Abstract
English for specific purposes (ESP) of biologists is one of the most dynamically developing variants of modern English that provides for efficient communication within life sciences exhibiting new tendencies in naming objects, facts and phenomena discovered by science. The article looks into a massive use in genetics – rightly considered the basis of modern biology due to its universal laws of heredity and variability – of expressive and colourful figurative terminological and nomenclature units based on cognitive metaphors and metonymies. The harmonious combination of rational, emotional and intuitive ways of scientific cognition allows the biological community to cope successfully with cognitive overload and psycho-emotional stress in the modern conditions of exponentially increasing volume of genetic information. It is demonstrated that the unusually metaphorical, figurative and humorous units of biological ESP carry out a new function of emotional discharge that requires no less attention than the traditional epistemic, cognitive and communicative functions which have already been studied quite well.
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