An undercover police officer, who had been marching with anti-police demonstrators, aims his gun at protesters after some in the crowd attacked him and his partner in Oakland, California December 10, 2014. Police said more than 100 demonstrators marched in Berkeley, California, which has a history of social activism. Under cloudy skies, turnout was smaller than earlier in the week, when demonstrators in the area threw rocks at police and shut down a major freeway. (Photo by Noah Berger/Reuters)

“Sally Mann (born in Lexington, Virginia, 1951) is one of America’s most renowned photographers. She has received numerous awards, including NEA, NEH, and Guggenheim Foundation grants, and her work is held by major institutions internationally. Her many books include Second Sight (1983), At Twelve (1988), Immediate Family (1992), Still Time (1994), What Remains (2003), Deep South (2005), Proud Flesh (2009), and The Flesh and the Spirit (2010). A feature film about her work, What Remains, debuted to critical acclaim in 2006. Mann is represented by Gagosian Gallery, New York. She lives in Virginia”.

Photo: Candy Cigarette, 1989. (Photo by Sally Mann)

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 relative of a Chinese passenger aboard the Malaysia Airlines MH370, covers his face after being told the latest update in Beijing, China, Monday, March 24, 2014. A new analysis of satellite data indicates the missing Malaysia Airlines plane crashed into a remote corner of the Indian Ocean, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said Monday. The news is a major breakthrough in the unprecedented two-week struggle to find out what happened to Flight 370, which disappeared shortly after takeoff from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 passengers and crew aboard on March 8. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)

An employee holds a plant with roots at the Plant Advanced Technologies (PAT) company greenhouse in Laronxe near Nancy, Eastern France, June 19, 2015. The farmers employed at the site in Laronxe are growing plants in a special way with a view to “milking” them for use in medicines, cosmetics and agrochemicals. Several major brands, including Germany's BASF and France's Chanel, have teamed up with Plant Advanced Technologies (PAT) in the hope of securing privileged access to the so-called “biomolecules” it extracts through the use of a patented technique. (Photo by Vincent Kessler/Reuters)

This combination of August 30, 2005 and July 29, 2015 aerial photos shows downtown New Orleans and the Superdome flooded by Hurricane Katrina and the same area a decade later. Katrina's powerful winds and driving rain bore down on Louisiana on August 29, 2005. The storm caused major damage to the Gulf Coast from Texas to central Florida while powering a storm surge that breached the system of levees that were built to protect New Orleans from flooding. (Photo by David J. Phillip/Gerald Herbert/AP Photo)

“The Zulu are the largest South African ethnic group, with an estimated 10–11 million people living mainly in the province of KwaZulu-Natal. Small numbers also live in Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Mozambique. Their language, Zulu, is a Bantu language; more specifically, part of the Nguni subgroup. The Zulu Kingdom played a major role in South African history during the 19th and 20th centuries. Under apartheid, Zulu people were classed as third-class citizens and suffered from state-sanctioned discrimination. They remain today the most numerous ethnic group in South Africa, and now have equal rights along with all other citizens”. – Wikipedia.

Photo: A Zulu woman playing the piano while a group of others sit and listen (to put it briefly, Englishmen scoff over Zulu). South Africa, circa 1925. (Photo by General Photographic Agency)

“Noh, or Nogaku – derived from the Japanese word for “skill” or “talent” – is a major form of classical Japanese musical drama that has been performed since the 14th century. Many characters are masked, with men playing male and female roles. Traditionally, a Noh “performance day” lasts all day and consists of five Noh plays interspersed with shorter, humorous kyōgen pieces. However, present-day Noh performances often consist of two Noh plays with one Kyōgen play in between”. – Wikipedia

Photo: A renowned Noh actor, Otoshige Sakai, demostrates how to put on a Noh mask, on May 17, 2004 in Tokyo, Japan. (Photo by Koichi Kamoshida/Getty Images)