Stunning microscopic footage showing “waves” inside a developing fly embryo has won the 14th annual Nikon Small World in Motion competition.
These mitotic waves occur during cell division when tissues are formed and move in the fruit fly embryo (Drosophila melanogaster fruit fly). Understanding these biological processes in flies could help uncover the forces that shape embryos across the animal kingdom. Many of these fundamental processes can go awry in humans, leading to neurological disorders, birth defects, and cancer.
“The beauty of basic research in biology is that what we learn in one organism often applies to other organisms and has the potential to contribute to the understanding of human disease,” Bruno Vellutinia researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden, Germany, who filmed the fly embryos, said in a statement.
Vellutini’s video was selected from 370 entries as the overall winner of the competition on Tuesday (September 17).
He captured the film using light sheet microscopy, a technique in which a “sheet” of focused laser light shines across a sample to produce high-resolution 3D images of living cells, tissues and organisms.
Vellutini’s video shows cell division occurring in waves during fly embryogenesis — the process by which a fertilized single-celled egg develops into a multicellular organism.
“Fruit fly embryos [that] “In our homes, in our kitchens, and in our trash, everything is going through the same processes as shown in the video. I believe this video is so impactful because it shows us how these amazing cell and tissue dynamics happen every day, all around us — even in the most ordinary living things,” Vellutini said.
Vellutini’s video was chosen as the winner for capturing “the stunning movement in the microscopic world that helps deepen our understanding of the processes that shape life itself,” panel judge Eric Flem, senior manager of communications and CRM at Nikon Instruments, said in the statement.
