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

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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.

Australian scientists have discovered a bigger, more venomous species of the Sydney funnel-web spider, one of the world's deadliest.

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