Winning entries in the 2026 Nikon Small World competitions reveal the hidden interactions that govern everyday life.

O n a frigid February morning in Edinburgh, Scotland, Patrick Hickey had run out of living things to put under his microscope. The plants and fungi in his garden had dried up, and summer puddles, with their flamboyant biological complexity, had long frozen over.

Hickey, a mycologist at Hypha Research Ltd., was using plant leaves to study mitochondria, cellular organelles that generate energy. He was planning to sprout mustard seeds for fresh samples, but he was impatient. While making coffee in his kitchen, he noticed a cold-hardy turtle vine hanging from the windowsill. “I snipped off an inch or so, put it in my pocket, took it into the lab, and was just amazed at what I saw,” Hickey said.

Under the microscope, mitochondria darted around the cells. They nimbly maneuvered around slower chloroplasts, like motorcyclists dodging traffic.…