An employee walks past a rotary dredge working at an open-cast iron ore mine of the Stoilensky mining and concentration plant (GOK), owned by the Novolipetsk (NLMK) steel mill, in the city of Stary Oskol in Belgorod region, Russia, August 4, 2015. (Photo by Maxim Shemetov/Reuters)

A couple takes a selfie as Hoa Binh hydroelectric power plant opens the flood gates after a heavy rainfall caused by Talas typhoon in Hoa Binh province, outside Hanoi, Vietnam July 20, 2017. (Photo by Reuters/Kham)

Visitors were able to pick their own flowers on this sunflower trail at Gloagburn Farm near Perth, in Scotland on September 13, 2021. Crawford Niven, a farmer, said he was inspired to make the trail, which is made up of nearly 200,000 plants, after seeing similar ones in America and Australia. (Photo by South West News Service)

The full moon rises behind the cooling towers of the nuclear power station in Philippsburg, Germany, 06 May 2020. The nuclear power plant in Philippsburg was completely shut down by 31 December 2019. According to the operator EnBW, the two cooling towers are expected to be demolished by blasting on 14-15 May 2020. (Photo by Ronald Wittek/EPA/EFE)

Smoke and steam billow from Belchatow Power Station, Europe's largest coal-fired power plant powered by lignite, operated by Polish utility PGE, in Rogowiec, Poland on November 22, 2023. (Photo by Kacper Pempel/Reuters)

Afghan security stands guard as a tractor eradicates a field of young poppy plants May 25, 2011, in Argu District, Badakshan, Afghanistan. (Photo by Paula Bronstein/Getty Images)

A young girl navigates her way around Hampton Court maze in the spring sunshine on May 2, 2009 in London, England. The Hampton Court maze is one of the most famous hedge mazes in the world and was planted between 1689 and 1695 by George London and Henry Wise. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

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)