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Pin-ItRalph Grimm, a prolific photomicrographer from Australia, has been in the Small World winners circle an impressive 16 times dating all the way back to 2005. His most recent entry, a differential interference contrast (DIC) movie of the ciliate Prorodon viridis showing beating cilia and green zoochlorellae perfectly demonstrates his imaging skills. DIC is a commonly used illumination technique to observe creatures such as this, but it can be immensely challenging to keep sharpness, focus and proper framing for the duration of a movie of such animals. This particular creature uses algal “solar” cells from which it derives part of its energy (long before man came up with the idea).
2020 Small World in Motion Competition
Honorable Mention
Ciliate (Prorodon viridis) showing its beating cilia and green zoochlorellae
Ralph Grimm
- Location
- Jimboomba, Queensland, Australia
- Technique
- Differential Interference Contrast
- Magnification
- 60X (Objective Lens Magnification)
Honorable Mention
Oil droplets on a soap film
Karl Gaff
- Location
- Dublin, Ireland
- Technique
- Reflected Light
- Magnification
- 4X (Objective Lens Magnification)
This movie shows lipid islands of soap floating on a very thin film of water. The film on which the soap floats is so thin that it does not interfere with the light hitting it, therefore allowing the light to pass through. This creates an appearance of a black abyss. The biggest challenge in creating a movie such as this is finding the ideal ratio between the soap and the liquid substrate, which is a precise formula of water and sugar to give it the correct viscosity. If too much sugar is used, the water will become too viscous and to remain invisible, but if not enough is used, the soap will break up too quickly.
Honorable Mention
Ciliates (Vorticella sp. and Paramecium sp.)
Roland Gross
- Location
- Gruenen, Switzerland
- Technique
- Differential Interference Contrast
- Magnification
- 10X (Objective Lens Magnification)
Mr. Roland Gross, a microscopy enthusiast and hobbyist, captured this movie of ciliates (Voriticella and Paramecium) foraging for food with Differential Interference Contrast (DIC) microscopy. The stalked ciliates attach themselves to substrates and utilize hair like organelles called cilia to direct passing nutrients into their mouth. By contrast, the Paramecium (shown as a “slipper” looking organism) uses its cilia for movement and sensation while it feeds. Movies such as this are especially difficult to capture because limited depth of focus can make keeping these active creatures in focus for any length of time nearly impossible. Recent advancements in high-end research microscopes help lock the focus on the subject matter, but it is not yet commonly available for non-research applications.
Top 20
Honorable Mentions
Judges
Dr. Dylan Burnette
Assistant Professor of Cell and Developmental Biology Vanderbilt University
Burnette has been using high resolution microscopy to study cells for over 20 years. His laboratory at Vanderbilt University focuses on how cells grow and divide. He is interested in how these processes contribute to the function of heart muscle. He trained as a graduate student with Dr. Paul Forscher at Yale University and as a post-doctoral fellow with Dr. Jennifer Lippincott-Schwartz at the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Burnette has placed in the Nikon Small World competition eleven times.
Samantha Clark
Photo Editor National Geographic
Clark works on stories about science and the environment. She previously worked on NPR’s photo team and at Pier 24 Photography. Before working in visuals, she was a reporter and radio producer based in the Bay Area of San Francisco.
Sean Greene
Graphics and Data Journalist The Los Angeles Times
Greene covers science, the environment and medicine. He started working for The Los Angeles Times in 2014 and specializes in combining the powers of visual storytelling and the internet to tell meaningful and memorable stories. He’s reported on native oysters, bugs and frog tongues, and helped develop projects such as an interactive map of the Milky Way, a tracker of coronavirus cases in California and a data analysis of the dialogue in the Star Wars movies.
Dr. Christophe Leterrier
Group Leader Institute of Neurophysiopathology at CNRS and Aix-Marseille University
An engineer by training, Dr. Leterrier turned to cell biology and neurobiology for his Ph.D. He studies how neurons are organized at the cellular level and how they differentiate, then build and maintain their incredibly complex arborization. Since 2017, he has led the NeuroCyto lab in Marseille where he applies advanced microscopy techniques to directly observe molecular assemblies at the nanoscale inside neurons.
Ariel Waldman
Chair of the External Council NASA’s Innovative Advanced Concepts Program
Waldman led an expedition to Antarctica to film microscopic life under the ice. She is the co-author of a National Academy of Sciences report on the future of human spaceflight and the author of the book What’s It Like in Space?: Stories from Astronauts Who’ve Been There. Waldman is the global director of Science Hack Day, a National Geographic Explorer, a member of the San Francisco Microscopical Society, and received an honoree from the Obama White House as a Champion of Change in citizen science.
