Merit Prize Winner: “A Well Earned Rest in the Sahara”. This photo of Moussa Macher, our Tuareg guide, was taken at the summit of Tin-Merzouga, the largest dune (or erg) in the Tadrat region of the Sahara desert in southern Algeria. Moussa rested while waiting for us to finish our 45-minute struggle to the top. It only took ten minutes of rolling, running, and jumping to get back down. The Tadrat is part of the Tassili N'Ajjer National Park World Heritage area, famous for its red sand and engravings and rock paintings of cattle, elephants, giraffes, and rhinos that lived there when the climate was milder. Photo location: Summit of Tin-Merzouga, Tadrat, Tassili N'Ajjer National Park, Algeria. (Photo and caption by Evan Cole/National Geographic Photo Contest)

A girl struggles with winds from approaching Typhoon Matmo along the eastern coast of Keelung, northeastern Taiwan, Tuesday, July 22, 2014. (Photo by Wally Santana/AP Photo)

South Korean Lee Jung-sook (L), 68, wipes the tears from her North Korean father Lee Heung-jong, 88, as they bid each other a sad farewell at a resort on Mount Kumgang, North Korea, 22 October 2015. About 390 South Koreans arrived at the resort two days ago for the first face-to-face reunion of families separated by the 1950-53 Korean War in nearly 20 months. A second group of some 260 South Koreans will do the same for three days starting on 24 October. (Photo by Yonhap/EPA)

North Koreans perform during the “Arirang” Mass Games at the May Day Stadium in Pyongyang, as part of celebrations ahead of the 60th anniversary marking the end of the 1950-53 Korean War, in this photo taken by Kyodo July 22, 2013. (Photo by KYODO)

Mount Nyiragongo is an active stratovolcano On the Virunga Mountains associated with the Albertine Rift. It is located inside Virunga National Park, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, about 20 km (12 mi) north of the town of Goma and Lake Kivu and just west of the border with Rwanda. The main crater is about two km wide and usually contains a lava lake.

Brazilian singer Anitta performs on the Coachella stage during the 2022 Coachella Valley Music And Arts Festival on April 22, 2022 in Indio, California. (Photo by Amy Sussman/Getty Images for Coachella)

American TikTok star Charli D'Amelio in the second decade of August 2022 turned heads in her latest Instagram pic, wearing a strapless red latex dress with a sultry updo and glam makeup. (Photo by charlidamelio/Instagram)

Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev as he bids the last farewell to his wife Raisa Gorbacheva during the funeral ceremony in Moscow, Russia, 23 September 1999 (reissued 30 August 2022). According to a Moscow Central Clinical Hospital statement, former Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev has died at the age of 91. As a supporter of the de-Stalinization programs of his predecessor Nikita Khrushchev, Gorbachev initiated numerous reforms during his tenure. He signed a nuclear arms treaty with the United States and withdrew the Soviet Union from the Soviet-Afghan war. His policies created freedom of speech and press, and decentralized fiscal policy planning and execution to increase efficiency. Gorbachev was the last leader of the Soviet Union, overseeing Russia’s transition from one party rule to fragile democracy. (Photo by Sergey Chirikov/EPA/EFE)