![\"Renderings](\"https:\/\/cdn.sci.news\/images\/enlarge13\/image_14604e-Eciton-hamatum.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nRenderings of an exemplary Antscan specimen: subsoldier of Eciton hamatum. Image credit: Katzke et al., doi: 10.1038\/s41592-026-03005-0.<\/p>\n
To build such an expansive digital library, Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology researcher Julian Katzke and colleagues sourced ethanol-preserved ant specimens from partner institutions, museum collections and experts around the world.<\/p>\n
After the researchers sorted the specimens by species and caste, they brought them to the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology<\/a> (KIT) in Germany for high-throughput X-ray micro-CT scanning, which is comparable to medical CT scans but in much higher magnification.<\/p>\n A synchrotron particle accelerator produced a high-intensity X-ray beam to rapidly scan a huge number of specimens, and a robotic sample changer rotated and swapped out the specimens every 30 seconds.<\/p>\n This enabled the creation of 2D image stacks that could then be used to construct 3D models.<\/p>\n While useful, the raw image files depicted ant specimens in contorted poses \u2014 a far cry from the lifelike models that the scientists hoped to build.<\/p>\n The 3D images reveal internal structures like muscles, nervous systems, digestive systems and stingers at micrometer resolution.<\/p>\n The models can easily be animated or incorporated into virtual reality worlds for research, education or entertainment.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve estimated that if we were to carry out this project with a lab-based CT scanner, it would take six years of continuous operation,\u201d Dr. Katzke said.<\/p>\n \u201cWith the setup at KIT, we scanned 2,000 specimens in a single week.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cTo do this manually would have taken years, so without these computational tools it basically would never have been done,\u201d added Professor Evan Economo, a researcher at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology and the University of Maryland.<\/p>\n