16 stunning photos of scientific phenomena in action

The winners of this year’s Royal Society Publishing Photography Competition do not disappoint.
clownfish in anemone
The tentacles on this sea anemone are white because they’ve been bleached. Like coral, anemones can lose their color (along with their health) as oceans heat up. Researchers are still figuring out how that might affect the symbiotic relationship between anemones and clownfish like the young one pictured here. Morgan Bennett-Smith

The Royal Society Publishing Photography Competition champions images that depict scientific phenomena, as captured by scientists themselves. Out of hundreds of entries, judges narrowed it down to a single winner in each of five categories along with a few runner ups. This gallery rounds them all up for a truly stunning experience.

 

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Sara Chodosh

Contributor

Sara Chodosh was an editor at Popular Science for more than 5 years, where she worked her way up from editorial assistant to associate science editor. In that time she slowly took over running the Charted section of the now-defunct print magazine. Her love of graphics eventually led to her current job as a graphics editor at the New York Times.