Images of a transgenic plant, bacterial colonies and polarised light were the winners in the second annual Heriot-Watt University photographic competition, aimed at recording the beauty that can be found in scientific research, teaching and advances.
The 2010 Scientific Photographic Competition, organised by the School of Engineering and Physical Sciences, was open to all staff and students and was won by Dr Peter Morris, a senior lecturer in the School of Life Sciences with an image entitled 'Blue Seeding', showing a seedling of a transgenic plant.
All of the winning images can be seen at the website below with links to all of the images entered.
In the image 'Blue Seeding', by Dr Peter Morris, the transgenic plant seedling shows the expression pattern of a specific gene. The plant gene has been fused to a marker gene that produces an enzyme which will cleave a substrate to yield a blue dye. The blue colour indicates where and when this plant gene is active during germination.
Second prize went to 'Heat Sink' by Dr Thomas Bishop, a research associate in the School of Engineering and Physical Sciences, and third prize to 'Rise of Clones', by Dr Susan Dewar, senior teaching fellow, and Paul Cyphus, a microbiology technician, both from School of Life Sciences.
Cash prizes were donated by SELEX Galileo.
View all the photographs from the 2010 Scientific Photographic Competition.