“Thunderstruck”. Summer stom. A super cell formed off the coast of New Zealand, intensified and swept across Christchurch and North Canterbury, February 23, 2014. Photo location: Christchurch, New Zealand. (Photo and caption by David Hardy/National Geographic Photo Contest)

“Aurora Hunters”. Photographers taking part in a photography tour on the Lofoten Islands in Norway, pull over on the side of the road to take a photo of their first ever Aurora Borealis after spotting it from their tour bus. Photo location: Rystad, Lofoten Islands, Norway. (Photo and caption by Mark Gee/National Geographic Photo Contest)

Most people know Nikon as a purveyor of pro and consumer-grade digital cameras. But the company's expertise with optics bleeds over into related markets – it's one of the science community's major suppliers of microscopes. And each year the company asks the community to send it some of their favorite images of tiny objects. A panel of scientists and journalists have chosen the best of this past year's submissions, which Nikon has placed on its Small World site.

Photo: Honorable Mention. “Snow crystal, illuminated with colored lights (5x)”. (Photo by Dr. Kenneth Libbrecht, California Institute of Technology (Caltech), Department of Physics, Pasadena, California, USA)

A large Mantle or Desk Clock featuring a fossil ammonite at its center, carved from the South American wood Keolbra with radiating Walnut spines. The clock hangs on a round, Plexiglass back supported by a wood base (Bubinga). The clockworks is a quartz, high-torque movement that runs on a single AA battery.

Dinah Jane, from left, Normani Kordei, Lauren Jauregui, and Ally Brooke of Fifth Harmony perform a medley at the MTV Video Music Awards at The Forum on Sunday, August 27, 2017, in Inglewood, Calif. (Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP Photo)

A tourist train is decorated with Christmas lights in Bogotá, Colombia on December 10, 2017. (Photo by Jaime Saldarriaga/Reuters)

Taliban fighter, Mostashhed from Wardak province, looks on as he visits Kabul for the first time as hundreds of Taliban fighters take a day off to visit the amusement park at Kabul's Qargha reservoir, at the outskirts of Kabul, Afghanistan on October 8, 2021. (Photo by Jorge Silva/Reuters)

English television, radio presenter and DJ Maya Jama was alluring as Medusa at Maya Jama's annual Halloween party on October 30, 2021 in London, England. (Photo by mayajama/Instagram)