Scientists tested pet-store 'superworms' on animal specimens and found the beetle...

Superworms, the larvae of Zophobas morio, are often used as animal feed Scientists tested pet-store 'superworms' on animal specimens and found the beetle larvae can clean skeletons for museums without harsh chemicals or bone damage.A common insect larva found in local pet shops is offering museums a safe, cheap, and gentle way to clean animal bones for research and display.According to a study published in the journal PLOS One, researchers at Ferdowsi University of Mashhad in Iran tested superworms—the larvae of the Zophobas morio beetle—to strip flesh from dead animals. The team found that these large larvae can pick bones completely clean without using harmful chemicals or causing damage to delicate bone structures.Overcoming museum space limits and specimen damageThe research began when the natural history museum at Ferdowsi University in Mashhad started running out of freezer space due to a steady flow of donated roadkill and injured birds."We don't have enough freezers to put these dead animals," said Niloofar Alaei Kakhki, a bioinformatician who worked on the study and is now based at the State Museum of Natural History in Stuttgart, Germany. "We have to find a way to clean t...