Microbial research captured among winning science images

Microbial research features among some of the winning images in Nature’s 2026 Scientist at Work photography competition.

While two researchers guiding a flock of northern bald ibis (Geronticus eremita) on their migration across the fields of Jaén in the south of Spain is the overall winning image, whale sharks, algal blooms, and mosquito experiments also feature among five spectacular images showcasing the diversity and challenges of scientific research.

Now in its seventh year, the competition aims to capture the worldwide realities of scientific work both in the laboratory and the field. Winners are selected by a panel of Nature staff.

This year’s competition saw more than 220 entries from scientists across the world. The winning image was taken by Gunnar Hartmann, an undergraduate student in BioGeoSciences at the University of Koblenz, Germany. In 2024, he joined the Waldrappteam, an Austrian conservation group supporting the reintroduction of bald ibis into Europe, on a 50-day migration journey from southeastern Germany to southwestern Spain.

The birds are hand-raised by their human caregivers, forming a bond that means they are happy to follow their foster parents in an aircraft, who guide them along the way with calls and shouts. “There are so many emotions for me,” Hartmann says, about the image. “I can smell the air from this day and imagine the sounds.”

Coral probiotics

Another winning image is that of freelance marine biologist Uli Kunz of Kiel, Germany, who captured the installation of an incubation chamber at the “coral probiotics village,” a project in the Red Sea off the coast of Saudi Arabia which has been championed by Applied Microbiology International Horizon Award winner Professor Raquel Peixoto, of King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in Saudi Arabia. 

The project aims to investigate how different coral species are adapting to the rising water temperatures caused by climate change. “In this photo, I wanted not only to capture the research divers in the midst of their often-hectic work, but also to show a moment of quiet contemplation,” says Kunz.

Striking photography

Also featured among the competition winners is a striking photograph taken via drone, by Haolun ‘Allen’ Tian, of a research team collecting water samples from a Canadian lake overrun by bright green algal bloom.

Marine ecologist Robert Harcourt captured an image of Michael Doane, a marine biologist, collecting a microbiome sample from a whale shark (Rhincodon typus) off the coast of Western Australia.

The final winning image, by Shayanta Chowdhury, is of entomologist Lee Haines viewing a yellow fever mosquito (Aedes aegypti) under an ultraviolet light in a laboratory at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana, USA.

“The UV illumination created striking colours from both the tiny mosquito and the condensation that formed beneath the cold Petri dish,” Chowdhury, a chemistry PhD student, explains.