These Stunningly Detailed 3D Images of Ants Showcase the Remarkable Diversity Across Their Many Species
Scientists used a game-changing technique to scan about 2,200 preserved specimens in just one week to create the Antscan database
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An estimated 20 quadrillion ants belonging to more than 15,000 known species currently crawl across the Earth. Those huge numbers make it hard for scientists to wrap their heads around the different behaviors and bodily compositions of all these diverse critters.
Now, a new database allows researchers and insect enthusiasts alike to browse through stunningly detailed 3D images representing hundreds of ant species. The Antscan digital library, described March 5 in the journal Nature Methods, will help advance research on the insects and can serve as a template for future digitization projects.
“We’re just at the beginning of even looking at the data,” says study co-author Evan Economo, an entomologist at the University of Maryland, to K.R. Callaway at Scientific American. “There’s many other things you could do with the project, and I’m sure there are really amazing things in there that people will dig out.”
To build the database, Economo and his colleagues spent years collecting ethanol-preserved ant specimens from institutions across the world, culminating in nearly 2,200 individual insects representing at least 792 species. (Some ant specimens’ species have not yet been fully described.) Then, they used a special tool called a synchrotron particle accelerator to scan the specimens with X-rays. Each ant’s scans took only 30 seconds, allowing all samples to be imaged in just one week.
The new method, called synchrotron micro-CT, involves more intense X-rays than traditional CT techniques and is therefore much faster. “We’ve estimated that if we were to carry out this project with a lab-based CT scanner, it would take six years of continuous operation,” says study co-author Julian Katzke, an evolutionary biologist at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, in a statement.
Did you know? Another unique use of a synchrotron particle accelerator
Researchers have started using this special tool to uncover an erased copy of an ancient star catalog, which was written onto parchments during the fifth or sixth century C.E. (The original star catalog was completed in 129 B.C.E.) Medieval monks reused the parchments to record writings of John Climacus, also known as Saint John of the Ladder.
The first renderings created from the scans were “kind of all crinkled up,” because they replicated the contorted shapes of the specimens, Economo tells the New York Times’ Ari Daniel. Artificial intelligence helped the team reposition the images into more natural positions. The work resulted in interactive digital images that showcase the ants’ inner and outer structures.
The database has already contributed to research. In a study published in December, Economo and some of his collaborators drew on Antscan data to examine the relationship between exoskeleton strength and ant colony size. They found that species with thinner outer layers often had larger colonies, meaning they trade individual protection for greater numbers, which might help these ant varieties adapt to new environments.
Antscan is transformative, says Jessica Ware, curator and chair of invertebrate zoology at the American Museum of Natural History, who wasn’t involved in the work, to the Times. “I don’t use this word lightly.”
Daniel Kronauer, a neuroscientist at Rockefeller University who studies ants and was not involved in the study, tells Warren Cornwall at Science that the library will make data more accessible. “It kind of democratizes the process a little bit,” he says. “You don’t need access to museum collections.”
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The research team plans to continue refining the digitizing process. For instance, some components, such as transforming the images into 3D body parts, aren’t automated and require time-consuming work, Economo tells Science. They also want to scan more types of invertebrates outside of ants.
What’s more, the work could help bring creatures to life in settings beyond research. “When specimens are digitized, we can build libraries of organisms that can streamline their use from scientific laboratories to classrooms to Hollywood studios,” Economo says in the statement.
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