GoKawiilNikon microscopy contest winner accused of using AI-altered image, Small World in Motion
Ning Xu, an optical engineer at the National University of Singapore, won Nikon's 2024 Small World in Motion competition for a video of cilia from a child with primary ciliary dyskinesia. Microscopy experts subsequently questioned the video on social media, saying the red, purple and blue structures shown beneath the cilia appear biologically implausible and may have been produced or altered using an AI tool. The competition's blog post on the winning entry did not describe or explain these colored structures.