Antscan, a pioneering new platform with micrometer-resolution 3D insect reconstructions, is poised to revolutionize the field of insect morphology. That’s why a team of scientists and artists recently launched an innovative project. More importantly, it provides researchers and enthusiastic amateurs alike with unprecedented access to detailed anatomical data of ants. The platform, populated by 3D models of the detailed internal structures of these fascinating insects, provides an interactive tour through their body and biology.
The Antscan initiative originated in an inspiring partnership. Evolutionary biologist Cameron Currie, biodiversity scientist Evan Economo, entomologist Julian Katzke, and many others joined forces to see it through. The team utilized micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) beamlines at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology’s synchrotron light source facility in Germany to scan 2,200 preserved ant specimens. This extensive dataset encompasses scans of 792 species across 212 genera, covering a significant portion of the described diversity within the ant family.
Microscopic Insights into Ant Anatomy
Antscan provides users the opportunity to rotate, zoom, and virtually dissect ants via an interactive online portal. This feature allows you to do a detailed, head-to-toe comparison of dozens of different anatomical pieces. You’ll get to zoom into the armored exoskeleton, internal muscles, nerves, digestive tracts and needlelike stingers of the ants.
These unprecedented scans created by Antscan were made possible by a truly unique source of super-bright, highly coherent X-rays produced at a classical particle accelerator. These higher dimensional imaging modalities produce very high-resolution internal anatomy in just seconds. One of the project’s creators, Julian Katzke, highlights the depth of the dataset. He hopes it can do justice to their diverse applications in the sciences, but just as importantly for the arts, outreach, and education as well.
That’s just a taste of what those high-resolution scans are showing us, though—the outer sculpted body of this beautiful specimen. They further explain how this biomineral “armor” layer looks like a bright sheath surrounding the cuticle. This layer is most heavily represented in the fungus-farming ants, yet almost entirely missing from most other branches of the ant tree. Descriptions of enigmatic adaptations, such as sexual dimorphism in blackwood borer, elucidate evolutionary adaptations and functional morphology within this diverse group of insects.
A New Era for Entomological Research
Researches are delving into Antscan’s vast dataset. They hope that it will be a catalyst for a fundamental change in how morphology is studied. Just as big data sequencing projects transformed DNA research, Antscan hopes to bring the same improvement to comparative work between ant species. As Cameron Currie noted, “It offers a truly fantastic opportunity for comparative work across ants,” exemplifying the promise of cross-species analysis.
Those high-resolution images that Antscan produces open the floor to comparison between species and spotting of trends across the entire ant family tree. Researchers now have the opportunity to systematically explore the distribution of biomineral armor layers. They may be able to study the differences in skeletal morphology between closely related genera. Such high-resolution detail had only been achieved before through a long process of physical dissection or destructive sampling.
Evan Economo emphasized the broader implications of this technology beyond entomology: “This is kind of like having a genome for shape.” He imagines that libraries of organismal form will someday start to reshape the fields of robotics and engineering. These open source libraries would deliver game-changing efficiencies for biomechanical-inspired designs.
A Permanent Resource for Future Generations
One of Antscan’s most significant contributions is its role as a permanent, high-resolution record of life’s architecture. Antscan offers an anatomical time capsule that future researchers will be able to query and revisit. This is extraordinarily important as specimens continue to degrade and wild populations continue to disappear. This approach is in step with the increasing focus on digital preservation assets in scholarly research.
As Marek Borowiec put it, “the true potential of this dataset will be unlocked once these approaches are implemented.” He pointed out that there will be even more exciting applications for the future. While the rich dataset itself is publicly available, its standardized format at scale makes it uniquely accessible to scientists from every corner of the globe.
He added, “The more people that can use and engage with the stuff in our museums, whether that be physically or virtually, the more value they return.” This democratization of data lays the foundation for collaboration and innovation across an interdisciplinary spectrum.
