A PhD student from the University of Adelaide has discovered a new species of parasitic wasp. The insect's lifecycle consists of injecting a living caterpillar with eggs so that the baby larvae can slowly eat the caterpillar from the inside out. In a sense, the larvae grow to be caterpillar-torturing wasps. As reported in the Journal of Hymenoptera Research, this new wasp is one of three new species in which this particular parasitic behavior has been observed.

This predatory behavior is similar to the aliens in the eponymous movie franchise, so the new species was called Dolichogenidea xenomorph. The wasp is about 0.5 centimeters in length, which might not seem much to us but is definitely plenty for the poor caterpillars.

"Dolichogenidea xenomorph acts as a parasite in caterpillars in a similar way that the fictional Alien creature does in its human host," lead researcher Erinn Fagan-Jeffries, PhD student at the University's School of Biological Sciences, said in a statement. "The wasp is also black and shiny like the alien, and has a couple of weird traits for the genus – so xenomorph, meaning 'strange form', fits really well."

D. xenomorph was discovered in Queanbeyan in the Australian state of New South Wales. The researchers believe the wasp has a much wider distribution, possibly across the entire country. These types of wasp play an important role in regulating the population of caterpillars, and similar species have been used to control agricultural pests. These three new species are a great find, with many other Australian wasps waiting for names and descriptions.

"We collected over 500 wasps from a particular subfamily, from all over Australia, and determined that there were more than 200 different species just in that relatively small number of specimens," added senior author Professor Andrew Austin, Fagan-Jeffries’ supervisor.

"There are currently only 100 species described in this subfamily for Australia, so we've at least doubled the number of known species. It's important to document our biodiversity so that we can make informed conservation decisions about our environment. Some of these wasps may potentially be useful biological control agents for pests, but we just don't know about them yet."

This is not the only aptly named wasp that has been in the news this week. A whole bunch of these winged insects with curious names were announced a few days ago.