27 Stunning Science Images Shortlisted For The Beaker Street Festival Photography Prize

Taken on the night of the 23rd April 2023 from South Arm Peninsula, this image features multiple examples of physical processes in action at the same time. A subtle aurora, combined with agitated bioluminescent algae and the core of the Milky Way rising on the southeastern horizon. Capturing all these processes in action in a single image really was like finding the Holy Grail.

Hygrocybe firma is a fungus whose very small, red spore bodies appear in Tasmanian forests in autumn. It has a biotrophic relationship with surrounding vegetation, where the mycelium lives inside or in close contact with plant roots. I like to photograph macro subjects, such as fungi, to show people the beautiful, tiny living species that live in the forest, that they may not notice on a walk. The red colour ‘pops’ amongst the forest greens, often making for lovely colour compositions.

What did the water say to the sand at the beach? Nothing, it just waved. EXCEPT that time when the party was gatecrashed by a large bloom of Noctiluca scintillans: a single-celled dinoflagellate with the emotional stability of a glow stick. While this looks like an oceanic screensaver and delights humans the world over, these lazy microscopic organisms multiply in the millions to create a vast shimmering rave party along entire coastlines. Yes, they’re lazy and temperamental. Mechanical stimulation causes the luciferin–luciferase reaction you see here: meaning when they’re rudely bumped or agitated, they scream in blue. All the while, they refuse to make their own food and instead outsource their own metabolism by recruiting symbiotic algae. Seen in blooms like this, the gelatinous blue specks have teamed up to destabilise the local ecosystem whilst spreading equal parts of wonder, drama, worry, joy, and trepidation. …Kinda like politics.

It is hard to see still water in action; however, the untimely death of this Orange-rimmed Satin Moth (Thalaina selenaea; Queenstown, Tasmania) reminds us that surface tension is always present, but only tends to reveal itself when acting on a structure. Here, the hydrophobic wing scales undergo disaggregation (not dissolution), giving the wing edges a visually frayed quality as the pigmented scales separate and drift slowly away. Surface tension draws water into microscopic gaps beneath exposed edges of the overlapping scales, where cohesive forces create curvature-driven lifting effects. These forces physically lift and detach the weakly anchored scales from the clear membrane below, dispersing them into suspension. When repulsion meets cohesion, something has to give — and in this case, it is the wing scales. Water wins, again.

These Magnificent, or Stalked Hydroids (Ralpharia magnifica) look like a bouquet of underwater flowers, but this animal (yes, animal) is in fact a sessile organism related to the sea jellies. Like sea jellies (jellyfish), they have tentacles with stinging cells that catch prey as it drifts past. They can form small colonies or can live as a single organism, and have a complicated lifecycle that comprises alternating sessile and free-swimming stages. They are still poorly understood, despite being one of the more fascinating underwater sights in our Great Southern Reef.

One-day-old Red Handfish (Thymichthys politus) hatchlings. These fish are newborns; therefore, they still display a substantial yolk sac. This structure contains nutrients that provide the fish with a secure food source during its development in the egg and its first days after emerging. The yolk sac will shrink and disappear as the fish continues growing and feeding from it; eventually, the hatchlings will start to actively look around for other food sources, such as small amphipods. These babies are part of the red handfish conservation project at the Institute of Marine and Antarctic Science. They come from the fish's last breeding season, November 2025. As part of the project, these fish will either be kept at the university for research and further contribution to the captive breeding program or will be released to contribute to the small and spatially restricted wild population left in Tasmania’s waters.

Fallen leaves of Nothofagus gunnii, southern Australia's only winter-deciduous tree, nestle quietly in a cradle of exposed Fagus wood in Mount Field National Park. Their vibrant copper hues are thanks to seasonal senescence: not just the process of ageing, but of chlorophyll degradation and nutrient resorption by the tree ahead of winter’s arrival. The fan-like leaves form a temporary blanket upon the ground, beginning their return to the soil through fungal and microbial decomposition. Underneath, weathered wood exists in a slower timeline, where lignin-rich fibres are re-shaped by freeze-thaw cycles and alpine damp. Lichens are abundant here; photosynthetic partners fixing carbon, and living on surfaces where soil is scarce in this high-altitude environment. Together, they exist as a living archive of sub-alpine ecology where growth, decay and renewal are a continuous cycle orchestrated by climate, chemistry and the passage of time.

