13 fascinating animal species discovered in the last decade, from the 'Wakanda' fish to the world's tiniest frog

In 2013, a researcher uncovered decades-old specimens of the small carnivore at the Chicago Field Museum. They had been labeled as olingos, a similar species, but olinguitos live at a much higher elevation than olingos.

So a team trekked out into the clouds forests of Ecuador to find this animal — the smallest known member of the raccoon family.

"The age of discovery is not over," Kristofer Helgen, curator of mammals at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, told National Geographic at the time. "In 2013 we have found this spectacular, beautiful animal, and there's a lot more to come."

Solomon Islands locals had long spoke of the coconut-eating, 2-pound Vangunu giant rat, but no scientist had ever confirmed its existence. Then a park ranger caught one scurrying out of a tree that loggers had cut down.

"It's the first rat discovered in 80 years from Solomons, and it's not like people haven't been trying — it was just so hard to find," Tyrone Lavery, the mammologist who first confirmed the species with DNA analysis, said in a press release.

Scientists consider the giant rat to be critically endangered because of logging. The rat that Lavery found in the felled tree died soon after.

"It's getting to the stage for this rat that, if we hadn't discovered it now, it might never have gotten discovered," he said. "The area where it was found is one of the only places left with forest that hasn't been logged."

The fat-tailed dwarf lemur is the only known primate that hibernates for an extended period of time. To prepare for their seven-month sleep, the animals gorge themselves on fruits and flowers to store fat in their tails — up to 40% of their body weight.

The spiky lizard is threatened by habitat loss and attempts to collect it to keep as a pet.

At an average of just 7.7 millimeters long, the little frog inhabits southern Papua New Guinea and eats tiny invertebrates like mites.

"I think it's amazing that they're continuing to find smaller and smaller frogs," Robin Moore, an amphibian expert who wasn't involved in the finding, told National Geographic. "They're adapting to fill a niche that nothing else is filling."

The Araguaian river dolphin is the first new river dolphin species discovered in a century, according to National Geographic.

"We're in 2017, verifying the existence of new species, and even though resources are scarce, we are seeing an immense variety and richness of biodiversity," Ricardo Mello, who coordinates the World Wildlife Fund's Brazilian Amazon program, said in a press release about the finding. "This is a signal that we still have much to learn about the Amazon."

Though it's not technically a newly discovered species, conservationists had feared that the silver-backed Chevrotain was extinct.

Its deep-purple scales, set in a chain-link pattern, reminded scientists of the high-tech suit worn by the superhero Black Panther.

So they named the newly discovered, 2-inch-long fish "Cirrhilabrus wakanda." Even its common name, "vibranium fairy wrasse," gives a nod to the fantastical, near-indestructible metal that lines the Black Panther's superhero suit.

This animal resembles a bottom-dwelling jellyfish, but the team of deep-sea explorers that discovered it isn't sure what kind of creature it is. The deep-water denizen may belong to a new species, but that has yet to be confirmed.

The team that spotted it has discovered three or four new species on every deep dive they've done, but leader Victor Vescovo noted that this particular animal was "very, very unique looking" compared to the others.

The new species, called Zospeum tholussum, lives 980 meters (3,200 feet) below ground in the Lukina Jama-Trojama cave system in Croatia. There's no light that far below the Earth's surface, so the tiny snail has no need for sight.