happy.

If you want to watch a new promo for Thursday night’s new “Big Bang Theory” season 6 episode, be sure to head on over to the link here.

Photo: CBS