The strangest sights in the universe could be right in front of you — if you could only see at a small enough scale. The microscopic universe is full of beautiful and terrifying sights, including monsters and treasures. Check out some of the greatest microscopy images of all time.


Top image: A wood ant holding a microchip in its mandibles, via DSLRimagery.

Butterfly eggs on a raspberry plant


(via DSLRimagery)



A micro-crack in steel

(via imgur)

Household dust


With cat fur, long hair, twisted synthetic and woolen fibres, a pollen grain and insect remains.

(via DSLRimagery)

Needle and thread


(via Reddit/scott4316)

E.coli bacteria on lettuce


(via AgriLife Today)

Beard hairs under a scanning electron microscope: cut with razor (left) and electric shaver (right)


(via Reddit/schematicboy)

A moth wing


(via Reddit/Dahaka11)

Head of an embryonic Zebrafish with 500x magnification


(via FEI Company)

This picture shows the aftermath of fayalite reacting with gaseous CO2 to form siderite, thereby capturing the CO2 in a solid, stable form.


(via Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)

A piece of dentine with dentinal tubules from human tooth, after demineralization using etching with 37% phosphoric acid for 15 seconds and 10% sodium hypochlorite for 1 minute.


(via FEI Company)

Shark skin (left) and a foot of a fly (right)


(via Reddit/ImNotjesus and EurekAlert)

The head of a maggot of a bluebottle fly


(via Imgur)

A high-chromium, nickel-based alloy


Its surface was chemically etched to reveal faceted crystallographic planes at regions of localized microstructural damage.

(via Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)

A mite, magnified about 850x


(via Wikimedia Commons)

Leaf of a Virginia spiderwort


(via Micropix/Wikimedia Commons)

The green chloropasts in the plant cells


(via BASF)

Marijuana


(via Imgur)

Spherical spores produced by the fungus Emericella nidulans are coated in a thin layer of the protein hydrophobic. Hydrophobin ensures that water rolls off the spores.


(via BASF)

A bacterium living on the diatom of an amphipod


(via Reddit/Snearky)

Leg of a Gecko


(via Reddit/soupyhands)

A Marine Worm, 58x magnification


(via fStoppers)

Steel


(via sofarfromcaring)

A bud of a sand dollar (or sea cookie) with 4348x magnification


(via monkey.grip)

Abdomen of a mosquito


(via Matt the monkey)