Wellcome Trust reveals winner of its photography contest
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An astonishing image of a pregnant pony uterus has been selected as the overall winner for the 2015 Wellcome Image Awards.
The photograph was taken by London-based Michael Frank using a historic specimen from the Lanyon Anatomy Museum of the Royal Veterinary College in London.
It shows the preserved uterus of a New Forest Pony, around five months into the pregnancy, with the developing foetus still attached.
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This astonishing image of a pregnant pony uterus was selected as the winner for the 2015 Wellcome Image Awards. It shows the preserved uterus of a New Forest Pony, around five months into the pregnancy, with the developing foetus still attached. 'It shows us a large and magnificent creature reduced to this sad, fragile and half-formed creation, which I find very humbling,' said one of the judges
'As far as standout images go, the image of the horse's uterus with the foetus still inside was incredible and just sticks in my mind,' said Picture Editor of BBC Focus magazine, James Cutmore, who was a member of the judging panel.
'It evokes many different emotions at once. It's fascinating, sad, macabre, almost brutal. Yet the subject is also delicate, detailed and beautiful.
'The image shows us a large and magnificent creature reduced to this sad, fragile and half-formed creation, which I find very humbling.'
Another of the Wellcome Image Awards judges described it as 'hypnotic, like a Hieronymus Bosch painting…only it is real and truly marvellous'.
The project saw Mr Frank collaborate with Nick Short from the Royal Veterinary College to bring a new perspective to a selection of historic specimens.
A whole mouse lungs (blue and green) is seen here. Microparticles that can carry medicines (pink) are being studied to see whether they can deliver these drugs to the lungs. Current anticancer therapies have many toxic side-effects, so researchers hope that these microparticles could one day deliver anti-cancer medicine in a much simpler, more targeted way
Illustration of pollen grains being released from a flower in the Asteraceae family. Asteraceae is one of the largest families of flowering plants and is commonly known as the aster, daisy, sunflower or composite family. Pollen grains contain the male sperm cell and are produced in the anther, one of the male parts of the flower
The pony uterus, along with others in the collection, are preserved in formalin and photographed through a Persex container.
Another stunning image, which came as a runner up, shows the central nervous system in a fruit fly.
Reminiscent of a Jackson Pollock painting, the neurons that are able to sense vibrations are shown in yellow, each depicted as a single line.
Messages enter and exit neurons at points of contact called synapses. This incredible image was captured from a system that was just 15 micrometres (0.015 mm) wide.
Other highlights include a whole mouse lungs, with medicines shown in pink studied to see whether they can deliver these drugs to the lungs.
Photograph of an old anatomical model. This particular model was about to be thrown away as rubbish when the photographer decided to rescue it and take one last photograph to honour the service it had provided to medical students. The photographer used lighting to create a specific mood, and the model looks as if it is sleeping or taking a rest in a chair after a long day
Micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) scan of the skull and front legs of a tuatara. The tuatara of New Zealand are all that remain of a group of animals that used to share the earth with dinosaurs. Their name comes from the spines along their neck, back and tail. Virtual X-ray 'slices' of a preserved specimen of this rare reptile were taken and used to create a digital 3D model
A separate image of nerve cells in a rat brain show finger-like projections act like tiny sensors, picking up information and passing on messages to help control and coordinate muscle movement.
Mr Frank said: 'Our vision was to capture these incredible specimens, which have sat for many years on the shelves of the Lanyon Anatomy Museum.
'Using sophisticated photographic techniques, we were able to rejuvenate these special dissections and make them available to a whole new audience of students, academics and the public.
'I like to think that this digital format is a fitting tribute to all the skill of past generations of anatomists in creating these resources and the many generations of vets who have benefited from studying them,' scientist and broadcaster Adam Rutherford, who presented this year's awards, said.
'The breath-taking riches of the imagery that science generates are so important in telling stories about research and helping us to understand often abstract concepts.
'It's not just about imaging the very small either, it's about understanding life, death, sex and disease: the cornerstones of drama and art.'
All the winning images will be exhibited at 11 science centres, museums and galleries, from the Eden Project in Cornwall to Satrosphere in Aberdeen, and as far afield as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Video courtesy of The Wellcome Collection
Reminiscent of a Jackson Pollock painting, this image shows part of the central nervous system in a fruit fly. A neuron able to sense vibrations (yellow) is surrounded here by lots of other neurons, each depicted as a single line. Messages enter (blue circles) and exit (red circles) neurons at points of contact called synapses. The width of the image is approximately 15 micrometres (0.015 mm)
Scanning electron micrograph of tree-like branches spreading out from a nerve cell in a rat brain. The finger-like projections in this network act like tiny sensors, picking up information and passing on messages to help control and coordinate muscle movement
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