In a time of unrelenting “unprecedented change,” it is grounding to remember that there is a beautiful, anticipated, and constant change occurring in the alpine regions of Tasmania. The ‘Turning of the fagus’ is one of the most spectacular seasonal events to witness. The leaves of the fagus (Nothofagus gunnii) are pictured in autumnal transition as they transform from green to a vibrant tapestry of red, yellow, and orange. The vibrant colours gradually come to prominence as the chlorophyll is withdrawn from the leaves first, leaving other pigments to 'shine'. The spectrum of colours on a single branch illustrates the uneven progression of seasonal change influenced by a delicate balance of local alpine environmental conditions. No matter what unfolds in the world, the turning of the fagus endures. Each year it arrives anew, never the same, but still offering a quiet promise of renewal and something extraordinary still to come.

Eddystone Rock is a tower-shaped rock rising about 50 m out of the water, and located in the Southern Ocean about 27km from the SE Cape. The rock is an erosional remnant of the Tasmanian mainland. The rock is home to Australasian gannets, black-faced cormorants, and fairy prions. It is also a hauling-out place for Australian and New Zealand fur seals. Alongside nearby Sidmouth Rock and Pedra Branca, Eddystone Rock has been designated an Important Bird Area for nesting shy albatrosses.

The aurora australis is an ephemeral phenomenon: a wave of charged particles colliding with the Earth’s atmosphere releases light that forms transient patterns in our skies. Beneath this all-too-brief display are the results of far slower processes. The Tasman Lighthouse has stood since 1906 on an island whose vegetation was altered over a few decades by introduced species. That vegetation had itself been initially shaped by strong winds and sea mists, and all of it in a landscape shaped on a geological scale: largely Jurassic Dolerite shaped by the Quaternary glacial and current interglacial erosion effects. Photography is able to capture these processes, from the transient to the ancient, as a single moment in time.

Pipefish share the family Syngnathidae with seahorses, sea dragons, and pipehorses, all possessing the same tubular jaws and limited swimming ability. Like their relatives, pipefish around the world have evolved sophisticated camouflage, mimicry, and commensal relationships that help them survive in complex habitats. This spotted pipefish (Stigmatopora argus), photographed in the shallow seagrass beds of Trial Bay, Tasmania, is one such master of disguise. It orients its slender body upward, aligning effectively with the vertical blades of seagrass it threads between. By matching posture, movement, and colour, it becomes almost indistinguishable from the habitat it depends upon. Survival isn’t always about speed or strength. For some creatures, success lies in knowing exactly when—and how—to disappear.

Emperor Penguin (Aptenodytes forsteri) chicks gather in creches for warmth and protection from predators while their parents return to sea to forage. The conservation status of Emperor Penguins was recently changed from Near Threatened to Endangered following a decrease in numbers. The chicks in their downy suits are not waterproof until they have completed their moult. Early sea-ice breakup due to warming has resulted in catastrophic losses of chicks. With increasing warming, IUCN modelling suggests Emperor Penguin numbers will halve by the 2080s. This image was taken on the very first visit by humans to the Lazarev colony on 5 November 2024.

A red handfish (Thymichthys politus), one of Australia’s rarest endemic fishes, rests among algae being consumed by a short-spined sea urchin (Heliocidaris erythrogramma). Found only in a single coastal habitat in southern Tasmania, red handfish “walk” along the seafloor using modified pectoral fins rather than swimming. With fewer than 250 individuals remaining in the wild, the species is on the edge of extinction. Its primary threat is habitat degradation linked to localised overpopulation of short-spined urchins, which can overgraze algal communities. My research focuses on managing urchin populations and restoring this critical habitat. It also aims to fill key knowledge gaps in red handfish ecology, including their diet, which is unknown in the wild. Is the small invertebrate visible here as potential prey? And are these food resources also being lost as the ecosystem continues to degrade?

This photograph was taken from Tasman Island during a large Southern Ocean swell, looking back toward the cliffs below Cape Pillar on Tasmania’s southeast coast. The waves in this image have travelled thousands of kilometres across open ocean before meeting the near-vertical dolerite coastline. When that energy reaches the cliffs it has nowhere to go but upward, throwing seawater high into the air and creating the dense spray visible along the rock face. The small seabird near the centre of the frame gives a sense of scale against the height of the cliffs and the force of the water moving through the scene. Events like this happen repeatedly during large swell conditions and slowly shape this coastline over time. This image captures a brief moment within that ongoing interaction between ocean energy and rock.

