Image of the Week
Striking images of optics and photonics, contributed by OPN readers
A Star Like No Other
Scientists have discovered a star behaving like no other seen before, giving fresh clues about the origin of a new class of mysterious objects called long period radio transients. Discovered in 2022, these objects vary in radio wave intensity in a regular way over tens of minutes. Read more.
—X-ray: NASA/CXC/ICRAR, Curtin Univ./Z. Wang et al.; Infrared: NASA/JPL/CalTech/IPAC; Radio: SARAO/MeerKAT; Image processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/N. Wolk
13 Jun 2025
Elastic Scattering Sunset
Rayleigh scattering produces a vibrant sunset as the sunlight traverses a greater atmospheric path, scattering more blues and greens to leave behind predominantly red hues.
— Edgar Guevara, CONAHCYT-UASLP, San Luis Potosi, Mexico
06 Jun 2025
"Coffee Bubble" Mirrors
Hot coffee poured into a ceramic mug bubbles up rapidly, generating a myriad of self-similar, curved reflectors that include images of the ceiling light gleaming at different scales.
—Jaeyoun Kim, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, USA
30 May 2025
Degenerating Beauty
Confocal image of a fruit fly retina expressing a toxic form of the RdgB protein, leading to degeneration.
—Guilliaume Thuery, Ireland, Wiki Science Competition 2023; CC-BY-4.0
23 May 2025
Pink Coriander
Coriander extract exhibits fluorescence due to the presence of chlorophyll under illumination from a 405-nm laser beam.
—Emiliano Hernández Figueroa, UNAM, Temixco, Mexico
16 May 2025
Milky Way Spiral
Milky Way dust emission as measured from the Planck satellite and converted into a polarization pattern of B-modes, a spiral type of polarization imprinted in the microwave sky.
—Uroš Seljak, University of California, Berkeley, USA, Winner Wiki Science Competition 2019; CC-BY-4.0
09 May 2025
Laser in Water
Scattered light from the extended propagation path of a kilohertz near-infrared femtosecond laser pulse inside a water-filled glass tube.
—Brijesh Prithvi, UM-DAE CEBS, Mumbai, India
02 May 2025
Paths of Light
Light passing through prisms and beam splitters is broken down into a spectrum of visible colors.
—Edgar Guevara, CONAHCYT-UASLP, San Luis Potosi, Mexico
25 Apr 2025
Earth in Far-UV
On 21 April 1972, NASA’s Apollo 16 mission took a far-UV photo of Earth with a UV camera. The original black-and-white picture was printed on Agfacontour professional film three times, with each exposure recording only one light level. The three light levels were then colored blue (dimmest), green (next brightest) and red (brightest).
—Apollo 16 Far UV Camera, G. Carruthers, NASA
18 Apr 2025
Colorful Ice "Feather"
A break in the ice on a frozen lake looks like a colorful feather. Unretouched photo taken with a Panasonic DMZ-TZ61.
— Michael Kobylinskiy, Friedenschule, Hermsdorf, Germany
11 Apr 2025
