malayanus

Malayanus is a Latin adjective used in biological nomenclature as the specific epithet in species names. In binomial names it follows the genus name and is always written in lowercase. The epithet malayanus usually signals a geographic association with the Malay Peninsula, Malaysia, or the broader Malay Archipelago in Southeast Asia. The form is masculine; feminine and neuter variants include malayana and malayanum, used to agree with the gender of the genus.

The most well-known use is Helarctos malayanus, the Malayan sun bear, a small bear native to Southeast Asian forests including parts of the Malay Peninsula, Borneo, and Sumatra. Beyond this, malayanus has been used in various other animal and plant taxa described from the region, but it does not denote a universal trait.

In taxonomy the epithet encodes provenance rather than phenotype. Names may change with taxonomic revisions, and the same geographic signal may appear differently in new combinations. Overall, malayanus is a geographic epithet that reflects historical naming from sources tied to Malaya and surrounding Southeast Asian regions.