Web-based, interactive "Anatomical Atlas of Flies"

[DQE]

At first glance, this seems especially helpful for people like myself who have little formal background in entomology.

http://www.ento.csiro.au/biology/fly/fly.php#

From the home page for this atlas:

The Anatomical Atlas is a collaboration between CSIRO and ABRS. It is part of an ABRS-funded identification key to fly families of Australia and US NSF-funded research into the evolutionary history of flies.

The Atlas can be used as a standalone resource to accompany any fly key or as an aid for teaching fly anatomy. The atlas works both ways: users can either click on a part to discover its name, or click on a name to discover the location and shape of a part. Common synonyms for anatomical terms are available from the information button that appears when terms and structures are highlighted.

The atlas relies on high resolution digital images of flies, and allows the user to change magnifications to see fine detail. The Atlas uses examples from the 4 major fly groups, representing different anatomical expressions of flyness. The user can learn fly anatomy by examining all the different parts of a single fly or highlight a particular structure and navigate between flies. In this way the user can recognize how the structure changes shape and form across this vast taxonomic spectrum. This is a graphical representation of transformational homology.

[ChrisR]

Nice find - it looks well done to me(, though I know nothing about flies).

[johan]

What a good learning tool, thanks