Microscopic wave-like patterns rippling throughout the floor of a fruit fly embryo have taken the highest spot in Nikon’s 2024 Small World in Movement competitors. In biology, the phenomenon is named mitotic waves, which synchronize cell division throughout your complete embryo.
The method was captured at 20x magnification by Dr. Bruno Vellutini of the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden—considered one of a slew of mind-boggling pictures to win accolades within the contest’s 14th yr.
Small World in Movement (beforehand) invitations entries in video or digital timelapse images which were captured by way of a microscope, revealing processes invisible to the bare eye and shedding gentle on the world round us.
Vellutini, a zoologist with a background in evolutionary and developmental biology, is devoted to advancing our understanding of how embryos develop from a single cell—a course of basic to all animal life. Like Richard J. Albrecht’s timelapse of a molting mayfly, Cora A. Harris’s prismatic documentation of crystallizing magnesium sulfate, or Dr. Luis Carlos Cesteros’s blooming algae, Vellutini highlights a unique view of one thing we truly work together with surprisingly typically.
“Fruit fly embryos in our homes, developing in our kitchens and our trash bins, are undergoing the same processes as shown in the video,” Vellutini says. “I believe the video is particularly impactful because it shows us how these fascinating cellular and tissue dynamics are happening every day, all around us—even in the most mundane living beings.”
Browse a couple of of our favourite entries right here, and discover all the profitable pictures on the competitors’s web site.
