Credit: Greg Pintilie/Stanford University; Greg Stewart and Muyuan Chen/SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
At left, an image made with cryogenic electron tomography (cryo-ET) reveals that some coronavirus particles bristle with spikes, while others are almost bald. At right, researchers used animation tools to create this high-resolution 3D image of a virus particle and its spikes, which are shaped like chicken drumsticks and bend every which way.