These stunning coloured images show detailed x-ray images of everything from skulls to light bulbs. Artist Paula Fontaine, from Westminster Massachusetts, created the images using a process called digital map painting. To create the images the x-ray emission source – the head of the machine on an arm which focuses the beam – is placed over the object. Paula then retreats behind a shielded screen before activating the x-ray exposure. Here: Brain storm, conceptual composite X-ray. (Photo by Paula Fontaine/Barcroft Media)

Coloured X-ray of a barn owl. A physicist has used X-ray to create an extraordinary collection of artwork. Arie van't Riets pictures reveal birds, fish, monkeys and flowers in an incredible new light. The 66-year-old, from Bathmen in the Netherlands, began X-raying flowers as a means to teach radiographers and physicians how the machine worked. But after adding a bit of colour to the pictures, the retired medical physicist realised the potential for an exciting new collection of art. (Photo by Arie van't Riet/Barcroft Media)

A large bull walrus returns to the shores of Prins Karl Forland after diving and feeding on clams. (Photo by Paul Nicklen/National Geographic). Svalbard, Norway, 2011

A family of baby brown bears appear to be dancing to Ring a Ring o' Roses as their mother relaxes behind a tree nearby. At just a few months old, two young males and one female gather in a circle, clutch each others' hands and begin to dance to the popular nursery rhyme. It's almost like a scene from a school playground as the bears joyfully play together, tapping their feet and moving around in a circle. (Photo by Valtteri Mulkahainen/Solent News & Photo Agency)

Buddy Bears are a series of painted, life-size fibreglass bear sculptures originally developed in Berlin, Germany. The first Buddy Bear was created by the German businesspeople Klaus and Eva Herlitz, in cooperation with the sculptor Roman Strobl in 2001.

People wearing bear fur costumes dance during the annual bear ritual gathering in Comanesti, Romania, Friday, December 30, 2016. In pre-Christian rural traditions, dancers wearing colored costumes or animal furs, toured from house to house in villages singing and dancing to ward off evil, in the present the tradition has moved to Romania's cities too, where dancers travel to perform the ritual for money. (Photo by Vadim Ghirda/AP Photo)

The X-47B prototype on Tuesday flew off an aircraft carrier and into the history books. Today's achievement, the first-ever catapult launch of an unmanned aircraft from the flight deck of a carrier, promises to open up a new chapter in the annals of naval aviation. Photo: An X-47B pilot-less drone combat aircraft is launched for the first time off an aircraft carrier, the USS George H. W. Bush, in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Virginia, May 14, 2013. The U.S. Navy made aviation history on Tuesday by catapulting an unmanned jet off an aircraft carrier for the first time, testing a long-range, stealthy, bat-winged plane that represents a jump forward in drone technology. (Photo by Jason Reed/Reuters)