Each year Nikon Small World recognizes the excellence of photography taken under the microscope. The contest showcases the beauty and complexity of life. Anyone interested in microscopy and photography can enter the contest and in its 42nd year, Nikon Small World received 2,000 entries from 70 countries. Here: 11th Place; Scales of a butterfly wing underside (Vanessa atalanta). (Photo by Francis Sneyers/Nikon's Small World 2016)

French photographer Bettina Rheims poses next to her work, two days before the opening of her exhibition “Pourquoi m'as-tu abandonnée ?” (Why did you abandon me?) at the Museum of Photography Charles Negre, in Nice on June 13, 2024. (Photo by Valery Hache/AFP Photo)

Participants prepare backstage during Belarus bodybuilding and fitness championship in Minsk April 25, 2015. (Photo by Vasily Fedosenko/Reuters)

A mahout splashes water on his elephant in the river Sabarmati on a hot summer day in Ahmedabad, India, May 20, 2015. (Photo by Amit Dave/Reuters)

A pair of gloved hands are dwarfed by the furry paws of Boris the Polar Bear at the Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium's animal health care hospital Saturday, February 23, 2013 in Tacoma, Washington. (Dean J. Koepfler/Tacoma News Tribune/MCT)

A junk boat sails in to dock as a woman sits on the pier in the central district of Hong Kong on May 15, 2019. (Photo by Isaac Lawrence/AFP Photo)

Challenger Deep Submersible is shown for the first time at the Virgin Group Media Announcement by the President & CEO of Virgin Airlines Sir Richard Branson at the Newport Harbor Yacht Club on April 5, 2011 in Balboa, California. (Photo by John M. Heller/Getty Images)