On the eve of the 2013 Melbourne Cup, Australian scientists have re-assembled its greatest winner, the New Zealand horse Phar Lap.
The champion thoroughbred's heart is preserved in a jar of formaldehyde at the National Museum of Australia in Canberra, his hide is mounted at the Melbourne Museum, and his skeleton is at the Museum of New Zealand.
Phar Lap's body parts were reunited - virtually - for Melbourne Cup day.
A CSIRO's robot at the National Museum of Australia has hooked up to museums in Melbourne and New Zealand via a high-speed broadband connection, to allow some Australian students to view Phar Lap's skin and bones on the same screen - digitally stitching the champion horse back together.
"While the classroom sweep can be a bit of fun on Melbourne Cup day, we are giving students a much richer cultural and educational experience that they'll hopefully remember for a long time," says Robert Bunzli, manager of the museum robot program at the museum.
The technological trickery was apparently a hit.
According to the CSIRO's blog, one student's verdict was: "OMG whoever invented the robot is a genius."
