Boys pan for gold on a riverside at Iga Barriere, 25 km (15 miles) from Bunia, in the resource-rich Ituri region of eastern Congo February 16, 2009. Ituri is one of many areas of the country to have experienced bitter ethnic conflict between rival tribes in recent years. Massacres have left tens of thousands dead. It is this fighting that led U.S. authorities to take the unprecedented step of naming Congo in section 1502 of the Dodd-Frank financial regulation act, which says U.S.-listed companies that source gold, tungsten, tantalum and tin from Congo or its neighbours must assure the U.S. stock exchange regulator that their business is not helping fund conflict. (Photo by Finbarr O'Reilly/Reuters)

In this undated photo provided by the North Korean government, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un tries a weapon during his three-day inspection from Aug. 3 until August 5, 2023 at major munitions factories in North Korea. Independent journalists were not given access to cover the event depicted in this image distributed by the North Korean government. The content of this image is as provided and cannot be independently verified. Korean language watermark on image as provided by source reads: “KCNA” which is the abbreviation for Korean Central News Agency. (Photo by Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP Photo)

Serbian police officers of the Special Anti-Terrorist Unit pose for a picture in their base outside Belgrade October 8, 2014. When the killing of an unarmed black teenager by a white policeman in Ferguson, Missouri, in August sparked sometimes violent protests, the response of police in camouflage gear and armoured vehicles wielding stun grenades and assault rifles seemed more like a combat operation than a public order measure. Some U.S. police departments have recently acquired U.S. military-surplus hardware from wars abroad, but there are many law enforcers around the world whose rules of engagement also allow the use of lethal force with relatively few restrictions. But for every regulation that gives police wide scope to use firearms, there is another code that sharply limits their use. In Serbia, police may use measures ranging from batons to special vehicles, water cannon and tear gas on groups of people who have gathered illegally and are behaving in a way that is violent or could cause violence, but they may use firearms only when life is endangered. (Photo by Marko Djurica/Reuters)

A patient solves a rubik's cube at a temporary hospital converted from “Wuhan Livingroom” in central China's Hubei Province on February 10, 2020. In face of the outbreak of the novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic, Wuhan authorities have transformed public venues such as exhibition centers and gymnasiums into temporary hospitals. The hospitals have a large capacity of treating patients with mild symptoms and play an important role in isolating the source of infection and cutting off the routes of infection during epidemic prevention. The first batch of patients was hospitalized on Feb. 5. (Photo by Chine Nouvelle/SIPA Press/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

“Microscope images forge an extraordinary bond between science and art, said Hidenao Tsuchiya, Olympus America's Vice President and General Manager for the Scientific Equipment Group. We founded this competition to focus on the fascinating stories coming out of today's life science research laboratories. The thousands of images that people have shared with the competition over the years reflect some of the most exciting work going on in research today – work that can help shed light on the living universe and ultimately save lives. We look at BioScapes and these beautiful images as sources of education and inspiration to us and the world”. – OlympusBioScapes

Photo: Pretarsus of the third leg of a female drone fly (Eristalis tenax), ventral view, by Dr. Jan Michels, Institute of Zoology, Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel, Germany. (Photo by Olympus BioScapes)

“Masked gunmen publicly shot dead six suspected collaborators with Israel at a large Gaza City intersection Tuesday, witnesses said. An Associated Press reporter saw a mob surrounding five of the bloodied corpses shortly after the killing”. – Karin Laub via Associated Press

Photo: Palestinian gunmen ride motorcycles as they drag the body of a man, who was suspected of working for Israel, in Gaza City November 20, 2012. (Photo by Suhaib Salem/Reuters)

Venezuela's food shortages, inflation and crumbling medical sector have become such a source of anguish that a growing number of young women are reluctantly opting for sterilizations rather than face the hardship of pregnancy and child-rearing. Traditional contraceptives like condoms or birth control pills have virtually vanished from store shelves, pushing women towards the hard-to-reverse surgery. While no recent national statistics on sterilizations are available, doctors and health workers say demand for the procedure is growing. (Photo by Carlos Garcia Rawlins/Reuters)

Jacob's Well is a perennial karstic spring in the Texas Hill Country flowing from the bed of Cypress Creek, located northwest of Wimberley, Texas. The twelve foot (four meter) diameter mouth of the spring serves as a popular swimming spot for the local land owners whose properties adjoin Cypress Creek. From the opening in the creek bed, Jacob's Well cave descends vertically for about thirty feet (ten meters), then continues downward at an angle through a series of silted chambers separated by narrow restrictions, finally reaching a depth of one hundred and twenty feet (forty meters). Until the modern era, the Trinity Aquifer-fed natural artesian spring gushed water from the mouth of the cave, with a measured flow in 1924 of one hundred and seventy gallons per second (six hundred and forty liters per second) discharging six feet (two meters) into the air. The spring is the greatest source of water recharging the Edwards Aquifer.