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)

Dr. Marius Kruger (C) and memeber of the Kruger National Park keeps the head of a rhino up during a white rhino relocation capture on October 17, 2014. The Kruger National Park relocated four rhinoceros from a high risk poaching area to a safer area as part of ongoing strategic rhinoceros management plan. (Photo by Stefan Heunis/AFP Photo)

In this Wednesday, December 2, 2015 photo, Dr. Gal Kelmer, head of the department of large animals, unties a horse after its operation at the University's Koret School of Veterinary Medicine in Rishon Lezion, Israel. “Horses have an instinctive response of flight from danger”, Kelmer said. “The minute they wake up they start trying to stand and run, even if they don't have control of their limbs. So then they fall”. (Photo by Oded Balilty/AP Photo)

Senior hurricane forecaster Dr. Jack Beven studies computer models as he tracks Tropical Storm Arlene at the National Hurricane Center on June 29, 2011 in Miami, Florida. Arlene is the first named storm of the 2011 Atlantic hurricane season and is moving at 8 mph, packing sustained winds of 50 mph as it heads towards the east-central coast of Mexico. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

Dr. Hannah Cobb from The University of Manchester looks at a viking sword during a viewing at CFA Archaeology of artefacts discovered from the first fully intact Viking boat burial site on October 18, 2011 in Edinburgh, Scotland. (Photo by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

Hollywood actress Malin Akerman helps King Digital Entertainment set the Guinness World Record for the World's Largest Hammock to celebrate the launch of its new game Paradise Bay on Wednesday, September 2, 2015, in Jersey City, N.J. (Photo by Charles Sykes/Invision for King World Entertainment/AP Images)

A French Air Force Mirage 2000 fighter jet takes off during the close air support (CAS) exercise Serpentex 2016 hosted by France in the Mediterranean island of Corsica, at Solenzara air base, March 17, 2016. Serpentex is an annual exercise that involves joint terminal attack controllers (JTACs) from 12 countries from March 7 to March 25, 2016. (Photo by Charles Platiau/Reuters)

Emily Ratajkowski arrives at The Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute Benefit Gala, celebrating the opening of “Manus x Machina: Fashion in an Age of Technology” on Monday, May 2, 2016, in New York. (Photo by Charles Sykes/Invision/AP Photo)