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Nikon Disqualifies Small World in Motion Winner Over Generative AI, Names New First Place

Nikon has disqualified the original first-place video in its Small World in Motion contest after the entrant acknowledged using AI-assisted processing, and named Nguyen Nam Nhat of Vietnam the new winner.

AI News Feed · 2026-10-10 04:10

The company said in a statement on the contest that it had been reviewing the video since last week, after skepticism about its authenticity circulated online. The Verge reported that the entry, submitted by Dr. Ning Xu, was presented as showing "tiny, hair-like structures called cilia moving in the airway of a child with the respiratory condition PCD." In a comment on LinkedIn, Xu acknowledged using AI, writing that "an unsupervised neural-network method was subsequently used for AI-assisted post-processing to distinguish and visualize features in the reconstructed grayscale images from the super-resolution optical imaging."

According to a BBC report cited by Ars Technica, some researchers said the video contained structural abnormalities, with cell features appearing and disappearing in a way not seen in actual cellular biology, and others identified what appeared to be AI watermarks embedded in the source files. Xu denied that AI was used "to generate the experimental movie, the cilia, or their motion," Ars Technica reported.

Nikon said its decision to disqualify the video "should not be interpreted as a judgment of the entrant's professional reputation, scientific contributions, or intent." The company also said it plans to "revisit rules and evaluation procedures for future competition entries." Xu's video has been removed from Nikon's website, and the updated rankings give first place to Nguyen Nam Nhat of Vietnam for a video of a tiny roundworm and a single-celled organism.

The remaining winners each moved up one position. Benedikt Pleyer of Bavaria, Germany, placed second with a video of jellyfish larvae suspended in water droplets; Andrew Moore of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in the United States placed third with a video of synchronized cell division in neighboring cells; Patrick Hickey of Hypha Research Ltd. in Edinburgh, Scotland, placed fourth with a video of the dynamics of mitochondria and chloroplasts in Turtle Vine leaf cells; and Igor Adameyko placed fifth with a video of a small, colorful sea slug, Cyerce kikutarobabai, in motion.

The Nikon Small World in Motion competition was founded in 2011 as a spinoff of the company's Small World Photomicrography Competition, which has been held since 1974. Both are intended to showcase the beauty and complexity of subjects seen through the light microscope, one through still photographs and the other through photovideography and time-lapse imaging.