Our enchanting world… under a microscope: From a miniature crystal castle to spores that look like rich caramel apples, these were voted the best microscopic photographs of 2023
A miniature crystal castle of golden rutilated quartz. The dark phosphorescent armor of a blue-black weevil. Slime molds form spores that resemble rich caramel apples. An alien alien pineapple, nested like the stamen and stigma of a hibiscus flower bud.
These eerily beautiful images – and more than 80 others – were honored this year as part of the Nikon Small World Photomicrography Competition.
The Japanese camera maker and imaging technology company has been holding the competition, which highlights the photographic achievements of those who capture images through a microscope, for almost half a century since 1974.
For this year’s competition, an estimated 1,900 photographs were submitted to an open call by photographers and scientists from 72 to land. The photos were then judged by a panel of five people, including a cell biologist from Princeton and the photo editor of the BBC’s Science Focus magazine.
This year’s top prize went to neuroscientist Hassanain Qambari, a researcher at the Lions Eye Institute’s Center for Ophthalmology and Visual Science in Perth, Australia. Qambari’s photo, a microscopic, composite photograph of the optic nerve head of a rodent taken via confocal microscopy, also had a practical purpose: helping patients with diabetes.
Qambari’s work at the Lions Eye Institute focused on the issue of diabetic retinopathy, a complication of diabetes that can lead to blurred vision or blindness due to damage to the blood vessels near the back of the eye.
“Current diagnostic criteria and treatment regimens for diabetic retinopathy are limited to late-stage disease onset,” Qambari said in a press release, “with irreversible damage to retinal microvasculature and function.”
He hopes his retinal imaging work will help in the early detection and reversal of the disease, which affects about 1 in 5 people with diabetes.
A literally blistering close-up of the tip of a match as it ignites along a matchbox won second place, an entry by German digital artist Ole Bielfeldt.
Third place went to Malgorzata Lisowska, a healthcare consultant based in Warsaw, Poland her image of an accidental valentine growing within a cluster of breast cancer cells.
But all top 86 images out Nikon’s competition this year are wonders to behold. Below are twelve that DailyMail.com can’t stop thinking about.
This castle-like image of gold rutile in quartz was created by Danny J. Sanchez of Mineralien LLC in Valley Village, California. Sanchez used reflected light at a sixfold magnification
These budding or fruiting slime molds (Trichia crateriformis) photographed by Dr. Frantisek Bednar from Zilinsky, Slovakia, were captured using a stacking technique popular with stargazing photographers, but focusing on these tiny organisms at five times magnification. The image was one of dozens of runners-up classified as ‘Images of Distinction’ by Nikon’s judges
Another image made sharper by image stacking, this blue-black weevil (Metapocytus sp.) plague was photographed by Dr. Andrew M. Posselt of the Department of Transplant Surgery at the University of California, San Francisco
On the left is an icy image that is actually a 25x enlargement of crystallized sugar syrup made by Dr. Diego García from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid in Spain using a polarized light method. On the right, a literally blistering close-up of the tip of a match as it ignites along a matchbox. The entry by German digital artist Ole Bielfeldt won second place this year
A stacked, fluorescent photo of a Acropora sp. with individual polyps with symbiotic zooxanthellae. Dr. Pichaya Lertvilai of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California captured the images at five times magnification
A cryptocrystalline micrometeorite resting on a #80 test sieve taken by Scott Peterson of New Hope, Minnesota. Peterson used 20X (objective magnification)
Venomous fangs of a small tarantula re-taken by John-Oliver Dum in Germany. 10X (objective magnification)
Purified mouse embryo taken by Dr. Arthur Chien of Macquarie University in New South Wales, Australia
Diatoms (single-celled algae) arranged on the head of a pin by Jan Rosenboom in Germany. 4X (objective magnification)
Motor neurons cultured in a microfluidic device for separation of cell bodies (top) and axons (bottom). Green – microtubules; Red – growth cones (actin). Photo taken by Melinda Beccari and Dr. Don W. Cleveland of the University of California, San Diego Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine in La Jolla. Image uses confocal, fluorescence and 20x magnification