Cute giant pandas enjoy life in China Conservation and Research Center for Giant Panda in Wenchuan County, Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture, southwest China's Sichuan Province, 8 February, 2023. (Photo by Rex Features/Shutterstock)

A vervet monkey passes in front of a woman on the shores of lake Naivasha, Kenya January 24, 2017. (Photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters)

On August 31, 2012, a long filament of solar material that had been hovering in the sun's atmosphere, the corona, erupted out into space at 4:36 p.m. EDT. The coronal mass ejection, or CME, traveled at over 900 miles per second. The CME did not travel directly toward Earth, but did connect with Earth's magnetic environment, or magnetosphere, causing aurora to appear on the night of Monday, September 3. (Photo by NASA/GSFC/SDO via The Atlantic)

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and these striking images of 2017 are no exception. The photo highlights include incredible snapshots of the natural world as well as some awesome animal and human encounters. The vibrant gallery also shows thrill-seekers pushing themselves to the limit with breathtaking stunts captured in perfect clarity. The pictures have been taken by a host of photographers from around the world. Here: The two lion cubs singing their hearts out at Antelope park in Zimbabwe. (Photo by David Jenkins/Caters News Agency)

A woman carries an inflatable float with the sahpe of a portion of pizza in a Barcelona, on July 18, 2020. Four million residents of Barcelona have been urged to stay at home as virus cases rise, while EU leaders were set to meet again in Brussels, seeking to rescue Europe's economy from the ravages of the pandemic. (Photo by Josep Lago/AFP Photo)

New Forest ponies graze as the sun rises over Godshill in the New Forest, Hants on September 18, 2022, on the day before the Queen's state funeral tomorrow. (Photo by Claire Sheppard/Solent News & Photo Agency)

A woman squeezes between two public buses in downtown Lima, March 17, 2014. Bogota and two other Latin American capitals – Mexico City, and Lima in Peru – were named as the three capitals with the least safe transport systems for women in the Thomson Reuters Foundation poll of more than 6,550 women and gender and city planning experts. Women in Latin America say they face a wide range of daily threats on public transport, and not enough is done to ensure their safety. (Photo by Enrique Castro-Mendivil/Reuters)

A general view of atmosphere at the annual VOLT Festival in Sopron, 208 kms west of Budapest, Hungary on August 16, 2016. (Photo by Rockstar Photographers)