Now celebrating its 40th year, Nikon Small World is widely regarded as the leading forum to recognize proficiency and photographic excellence of photography taken under the microscope. To select the winners, competition judges analyzed entries from all over the world covering subjects ranging from chemical compounds to up-close-and-personal looks at biological specimens. The 2014 winners will be revealed on October 30th. In 2014, the competition received over 1,200 entries from more than 79 countries around the world. (Photo by Dr. Igor Robert Siwanowicz/Nikon Small World 2014)

Rolando Pujol Rodriguez photographed the Cuban raft exodus in 1994, and twenty years later Enrique de la Osa took portraits of some of the people who made it to the United States, in this story which combines archive and present day images. Here: People put the finishing touches to a makeshift boat on a rooftop before lowering it onto a truck and launching it into the Straits of Florida towards the U.S., on the last day of the 1994 Cuban raft exodus in Havana, in this September 13, 1994 file photo. (Photo by Rolando Pujol Rodriguez/Reuters)

Women, dressed in traditional Japanese kimonos, cross a street in Kyoto, western Japan November 19, 2014. (Photo by Thomas Peter/Reuters)

Mount Sinabung volcano erupts, as seen from Tiga Pancur village, Karo Regency in Indonesia's North Sumatra province, in this October 8, 2014 file photo. (Photo by Y. T. Haryono/Reuters)

The Northern Lights glow green in a spectacular light show above a field of trees frozen solid with snow. (Photo by Jaak Sarv/Solent News & Photo Agency)

“Centuries ago, Inuit hunted the bowhead whale. At that time, whale hunting undoubtedly was part of a complex and very important ritual, if only because of the size of the catch. The position that the ancestors of today's Inuit occupied in the living world involved a relationship with the spirit that inhabited each animal but also their species”. (Photo by Robert Frechette/2014 Sony World Photography Awards)

A fox runs out onto the pitch before the start of the second half. Celtic League 2012/13, Round 19, Leinster v Ulster, RDS, Ballsbridge, Dublin, March 30, 2013. (Photo by Paul Mohan)