The current world Champions in the Men's and Women's RS:X, Piotr Myszka of Poland and Blanca Manchon of Spain arrive at Bathers Beach carrying the ISAF World Championships Flag to be raised to officially open the 2011 ISAF Sailing World Championships on December 2, 2011 in Perth, Australia. (Photo by Mark Dadswell/Getty Images)

These beautiful shots may look like works of modern art – but they are actually close-ups of chemical reactions. The works were snapped with the help of a group of scientists from the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) in Anhui, China. Here: Zinc reacting with lead nitrate in a soft gel to form lead crystals. (Photo by Yan Liang/Caters News)

An Israeli boy swims next to sheep belonging to a Palestinian farmer in the West Bank village of Al-Auja in the Jordan Valley on April 8, 2015 during the Jewish Passover holiday. Thousands of Israelis spent the day outdoors, picnicking and touring the country during the eight-day Passover holiday, which commemorates the Israelites' exodus from Egypt some 3,500 years ago. (Photo by Menahem Kahana/AFP Photo)

A couple embrace during the start of the San Fermin festival in Pamplona, Spain July 6, 2016. Revelers from around the world kick off the festival with a messy party in the Pamplona town square, one day before the first of eight days of the running of the bulls. (Photo by Vincent West/Reuters)

“Cassowaries are large, flightless birds related to emus and (more distantly) to ostriches, rheas, and kiwis”, writes Olivia Judson in the September issue of National Geographic magazine. How large? People-size: Adult males stand well over five foot five and top 110 pounds. Females are even taller, and can weigh more than 160 pounds. Dangerous when roused, they’re shy and peaceable when left alone. But even birds this big and tough are prey to habitat loss. The dense New Guinea and Australia rain forests where they live have dwindled. Today cassowaries might number 1,500 to 2,000. And because they help shape those same forests – by moving seeds from one place to another – “if they vanish”, Judson writes, “the structure of the forest would gradually change” too. (Photo by Christian Ziegler/National Geographic)

“Light From Heaven”. Taken around Mount Bromo, East Java, Indonesia in the morning. Photo location: East Java, Indonesia. (Photo and caption by Pimpin Nagawan/National Geographic Photo Contest)

ATTENTION! All pictures are presented in high resolution. To see Hi-Res images – just TWICE click on any picture. In other words, click small picture – opens the BIG picture. Click BIG picture – opens VERY BIG picture.

Igor Perne (L), 53, an electronic engineer and a member of the International Virtual Aviation Organisation (IVAO), and fellow virtual pilot Franc Lavric gesture for the camera before taking off on a virtual flight in a flight simulator in Nova Vas, Slovenia November 13, 2014. In 2011, Perne, a lifelong flying enthusiast, bought parts of a written-off Cyprus Airways airliner and then spent two and a half years turning the entire nose of the scrapped aircraft into an elaborate flight simulator. (Photo by Srdjan Zivulovic/Reuters)