The Malabar Giant squirrel – double the size of their grey relatives and measuring up to 36 inches (91.5 cm) from head to tail – lives deep in the forests of India. The athletic animals can leap an incredible 20 feet (6 m) between trees. Photographer Kaushik Vijayan, 39, snapped the animals in their native habit to produce these stunning images. Kaushik, from Kerala State, India, said: “Up until that point I had never heard about a squirrel like that or seen one. The sight was an absolute feast for my eyes. The squirrels fascinated me and I got excited to capture this beauty on my camera”. (Photo by Kaushik Vijayan/South West News Service)

Japanese sеx doll exhibition attracts hundreds of mannequin-fetishists to celebrate 40 years of the X-rated love bots in Tokyo, Japan on May 19, 2017. These silicon seductresses were the star of an extraordinary exhibition in Japan showcasing sеx dolls that cost as little as a second hand car. Japanese sеx doll maker Orient Industry (originally Orient made dolls for disabled people) were laying bare their dazzling bevvy of beauties in an extravaganza to mark its 40th anniversary this week. Here: Orient industry prides itself on its detail with two looking extremely real as they sit flirtatiously on a couch. (Photo by Masatoshi Okauchi/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

Oscar winner Charlize Theron explodes into summer in “Atomic Blonde”, a breakneck action-thriller that follows MI6’s most lethal assassin through a ticking time bomb of a city simmering with revolution and double-crossing hives of traitors. (Photo by Jonathan Prime)

“Catch of the Decade”. Can you guess what happened next? Photo location: Katmai National Park, Alaska, USA. (Photo and caption by Aaron Baggenstos/National Geographic Photo Contest)

A wild macaque monkey eats fruit dropped by pedestrians in a suburb of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on June 11, 2013. (Photo by Mohd Rasfan/AFP Photo)

Mayu adjusts Koiku’s kimono, as Koiku wears a protective face mask while posing for a photograph, before they work at a party where they will entertain with other geisha at Japanese luxury restaurant Asada in Tokyo, Japan, June 23, 2020. (Photo by Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters)

Beautiful, strange and occasionally alarming pictures from the shortlist for this year’s Wellcome image awards – which celebrate the very best in science photography and imaging – from an x-ray of a bat to a micrograph of a kidney stone. The exhibition opens on 12 March at three science centres and the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester. Photo: Scanning electron micrograph (SEM) of an Arabidopsis thaliana flower, also commonly known as thale cress. Some of the anthers are open, revealing pollen grains ready for dispersal. Arabidopsis was the first plant to have its entire genome sequenced and is widely used as a model organism in molecular and plant biology. Horizontal width of image is 1200 microns. Magnification 100x. (Photo by Stefan Eberhard/Wellcome Images)

This graceful husky appears to be smarter than your average dog having apparently mastered the art of walking on water. The soft-footed canine was photographed while making its way across a lake in northern Russia. Photographer Fox Grom captured a remarkable set of images after heavy rain fell on a frozen lake to create the amazing illusion. The 40-year-old, who works as an all-terrain vehicle driver, regularly walks his pet dogs, Alaska and Blizzard, near the natural beauty spot. “I always take pictures of my dogs whilst walking them but on this occasion there was an extraordinary phenomenon“, he said. “The ice was already very thick when it rained heavily making for a spectacular scene”. Here: Husky dog Alaska walks on water in Northern Russia, January 2015. (Photo by Fox Grom/Visual Press Agency)