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)

A lone male cheetah is set upon by a pack of African wild dogs. Peter Haygarth had been following the dogs as they hunted in Zimanga Private Game Reserve in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. On first encountering the cheetah, the dogs were wary, but as the rest of the pack arrived, their confidence grew and they began to encircle the cat. Peter kept his focus on the cat’s face. In a few minutes the spat was over as the cheetah fled. (Behaviour: mammals category). (Photo by Peter Haygarth)

An Afghan hunter shoots at a duck in Laghman province, Afghanistan on May 30, 2018. (Photo by Reuters/Parwiz)

Ayah, 37, weeps as she is embraced by a police officer during a demonstration against the Danish face veil ban in Copenhagen, Denmark, August 1, 2018. (Photo by Andrew Kelly/Reuters)

Hippo keeper Atthapon Nundee, 31, takes pictures of a two-month-old female pygmy hippo named “Moo Deng” who has recently become a viral internet sensation, at Khao Kheow Open Zoo in Chonburi province, Thailand, on September 16, 2024. (Photo by Athit Perawongmetha/Reuters)

A sunflower “smiles” in a field in Tokyo on August 7, 2014. Some 20,000 sunflowers were enjoyed by visitors to the area this week. (Photo by Yoshikazu Tsuno/AFP Photo)

A performer wears a face shield at a shopping center on New Year's Eve during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Bangkok, Thailand on December 31, 2020. (Photo by Soe Zeya Tun/Reuters)

A girl carries bottles of water filled from a charity tank at a camp for internally displaced people (IDPs) near Sanaa, Yemen on March 25, 2022. (Photo by Khaled Abdullah/Reuters)