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Nikon disqualifies Small World in Motion winner over AI

Updated 2 times since CLSTR started tracking revisions of this situation.

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2026-10-10 00:02 UTC → 2026-10-12 12:26 UTC · added ~~removed~~

Nikon has disqualified the grand prize winner of its 16th annual Small World in Motion microscopy competition, Ning Xu of Tsinghua University, following an investigation into allegations of artificial intelligence use and biological inaccuracies. The controversy centered on a video depicting cilia movement in a child with primary ciliary dyskinesia. Researchers had raised concerns that biological structures appeared to “pop in and out of existence” and did not match known dimensions, while some identified a Google SynthID watermark. Although Dr. Xu maintained that an unsupervised neural network was used only to “distinguish and visualize features in the reconstructed grayscale images” rather than to generate the cilia or their motion, Nikon concluded the entry violated competition rules. Nikon clarified that the disqualification was based strictly on eligibility rules and was not a judgment of the entrant’s professional reputation or intent. The company also announced plans to revisit its evaluation procedures for future competitions. As a result of the disqualification, Nguyen Nam Nhat of Vietnam has been named the new winner for a video featuring a roundworm and a single-celled ~~organism.~~ Dileptus microorganism. The decision also resulted in a shift for other runners-up, including Benedikt Pleyer of Germany, Andrew Moore of the US, and Patrick Hickey of Scotland.

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