The microscopic world hidden in an autumn leaf won the Royal Society Publishing Photography Competition 2023. The overall winner, Irina Petrova Adamatzky, studies the electrical activity of fungi, slime molds and other microorganisms at the Unconventional Computing Lab at UWE Bristol.
“I unintentionally captured this scene while collecting samples of slime molds in a field near my home in Somerset, I noticed them the previous evening and intended to collect samples to measure their electrical activity for our research.” However, my attention was diverted by a simple autumn leaf which, although seemingly ordinary, contained something intriguing. I collected it and my samples, and the next day I was amazed to discover what seemed like another world within the confines of this unassuming sheet.
