The Galleries:
Photo Gallery
Microscope Museum
Silicon Zoo
Pharmaceuticals
Chip Shots
Phytochemicals
DNA Gallery
Microscapes
Vitamins
Amino Acids
Birthstones
Religion Collection
Darkfield Gallery
Hoffman Images
Pesticides
Tree Collection
BeerShots
Cocktail Collection
Screen Savers
Win Wallpaper
Mac Wallpaper
Movie Gallery
Home
Favorite
Shortcuts:
Aids Therapeutics
Buckyballs
Cocktails
Dinosaur Bones
DNA
Feathers
Ice Cream
Liquid Crystals
Moon Rocks
Soft Drinks
Sugars
Vegetables
Vitamins
Wines
Silicon Zoo Shortcuts:
Technical Details
Silicon Seascape
Silicon Yin Yang
Zoo Microscopy
Zoo Screen Savers
Zoo Wallpaper
Air Force One
Big Mac Attack
HP Hummingbird
R12000 Plate
Canine
Cheetah
Con Artist
Cyrix Chili
Daffy Duck
Dilbert
Anubis
Godzilla
Groucho
Hooters
Lassie
Lunar Lander
Mickey Mouse
Gators
Road Runner
Rolex
Sonic
Stay Puft
USS Enterprise
Siliconous
Tasmanian Devil
Thor
Velociraptor
Waldo
HP Thunderbird

The Molecular Expressions Galleria is your gateway to our numerous collections of photographs taken through a microscope. Use the buttons to the left or right and the links below to navigate to points of interest on our website.

Snoopy

In October 1950, cartoon illustrator Charles Schultz added the character Snoopy, a young beagle pup, to his comic strip Peanuts. Serving as lead personality Charlie Brown's independently-minded dog, Snoopy has played an integral role in the broad success of the cartoon and has a reserved a place in hearts of millions of fans. The silicon version of Snoopy illustrated above was discovered by Richard Piotter of New Ulm, Minnesota, who also loaned the 4-inch wafer (made by a 1980s-era semiconductor company named Trilogy) from which the image is derived.

The Galleries:
Photo Gallery 
Our main gallery of photomicrographs featuring an abbreviated number of images from each collection as well as some information about the subjects that are presented.
Featured Microscopist 
Our second featured microscopist is the renowned German photomicrographer Karl E. Deckart. With his excellent reflected light microscopy using differential interference contrast techniques, Karl has been a consistent winner of the Nikon Small World competition and has collected a total of 16 prizes and several honorable mentions. Deckart's reflected light image of aluminum milling grooves on the surface of bar stock captured 5th prize in the 2000 Small World competition.
Cell Biology 
Although the human body contains over 75 trillion cells, the majority of life forms exist as single cells that perform all the functions necessary for independent existence. Most cells are far too small to be seen with the naked eye and require the use of high-power optical and electron microscopes for careful examination.
Museum of Microscopy 
Our artists have re-created microscopes of the past with full color three-dimensional drawings that simulate how these beautifully crafted instruments might have looked when new.
Pharmaceuticals (Drug Shots) 
We take a close-up look at various pharmaceutical agents under the microscope. This gallery includes everything from antibiotics and anticancer agents to designer drugs and abused substances.
Silicon Zoo 
This unique gallery features microscopic silicon graffiti that we have discovered while photographing the surface of integrated circuits. The gallery contains images of Daffy Duck, Waldo, Godzilla, Dilbert, Dogbert, cars, boats, space ships, chip designer's names and much more.
Chip shots 
The term "chip art" takes on a new meaning with this gallery, which explores the beautiful surface features on some of today's hottest microprocessors. Appearing in the gallery are both partial and full-die photomicrographs of chips from top manufacturers such as Intel, Hewlett-Packard, NEC, MIPS, Digital, and many others.
Religion Collection 
This gallery contains images of selected items that commemorate the great religions from around the world. Photomicrographs of religious icons such as the spices frankincense and myrrh, bread, wine, baptismal water, and Lotus blossoms are the staples of this collection.
Vitamins 
Vitamins was one of our original collections and the first complete gallery of biochemicals that we photographed over 10 years ago. This gallery contains all of the common vitamins as well as some vitamin wannabes.
Amino Acids 
Another biochemical gallery featuring images of the 20 amino acids commonly found in proteins and enzymes as well as those that participate strictly in intermediary metabolism. These are a part of our growing lineup of biochemicals that will be coming on-line in the near future.
Birthstones 
Birthstones is a collection of photomicrographs illustrating a wide variety of minerals that contain precious gemstones. The images are arranged according to the Zodiac designation for the gems.
Microscapes 
Explore our idea of "art in science" where we have attempted to utilize multiple-exposure photomicrography to craft alien/surrealistic landscapes that appear to derive from other worlds.
Darkfield Microscopy Gallery 
Darkfield microscopy uses oblique illumination to produce bright images of specimens that appear on a dark or black background. This gallery explores a variety of biological, geological, chemical, and materials samples photographed under darkfield illumination.
Hoffman Modulation Contrast Gallery 
Modulation contrast takes advantage of optical phase gradients to render images with a pseudo three-dimensional appearance. We have applied the technique to a wide variety of samples to demonstrate the numerous effects possible with this illumination strategy.
BeerShots 
Visit BeerShots to enjoy colorful photographs of recrystallized beer taken with an optical microscope. Our cameras have captured over 160 beers from breweries around the world, which are presented in this gallery for your viewing pleasure.
Cocktails 
Our most famous collection was prepared for those of you who don't like beer. This collection contains an ever-growing number of the most popular cocktails and serves as the backbone of our "Cocktails Collection" line of neckties. The images are accompanied by the recipe used to make the cocktail.
Pesticides 
A collection that we have termed "drugs for bugs", which contains many of the common commercial chemicals that are used to control pests both in the home and on the farm.
The Tree Collection 
Photomicrographs of thin sections produced from the wood of more than 30 different trees. Images are accompanied by text describing characteristics and habitat of the individual trees.
Windows and Macintosh Wallpaper 
These sites were designed for our visitors who would like to adorn the desktops of their computers with Molecular Expressions photomicrographs. The wallpaper is made from images featured in our collections, and has been modified to tile seamlessly for optimum appearance.
Movie Gallery 
This gallery is for those of you would like to see a more psychedelic flair to our images (as if they weren't already wild enough). The movies are available as steaming videos or AVI downloads and we also provide links to the viewing software.
Questions or comments? Send us an email.
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This website is maintained by our
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in collaboration with Optical Microscopy at the
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory.
Last modification: Friday, Nov 13, 2015 at 01:18 PM
Access Count Since June 1, 1997: 3438952
Microscopes provided by:
Visit the Nikon website. Visit the Olympus Microscopy Resource Center website.