I think that might just be the original and it simply is symmetrical to that degree. I found a few more examples of "cryo-em center slices" and I've yet to find one that doesn't have really strong symmetry down to the small dot patterns.

A different paper, this figure shows a number of cryo-em images, including a simulation, and they all show the same degree of pattern symmetry https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Central-sections-through...

First figure in this third paper also shows symmetry of small patterns https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/jvi.00990-22

Thanks, those examples make it pretty clear.

I still think it’s super weird that it looks exactly like an EM image, but is generated. Anyway, good to know!