“The Newcastle funnel-web, Atrax christenseni— dubbed Big Boy—is a totally new species. The ‘true’ Sydney Funnel-web, Atrax robustus centres on the North Shore of Sydney and the Central Coast, and the Southern Sydney Funnel-web, Atrax montanus, is a resurrected species name from 1914,” Loria explained.

Researchers say they used anatomical and DNA comparisons to study different populations of the Sydney funnel-web spider – one of the world’s deadliest spiders – and found there were three species, only two of which were previously known to science.

A new type of spider, nicknamed the ‘big boy’, has officially been discovered in Australia- and immediately became one of the deadliest arachnids in the world. The Sydney funnel-back spider has held the title of world’s most venomous spider for many years,

A larger, more venomous, longer-fanged species of one of the world’s deadliest spiders has been discovered by scientists in Australia...

A bigger and more dangerous version of the world's deadliest spider has been discovered by boffins in Australia. The Newcastle funnel-web spider was named after the port city, 100 miles north of Sydney,

Dr Helen Smith, an arachnologist (spider biologist) at the Australian Museum and one of the authors of the study suggested naming the newly identified species from Newcastle after Christensen’s hard-work to get the sub-species acknowledged by the scientific community for nearly twenty years.

Scientists in Australia have discovered a ‘giant’ species of Sydney funnel-web spider, one of the world’s deadliest. Nicknamed ‘Big Boy’, the species was originally found by Kane Christensen, a spider enthusiast and ex-head of spiders at the Australian Reptile Park. in the early 2000s near Newcastle, 170 km north of Sydney.

The deadly 3.54-inch-long spider Atrax christenseni is among the most dangerously venomous spiders for humans.