20 February 2021 | New Scientist | 29Top of the class
The Royal Photographic
Society’s Science Photographer
of the Year competition
THE terrifying effects of climate
change are captured perfectly in
North Pole Underwater (far left,
top), taken by photographer Sue
Flood. The signpost represents
the geographic North Pole.
At 90 degrees north, it is Earth’s
northernmost point, but rising
sea levels created by warmer
global temperatures have been
pushing it eastwards since 2005.
The shot won Flood the top prize
in the climate change category in
the Royal Photographic Society’s
2020 Science Photographer of the
Year competition. She hopes to
raise awareness of the “alarming”
rate at which polar ice is melting.
Katy Appleton won the
Young Photographer of the Year
award in the general science
category for Rainbow Shadow
Selfie (near left, top), achieved by
casting her shadow onto a wall
to highlight sunlight shining
through a prism.
Among the competition’s
other selected images is Turing
Patterns by David Maitland
(near left, bottom). It shows
chemicals spiralling on a Petri
dish, caused by an oscillating
Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction.
In My Way – Frank Sinatra
(far left, bottom), a composite
shot from her photo series
Bubble Beats, Kym Cox used
sound to create patterns on a soap
film stretched over a loudspeaker.
This image was achieved with
Sinatra’s signature song; varying
sound frequencies alter the
soap’s thickness, changing
the colours that show up.
See the winning and shortlisted
images online at the Science and
Industry Museum in Manchester,
UK, until 2 May. Other entries are
available at rps.org/spoty. ❚
Gege Li