Ever wanted to visit another world? Mars, one of our closest celestial neighbors, is an astonishing 225 million kilometers from Earth, a distance that would take over 1,000 years to walk.
But guess what? Many things on Earth look exactly like Mars; that’s what this year’s winner of the Royal Society Publishing Photography Competition proved. Although this photo looks like a snapshot of an extraterrestrial plant, it actually shows a group of Smile mold growing in a lush garden in the UK.
But the other pictures in the collection are equally amazing. From a crystal forest to a temporary rift and jellyfish elevator, the images capture strange scientific phenomena.
Ecology Category Runner-Up – Postwar Chamois
The image shows an Alps chamois (Lupikapra Lupikapra) Licking the walls of a World War II air raid shelter in the mountains of Val Valaita in the Western Alps. Photo credit: Filippo Calgati
Micro-imaging category runner-up – Crystal lighthouse in the wild forest
The image shows microcrystals of beta-alanine and L-glutamine, showing the evolution of the crystal pattern during the crystallization process. Photo credit: Shyam Ulhas
Astronomy Category Winner – Western Veil Nebula
The Veil Nebula, a spectacular supernova remnant, discovered in the constellation Cygnus, about 10,000 to 20,000 years ago, has gained attention. The horn of the nebula in our sky is several times the size of the Moon. Photo provided by Imran Sultan
Overall Winner – Mars Landscape
The photo shows a specimen lamproderma scintillance, a microorganism that grows on the autumn leaves of Somerset, England. The slime mold exhibits a range of hues, from earthy browns to glossy bronzes to steel-blue iridescent hues of the surrounding deciduous trees. Photo credit: Irina Petrova Adamatsky
