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(Image: Materials Research Society Science as Art Competition and Joong Hwan Bahng, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor)

This jostling family of garish hedgehogs is not just a playful picture – it shows the serious business of analysing a novel material. You’re looking at zinc oxide growing on the outside of tiny spherical particles, as seen through the lens of a scanning electron microscope.

With colour added to the monochrome original, this picture – taken by Joon Hwan Bahng of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor – bagged first prize in the Materials Research Society’s biannual competition, .

The judges picked out this image for its beauty and its power to reveal visually how the rough surface of a microsphere can affect the growth of crystals.