About Endless Forms Studio

Resources for communicating about anatomy in biological and biomedical informatics applications.

Goals of our work

We create resources that represent the anatomy of humans and other organisms. We depict typical anatomy, developmental anatomy, variations, and malformations. Our work unites visual representation with ontological representation. Our goal is to create representations of anatomy that will serve as standards in biomedical software applications and education. We also develop software tools to demonstrate use of our anatomical resources to guide other developers in incorporating our work into larger projects. We intend for our work to be widely used. See details of each project page for licensing details.

Team

Our core team is based at the University of Kentucky:
  • Melissa Clarkson
    Melissa Clarkson, PhD MDes MA
    Assistant Professor Division of Biomedical Informatics, College of Medicine
    areas of work: information design, knowledge representation, natural science illustration
  • Todd Detwiler
    Todd Detwiler, MS
    Lead software developer
Past team members:
  • Kristen Platt
    anatomist
  • Noah Perry
    software developer
  • Ava Krueger, MA
    medical illustrator
We collaborate with other researchers and domain experts, including:
  • Joe Hefner, PhD
    affiliation: Michigan State University
    contribution: osteological traits and morphology
  • Lynn Schriml, PhD
    affiliation: University of Maryland
    contribution: ontology-based integration of diseases and anatomy
  • Amanda Saltzman, MD
    affiliation: University of Kentucky
    contribution: morphology of pediatric urogenital anatomy
  • Emilie K. Johnson, MD, MPH, FACS
    affiliation: Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago
    contribution: morphology of pediatric urogenital anatomy
  • Julian Dupuis, PhD
    affiliation: University of Kentucky
    contribution: insect anatomy

Funding

We are supported by funding from the National Institutes of Health. See individual project pages for specific information about our grants.

Non-profit organization

Endless Forms Studio became a nonprofit corporation registered in the Commonwealth of Kentucky in January 2024. This nonprofit holds the copyright of our work, ensuring that the resources we develop can be managed and maintained into the future without reliance on any single individual or institution. The members of the Board of Directors are Dr. Melissa Clarkson, Dr. Kristen Platt, and Dr. Lynn Schriml.

The origin of our name

The name “Endless Forms” references the last line of Charles Darwin’s well-known book, On the Origin of Species:

There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.

Charles Darwin