Ted Kinsman is a scientific photographer that specializes in creating images for books, magazines, and television. His particular areas of interest are in x-ray radiography, high-speed photography, Scanning electron microscopy, and time-lapse cinematography. His work has appeared in numerous books and magazines ranging from Discover Magazine to Forbes. Recently his work has appeared on Gray's Anatomy and CSI New York. In addition to running 
B.N. (Bobbie) Sullivan has a strong affinity for the sea and everything in it. She first learned to dive in 1970 and has since logged thousands of dives. A wish to document the marine life she encountered prompted her to learn underwater photography more than 20 years ago. More recently, she began to write about the marine life she has photographed. A research psychologist by profession, she approaches her subject matter with the mindset of a scientist, but targets her writing to a general readership in whom she hopes to foster an appreciation for the ocean and its inhabitants.
B Jefferson Bolender is Training Coordinator of the State of Arizona's
program for disability awareness and assistive technology. Through
her travels she always has a camera at hand to photograph everything
from people to technology and nature. As a teacher of elementary
education, special education and art, her interests include a wide
array of subject matter with an emphasis on documentation with an
artist's eye.
Steve Jurvetson enjoys rocketry and photography and especially the pursuit of both in the Black Rock Desert. Some action photos and video links can be found 
Alex Wild is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he works on the molecular phylogenetics of various groups of insects. He is also a part-time photographer whose images appear in such venues as Ranger Rick, Smithsonian, BBC Wildlife, and even ScienceBlogs.
A few days ago I noticed the search term "Malagasy Mystery Ant" showing up in the stats for my other blog. This puzzled me, as it wasn't a phrase I was familiar with. So I googled it.
All mentions of the term trace back to a caption in the New York Times slide show from last week. Goodness. I- your humble blogger- had coined it myself, in a haze of deadline fever while submitting images for the slide show. And then, apparently, I forgot all about it.
Am I going senile already? I hope not.
The problem with insects is their sheer number. There are millions of species. How many million we can't say, and our guesses even as to the appropriate order of magnitude are tentative.* Certainly, there are too many for any language to absorb into common parlance. Most pass their lives entirely unnoticed by humans, and any specialists who happen to work on them are content with the scientific names. This is to say, most insects have no common name at all.
So when pressed to produce a memorable English name in a situation where the Latin may be inappropriately technical, such as a newspaper caption, entomologists often simply invent something. Like, Malagasy Mystery Ants.
In my defense, the name is appropriate. We know very little about the biology of the genus Mystrium. These uncommonly seen ants occur in tropical regions throughout the old world but are most diverse in Madagascar. They are cryptic predators, odd little creatures belonging to an ancient radiation of ants, the Amblyoponinae, that are best known for their habit of drinking the hemolymph of their own larvae. Some species have an odd reproductive quirk whereby the fertile females are not the bulky queens common to most ants, but lithe red insects dwarfed by the large black workers that leave the nest to pursue prey.
I've never understood why some natural history societies attempt to regulate common names. There's no point. We already have universal nomenclature in the Linnean system, and maintaining two sets of regulated names is redundant. The beauty of common names is that they aren't regulated, leaving them fluid, free to reflect local sensitivities.
*for more on the diversity of life, see Rob Dunn's book Every Living Thing.
Life Science
Comments
What a strange ant. Looks nice though. :)
Posted by: liudvikas | May 6, 2009 9:20 AM
Well, the type species of the genus is Mystrium mysticum Roger after all, so I think your subconscious just aptly kicked in under the deadline pressure.
As for why the scientific name? Roger does not explains but marvels at the beauty of its morphology. I guess your explanation is right and he was as puzzled by this ant back when he described it in 1862 as we still are today.
Posted by: Roberto Keller | May 6, 2009 10:56 AM
My 4 year old and I have been enjoying your excellent ant photography. Apparently, nothing is more fascinating to small males of our species than seeing tiny bugs magnified to monstrous proportions on the computer screen!
Imagine my son's delight when we found our very own bug to photograph and show off. Any hints on identifying beetles for those of us who are not entomologists? We live in far far Upstate NY and have never seen the like here before. (you can see the beetle here: http://lunasbaublebilities.blogspot.com/2009/05/maxxs-bug.html
Posted by: Virginia Burnett | May 6, 2009 9:43 PM
If author is reading this, please answer the question:
What equipment are you using for those amazing photos, I bet it is beyond my finances, but still I'm curious.
Posted by: liudvikas | May 7, 2009 3:43 AM
Alex describes his technique in other posts, but his main weapon is a Canon digital camera and this:
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/lenses/mp-e-65.shtml
Everything else is technique and the way to get to carnegie hall: practice, practice and practice.
(And willing to get bitten by ants waiting for the perfect shot)
Posted by: KeithB | May 8, 2009 5:10 PM