Lali carries balloons to sell on a beach in Mumbai, India, Sunday, October 11, 2015. The United Nations General Assembly marks October 11 as the International Day of the Girl Child, to recognize girls’ rights and the unique challenges girls face around the world. (Photo by Rafiq Maqbool/AP Photo)

Most people know Nikon as a purveyor of pro and consumer-grade digital cameras. But the company's expertise with optics bleeds over into related markets – it's one of the science community's major suppliers of microscopes. And each year the company asks the community to send it some of their favorite images of tiny objects. A panel of scientists and journalists have chosen the best of this past year's submissions, which Nikon has placed on its Small World site.

Photo: Honorable Mention. “Snow crystal, illuminated with colored lights (5x)”. (Photo by Dr. Kenneth Libbrecht, California Institute of Technology (Caltech), Department of Physics, Pasadena, California, USA)

This plane looks like it's bound for the moon as it shoots across the sky. Photographer Sebastien Lebrigand was impressed he could even see the lights on the jet's wings in this stunning silhouette. (Photo by Sebastien Lebrigand/Solent News)

A group of colorful row houses are reflected on to the top of a black car parked on 3600 block of N street in the Georgetown section of Washington DC, February 16, 2017. (Photo by John McDonnell/The Washington Post)

A U.S. Army soldier with the 10th Special Forces Group and his military working dog jump off the ramp of a CH-47 Chinook helicopter from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment during water training over the Gulf of Mexico as part of exercise Emerald Warrior 2011 on March 1, 2011. (Photo by Tech. Sgt. Manuel J. Martinez/U.S. Air Force)

Bathers brave the cold waters of the North Sea as they take part in the annual Boxing Day dip at Redcar Beach on December 26, 2019 in Redcar, England. The event attracts hundreds of people each year who take to the cold water wearing fancy dress as they help to raise money for a number of charities. (Photo by James Glossop/The Times)

Palestinian groom Mohamed abu Daga and his bride Israa wear face masks amid the COVID-19 epidemic, during a photoshoot at a studio before their wedding ceremony in Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip, on March 23, 2020. Authorities in Gaza confirmed on March 22 the first two cases of novel coronavirus, identifying them as Palestinians who had travelled to Pakistan and were being held in quarantine since their return, as the United Nations warned of potential disastrous outcomes to an outbreak given the high poverty rates and weak health system in the coastal strip, under Israeli blockade since 2007. (Photo by Said Khatib/AFP Photo)

Womentake a selfie in front Russian military vehicles during a rehearsal for the WWII Victory Parade in Moscow on June 17, 2020. Russia's President Putin on June 24 will preside over a massive military parade to mark Soviet victory in World War II, which was postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic. (Photo by Dimitar Dilkoff/AFP Photo)