Crown shyness is the pattern of gaps that forms between neighbouring tree crowns. One hypothesis is that these gaps result from mechanical abrasion: as adjacent branches collide in the wind it damages sensitive growing tips and limits further outward growth. Whatever the cause, the result is a canopy with channels of sky rather than a continuous layer of leaf cover. This photograph shows a Myrtle, Nothofagus cunninghamii, canopy.

Humans have been observing and recording celestial events for thousands of years, with lunar eclipses holding a special fascination for us. This total eclipse was designated a 'blood moon' due to the reddish hue cast from Earth's shadow and atmosphere. It was also a supermoon, so called because it appears larger than usual in our sky due to its close proximity to Earth. This moment is called the perigee, at which point the moon is roughly 45,000 km closer to Earth than at the farthest point in its elliptical orbit. It was challenging to observe and image, with intermittent cloud cover throughout the night. My image depicts twenty-four separate photographs showing the progression of the eclipse through its many different phases. This image was created specifically to illustrate the eclipse timeline and is often used by me during public astronomy outreach sessions. Note that only basic photo editing software was used to scale and position the individual images. The spiral arrangement is purely for aesthetic and presentation purposes and doesn't reflect the 'movement' of the moon in the night sky.

Numbering just under 300 and standing for hundreds of years defiant against one of the harshest environments in Australia, the Miena cider gum (Eucalyptus gunnii subsp. divaricata) has been a consistent companion for the traditional custodians of the land, the Tyerrernotepanner, who have lived beside and relied on nourishment from them for millennia. The Central Plateau's high altitude, usually dry air, and distance from much of humanity make it an excellent observing locale for astronomy -- a pastime sadly being ruined by the relentless acceleration of ‘space junk’ - criss-crossing our skies at hellish pace, and leaving inescapable light trails in its wake. Humans have left indelible marks across virtually every environment on terra firma, such as the relentless march of climate change that has driven the Ciders to the brink of extinction; particularly bad wildfire seasons in recent decades have wiped out the vast majority of the population, leaving ghostly gnarled remains on the Highland landscape. Terra firma bears our scars, but space at large does not need to.

Cemeteries. Places of grief, loss, mourning, neglect, abandonment. But if you look closely they are also places overflowing with life, as neglected headstones will, over time, develop a skin of slow-growing lichen. Lichens are a classic example of the biological process of symbiosis between fungi and algae or cyanobacteria. The algae produce nutrition via photosynthesis, and the fungus provides hydration and protection. Lichens may also contribute to pedogenesis, accelerating the headstone’s degeneration as it slowly crumbles to eventually become part of the soil. Photographing the headstones in the tiny cemetery at Marion Bay on Tasmania’s east coast gave rise to images of abstraction in which the viewer leaves behind the physical memorials and is drawn into the other-worldly minutiae of biological growth – to be awakened to the colours and textures of cemetery lichen, to wonder what they were seeing, and then to get lost in the detail.

The Platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus) has a two‑layered fur for maintaining thermal homeostasis in Tasmania’s cold, freshwater environments. Its outer coat consists of tightly packed guard hairs rich in natural oils that provide water resistance. Beneath this lies a layer of fine, wool‑like underfur that traps a stable layer of air against the skin. Together, these layers form a very effective thermal insulation. The air layer is retained during repeated diving, minimising convective heat loss when diving in rivers and alpine streams that can approach near‑freezing temperatures. The effectiveness of this insulation enables platypuses to sustain extended foraging, often for up to 12 hours per day without significant drops in core body temperature - essential for the species’ semi‑aquatic lifestyle and its distribution across Tasmania’s colder habitats.

An Australian Ghostshark (Callorhinchus milii) scours the seagrass beds of the river Derwent for an easy meal. This is not actually a shark but a ‘Chimaera’. This group of cartilaginous fishes branched off from the sharks and rays nearly 400 million years ago. Members of this species use their plough-shaped snouts to detect prey hidden in the sand. Their snouts are lined with the ‘Ampullae of Lorenzini’, little pores that sense the faint electric fields of potential prey. Ghostsharks also have a large spine on their dorsal fin to fend off large predators, but as you may have noticed, it may be the smaller parasitic predators they need to watch out for. On the back of the fish in the photo you can see at least four isopods that are feeding off blood and mucus. To emphasise their ghostly appearance with light streaks, I utilised a long exposure with both a flash and dive lights.