Renowned amphibian and reptile photographer Matthijs Kuijpers has released his first book, “Cold Instinct”. Kuijpers says the aim of the work is “for the viewer to abandon the fear and negative thoughts that often surround these animals”. What’s left is the bizarre beauty of these creatures in their simplest form – no backgrounds and no distractions. Here: Mossy frog (Theloderma corticale). (Photo by Matthijs Kuijpers/The Guardian)

A fuzzy caterpillar on a basil plant in west Bengal, India on December 25, 2023. The caterpillar’s defence system is its hair, which has microscopic barbs that break off easily in the skin of would-be predators. (Photo by Soumyabrata Roy/NurPhoto/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

Underwater photographer of the year – winner. Dancing Octopus by Gabriel Barathieu (France). Location: Island of Mayotte, off the coast of south-east Africa. “Balletic and malevolent”, one judge said of this octopus, hunting in a lagoon. Barathieu waited until spring tides when there was just 30cm of water on the flats and plenty of light in the shallows. (Photo by Gabriel Barathieu/UPY2017)

The number of soldiers on both sides of WWII that were killed or went missing is just staggering. Now, the mystery surrounding one RAF pilot and what happened to him and his plane has been solved after 70 years. RAF flight Sergeant Dennis Copping climbed into his Kittyhawk P-40 aircraft in June 1942 to fly the plane to another airbase for repairs. He was never seen or heard from again.

A fledgling solar system containing deep within it enough water vapor to fill all the oceans on Earth five times, located in our Milky Way galaxy about 1,000 light years from Earth in the constellation Perseus. (Photo by Reuters/NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Masquerade performers participate in the annual Badagry cultural festival near the old slave port in Badagry, on the outskirts of Lagos, Nigeria August 27, 2016. (Photo by Akintunde Akinleye/Reuters)

National Geographic photographer Steve Winter has spent most of his adult life shooting wild cats. Photo: A 14-month-old cub, cooling off in a pond, is riveted by a deer that appeared near the shore. Tigers are powerful swimmers; they can easily cross rivers four to five miles wide and have been known to swim distances of up to 18 miles. (Photo by Steve Winter/National Geographic)

Mateo Santiago, Field Manager at Tropical Bamboo Nursery and Gardens, photographs rain water collecting in the corpse flower as Garden Manager Melanie Benson steadies a ladder. Santiago crinkled his nose up distastefully when he described its odor, which was at its worse Sunday night. “It smelled like a dead rat”. (Photo by Melanie Bell/Palm Beach Daily News)