Adrienne Sipe (L) and Brooke Gilliam of Washington D.C. leap off a snow podium they made near the U.S. Capitol in Washington February 13, 2014. A deadly and intensifying winter storm packing heavy snow, sleet and rain pelted a huge swath of the U.S. East Coast on Thursday, grounding flights and shuttering schools and government offices. (Photo by Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)

Beautiful, strange and occasionally alarming pictures from the shortlist for this year’s Wellcome image awards – which celebrate the very best in science photography and imaging – from an x-ray of a bat to a micrograph of a kidney stone. The exhibition opens on 12 March at three science centres and the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester. Photo: Scanning electron micrograph (SEM) of an Arabidopsis thaliana flower, also commonly known as thale cress. Some of the anthers are open, revealing pollen grains ready for dispersal. Arabidopsis was the first plant to have its entire genome sequenced and is widely used as a model organism in molecular and plant biology. Horizontal width of image is 1200 microns. Magnification 100x. (Photo by Stefan Eberhard/Wellcome Images)

Rick Sorenson, owner of the Rio Ramaza Marina, wades in the Sacramento River after securing an old paddlewheel boat on his property as the river makes its way up the levee on Garden Highway in Sacramento, Calif., Monday, January 9, 2017. (Photo by Hector Amezcua/The Sacramento Bee via AP Photo)

Young women flash the victory sign in front of a bonfire as Turkish Kurds gather during Newroz celebrations for the new year in Diyarbakir, southeastern Turkey, on March 21, 2017. Newroz (also known as Nawroz or Nowruz) is an ancient Persian festival, which is also celebrated by Kurdish people, marking the first day of spring, which falls on March 21. (Photo by Ilyas Akengin/AFP Photo)

Actress Laetitia Casta attends the “The Meyerowitz Stories” screening during the 70th annual Cannes Film Festival at Palais des Festivals on May 21, 2017 in Cannes, France. (Photo by Stephane Mahe/Reuters)

Nyibol Lual, 13 years old, helps her family to prepare the land for cultivation on May 31, 2017, in Panthau, Northern Bahr al Ghazal, South Sudan. The family has a small land where they cultivate sorghum. An estimated 63 per cent of the population in Northern Bahr al Ghazal is experiencing severe food insecurity, according to the latest Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report. The situation is particularly bad in Aweil West and Aweil South counties, where the exhaustion of household food stocks and growing dependence on financially inaccessible markets have left the population facing Emergency levels of food insecurity. (Photo by Albert Gonzalez Farran/AFP Photo)

Cottbus Aviation Museum specialists prepare a Soviet Tupolev 134 A passenger plane for dismantlement in Gruenz, Germany, 10 July 2017. The team is preparing the 29 ton plane for transport from a garden in Gruenz to the Aviation Museum in Cottbus. The plane' s owner acquired it in 1991 and transported it with nine tractors and numerous helpers to his vegetable garden where he planned to open a cafe. The plane, formerly used by the East German Stasi for anti- terror operations training, is 30 metres long. (Photo by Jens Büttner/Zentralbild/DPA)

Londoners enjoy a “Silent Night” as Big Ben falls silent, London, UK on August 21, 2017. ose Allerston from Clapham, London said “After a stressful day in the office, I couldn't think of anything better than going home and climbing into bed – but when I saw this bed opposite Big Ben I just couldn't resist getting in for a snuggle”. (Photo by Imagewise Ltd/Rex Features/Shutterstock)