Nikon just announced the winners of the 2024 Nikon Small World Photomicrography Competition, where scientific microscope images become art. This year’s top prize went to Bruno Cisterna, who (assisted by Eric Vitriol) captured a detailed image of the structural framework of neuronal cells.
Thanks to microscopes, biologists are able to see tiny details that can explain how our bodies work or why we get sick. The more detail the images have, the more information they hold. And sometimes a crisp and clear colorful microscope image is not only informative, but pretty as well.
Cisterna studies how the structural components of neurons might affect neurodegenerative conditions like Alzheimer’s disease. “One of the main problems with neurodegenerative diseases is that we don’t fully understand what causes them,” he said in a statement to Nikon. “To develop effective treatments, we need to figure out the basics first. Our research is crucial for uncovering this knowledge and ultimately finding a cure.”
In his winning microscope image, fluorescent colors highlight different parts of the cell. One color shows the cell nucleus (to mark where each cell is) and others show the structural component actin (which determines the shape of the cell) and the microtubules that are part of the communication and transport network within a cell.
The cells themselves are not from human brains. To do this type of exploratory research, researchers like Cisterna often use “cell lines”. These are cells that can grow and live outside of a living organism so they can be kept in a petri dish or a flask. Cell lines often originate from cancer cells, because cancer cells readily multiply into more cells. The cell line in this image originally came from a mouse brain tumor, but here these cells serve as a general model for any brain cell.
Cisterna’s research explored the role of a protein called PFN1. He found that it plays an important role in building the microtubule infrastructure in the cell. When this system malfunctions, this could lead to the same kind of cell damage as what happens in neurodegenerative diseases. This research was published in the Journal of Cell Biology earlier this year.
Taking the winning image was not an easy task. “I spent about three months perfecting the staining process to ensure clear visibility of the cells,” says Cisterna. But the result was worth it. His image is the 50th winner of the annual Nikon Small World competition, which launched in 1974. This year, the competition received over 2100 entries from eighty countries. While scientific research is usually only assessed based on the information it presents, the judges of this image competition also take into account the visual impact of the microscope images and the technical skill required to create it.
All winning images and honorable mentions are visible on the Nikon Small World website. There you can also find the winners of the Small World in Motion video competition which were announced last month. The video element of the contest was added in 2011 to acknowledge that modern microscopes can do much more than take photos. The winning video was a close-up of a fruit fly embryo taken by Bruno Vellutini.
