A stunning photograph showing the ghostly last dance of the Danube mayfly has won the 2016 Royal Society Publishing photography competition.
All of the winners, runners up and specially commended photographs are included below, and can also be viewed here at the Royal Society in a special free exhibition on 17th and 18th September and on our online gallery.
Imre Potyó: Dancing with stars – Overall winner and Winner: Behaviour
Tane Sinclair-Taylor: In a world without colour – Winner: Ecology and Environmental Biology
María Carbajo Sánchez: In balance – Winner: Micro imaging
Nick Robertson-Brown Departing eagle ray – Winner Evolutionary Biology
Jonathan Diaz-Marba: In search of food – Runner up: Behaviour
Tyler Square: The spiralled snake axis – Runner up: Micro imaging
Tegwen Gadais: Les artistes – Runner up: Ecology and Environmental Biology
Fredrik Pleijel: Polychaetous worm with engine and wagons – Runner up: Evolutionary Biology
Alexandre Bonnefoy: Fubuki (snow storm) – Special commendation
Mark Cowan: Butterflies and caiman – Special commendation
Claire Collins: Carbon nanotube jellyfish – Special commendation
Prasenjeet Yadav: Speeding divergence – Special commendation (Publisher’s choice)
The competition is a collaborative project run by all of the Royal Society’s biological science journals: Biology Letters, Interface, Open Biology, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, Proceedings of the Royal Society B and Royal Society Open Science. The competition was judged on a dual criteria of aesthetic beauty and scientific interest by a panel of judges: Alex Badyaev, David Maitland, Ulrike Muller and Claire Spottiswoode. For more information about the Royal Society Publishing photography competition, and to view all of the shortlisted photographs please visit https://royalsociety.org/journals/publishing-activities/photo-competition/.
