Minature masterpieces

Just because something eludes the naked eye, doesn’t mean it isn’t beautiful as images from the Nikon Small World Photography Competition show It’s odd to think that some of the most beautiful things in Nature are hidden from our naked gaze. By virtue of an evolutionary journey that seems to have optically short changed us – the human retina can claim about 200,000 photoreceptors per mm², yet a buzzard has an incredible 1,000,000 per mm², both nothing compared to the giant squid which has an estimated 1,000,000,000 per mm² – much of the beauty of nature is hidden from us.

We have the wonderful advances in microscopy to thank for our ability to peer into this erstwhile hidden realm - and what a stunning realm it can be. Cue the Nikon Small World Photography Competition, which showcases the beauty and complexity of life as seen through the light microscope.

Since 1974, Nikon have rewarded the world’s best photomicrographers who take stunning photos during their everyday work. A photomicrograph – as well as being a technical document that can be of great importance to science – can also be an object of beauty.

We’ve managed to get our hands on some of the winners and runners-up from this year – it is indeed wonderful to look at nature in miniature.

[caption id="attachment_25568" align="alignleft" width="187" caption="1st Place Dr. Igor Siwanowicz Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology Martinsried, Germany Portrait of a Chrysopa sp. (green lacewing) larva (20x) Confocal"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_25572" align="alignright" width="200" caption="2nd Place Dr. Donna Stolz University of Pittsburgh Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA Blade of Grass (200X) Confocal stack reconstruction, Autofluorescence"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_25580" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="3rd Place Frank Fox Fachhochschule Trier Trier, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany Melosira moniliformis, living specimen (320X) Differential Interference Contrast"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_25582" align="alignright" width="200" caption="4th Place Dr. Robin Young The University of British Columbia Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada Intrinsic fluorescence in Lepidozia reptans (liverwort) (20X) Live mount, Confocal microscopy"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_25715" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="5th Place Alfred Pasieka Hilden, Germany Microchip surface, 3D reconstruction (500x) Incident light, Normarski Intereference Contrast"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_25586" align="alignright" width="200" caption="6th Place Dennis Callahan California Institute of Technology Pasadena, California, USA Cracked gallium arsenide solar cell films (50X) Brightfield"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_25717" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="7th Place Gabriel Luna UC Santa Barbara, Neuroscience Research Institute Santa Barbara, California, USA Retinal flatmount of mouse nerve fiber layer (40X) Laser Confocal Scanning"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_25718" align="alignright" width="200" caption="8th Place Dr. Bernardo Cesare Department of Geosciences Padova, Italy Graphite-bearing granulite from Kerala (India) (2.5X) Polarized light"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_25719" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="9th Place Dr. Jan Michels Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel Kiel, Germany Temora longicornis (marine copepod), ventral view (10X) Confocal, Autofluorescence and Congo Red Fluorescence"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_25720" align="alignright" width="200" caption="10th Place Joan Röhl Institute for Biochemistry and Biology Potsdam, Germany Daphnia magna (freshwater water flea) (100X) Differential Interference Contrast"][/caption]