It’s the United States of Air-merica! Pilot Jassen Todorov from San Francisco spent three weeks flying across eight states in a 1976 Piper Warrior plane to capture the this shots – from deep craters in Arizona’s red desert and the swamps and wetlands in Florida and Louisiana, that look like they could be on alien planets, to freeways and stretches of suburban Texas. Here: El Paso, Texas at sunset. (Photo by Jassen Todorov/Caters News)

6th Place: Javier Rupérez, Almáchar, Málaga, Spain. Small white hair spider. Reflected Light, Image Stacking, 20x (Objective Lens Magnification). (Photo by Javier Rupérez/Nikon's Small World 2019)

Now celebrating its 40th year, Nikon Small World is widely regarded as the leading forum to recognize proficiency and photographic excellence of photography taken under the microscope. To select the winners, competition judges analyzed entries from all over the world covering subjects ranging from chemical compounds to up-close-and-personal looks at biological specimens. The 2014 winners will be revealed on October 30th. In 2014, the competition received over 1,200 entries from more than 79 countries around the world. (Photo by Dr. Igor Robert Siwanowicz/Nikon Small World 2014)

The barren landscapes of the south-western US provided inspiration for photographer David Clapp. He visited Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Arizona as part of his project on other-worldy locations, with surreal results. Here: An infrared image at dusk of strange clay rock formations in Ah-Shi-Sle-Pah Wilderness in Farmington, New Mexico. (Photo by David Clapp/Barcroft Images)

A man tries to stop two bulls from locking horns during a bullfight in the eastern emirate of Fujairah October 17, 2014. There are no matadors or picadors, but bulls locking horns with each other draw big crowds to bullfights in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). An hour's drive from the dancing water fountains of Dubai's glitzy downtown, hundreds of fans gather in Fujairah to watch bulls fighting, or perhaps more accurately head butting, with honour rather than money at stake. The UAE sport involves two bulls locking horns in a three-to-four minute Sumo-wrestling-like fight that usually ends with no bloodshed. (Photo by Ahmed Jadallah/Reuters)

A boy pushes a donkey cart loaded with bundles of cotton blooms that were collected by women cotton pickers in Meeran Pur village, north of Karachi September 25, 2014. Women make up the bulk of Pakistan's half a million cotton producers, but labour rights activists say they are often exploited by overseers, who often withhold their wages and may subject some of them to sexual harassment. (Photo by Akhtar Soomro/Reuters)

Third place: the rear leg, claw and respiratory trachea of a louse (Haematopinus suis). (Photo by Frank Reiser/Nassau Community College/Nikon Small World Photomicrography 2021)