Extraordinary Microscope Images

I never get tired of looking at these micro shots, it is amazing to see the detail and color of such tiny worlds. These are the result of The Olympus BioScapes International Digital Imaging Competition.
The past couple of years we have seen more and more of these and it only strengthens my appreciation for the wonderfully complex organic world of ours.

1st Place: Daddy longlegs
Germany's Igor Siwanowicz won first place in the Olympus BioScapes competition for this image, showing the eyes of a spiderlike bug known as a Daddy Longlegs or Harvestman. The picture has been color-coded to reflect depth, and shows the lenses (two large ovals), the retinas and the optic nerves.

7th Place: Damselfly's eye
Germany's Igor Siwanowicz won seventh place in the Olympus BioScapes competition for this view of the eye of a damselfly. This projection of a series of confocal microscope images shows the regular, crystal-style architecture of the eye of Enallagma cyathigerum. The area covered in the photo measures about 0.6 by 0.8 millimeters, or 0.02 by 0.03 inches.

5th Place: Primordium
This picture by Iranian horticulturist M. Reza Dadpour shows the primordium (bud) of the weedy flower Tribulus sp. during its final stages of development. More than 100 images, focused at different depths, were composed to produce this view. The image won fifth prize in the 2010 Olympus BioScapes competition.

8th Place: Beetle leg
German researcher Jan Michels' eighth-place image shows a lateral view of the adhesive pad on the leg of a beetle (Clytus sp.). The view was captured using autofluorescence.

9th Place: Wildflower seeds
China's Yanping Wang won ninth place in the 2010 Olympus BioScapes competition for this image of wildflower seeds, captured using brightfield reflected light.

2nd Place: Rat brain
California's Thomas Deerinck won second place in the Olympus BioScapes competition for this image of a structure known as the hippocampus, within the brain of a rat. The tissue was stained to reveal the distribution of glial cells (blue), neurofilaments (green) and cell nuclei (yellow).

3rd Place: Coral
The third-place image in the Olympus BioScapes competition shows a solitary coral (Fungia sp.). The tentacle tips, called acrospheres, are visibly enhanced. This picture was taken by James Nicholson, a coral researcher in South Carolina.

10th Place: Weevil head
The Olympus BioScapes International Digital Imaging Competition honors the world's most extraordinary microscope images of life science subjects. This 10th-place picture, by British photographer Laurie Knight, shows the face of a weevil (possibly Curculio nucum or Curculio glandium). The image was captured using a lighting technique known as episcopic illumination.

4th Place: Diatoms
Fanlike diatoms, representing the species Licmophora juegensii, have latched onto red algae in this fourth-place picture by Germany's Wolfgang Bettighofer. Licmophora cells are able to move and, supported through light sensors, locate a place with suitable light exposure. Then they produce a sticky stalk that keeps them attached to their home base. The sample was collected from brackish water in the Baltic Sea.

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I really like the grandaddy long leg (harvestman), the colors are incredible!
I hope you enjoyed!

Peace,
spec

Beautiful!
I really like the beetle leg, daddy long-leg, and weevil.

Great photos!

Wow, these are amazing! It is so unreal how technology allows us to look at something like that! I love the coral

reply to post by speculativeoptimist


Thank you for sharing these. Are the colors natural or artificial? I'm sorry if it's a silly question but the images seem so unreal.

reply to post by nicolee123nd

That weevil reminds of Starship Troopers
Thanks for the reply!
spec

reply to post by inthemass

Thanks inthemass
spec

reply to post by dct1988

Thanks for the reply dct, glad ya enjoyed!
spec

reply to post by Ek Bharatiya

Yes the colors are real EK, so much that they look surreal.
These things look like art and I can see hanging one up like an abstract painting.
Thanks for the reply!

spec

Some additional micro photos if interested.
here

spec

Beautiful!
Daddy Long legs freak me out totally, and seeing them at this scale doesn't really help my phobia......but it is still wonderfully artistic.

Wow amazing pictures. They are very colorful and detailed.

Thank you stars and Infamous

spec