2009 Nikon Small World winners

The 2009 Nikon Small World Photomicrography Competition winners have been announced. The first place prize (pictured below) goes to a photograph of a thale cress anther taken by Heiti Paves of Tallinn University of Technology in Estonia. The 20X image was taken using a confocal microscope. More than 2,000 entries were received for this 35th year of the competition.

Other top winners included Gerd A. Guenther from Düsseldorf, Germany, who took second place with a 150X image of a Sonchus asper (spiny sowthistle) flower stem section taken with darkfield microscopy.

Pedro Barrios-Perez from the National Research Council of Canada’s Institute for Microstructural Sciences in Ottawa, Canada received third place for his picture of a wrinkled photoresist, which was taken at 200x using brightfield microscopy.

The People’s Choice Award went to a bundle of fluorescent actin protein filaments captured by Dennis Breitsprecher of Hannover, Germany. The image won the most votes from the public.

See more winners, and get information on entering next year’s competition at www.nikonsmallworld.com.