2003 Photomicrography Competition

Director of the Optical and Magneto-Optical Imaging Center at the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory at Florida State University, Michael Davidson has been involved with various aspects of microscopy for over 25 years. Mr. Davidson’s scientific research includes the packaging of DNA into virus heads, liquid crystallinity in biological systems, and the adsorption of small liquid crystal molecules onto surfaces.

Mr. Davidson has authored many scientific articles on the subject of photomicrography. His photomicrographs have been published in more than a thousand national and international scientific journals, popular magazines and newspapers. Before becoming a judge, Davidson won two top ten Small World awards, placing 9th in both 1987 and 1990.

The Director of the Nikon Imaging Center at Harvard Medical School, Dr. Waters advises and trains researchers on specimen preparation and use of microscopes and imaging software. Dr. Waters has won numerous awards, including the 2001 Optical Imaging Association Award for Achievement in Optical Microscopy presented by the Microscopy Society of America, and the 6th and 9th place prizes, respectively in the 1999 and 2001 Nikon International Small World Competitions. Dr. Waters is a member of the American Society of Cell Biology and the Microscopy Society of America, and has contributed to many scientific publications.

Dr. Forscher is a professor in the Department of Molecular Cellular and Developmental Biology at Yale University. A Nikon Partner in Research, Dr. Forscher has enjoyed a distinguished career as a researcher and academic, and is currently continuing his study of the regulation of neuronal motility after receiving a research grant from the National Institutes of Health.

A frequent presenter at numerous symposia and seminars, Dr. Forscher has spoken at events such as the AAAS, the Society for Neuroscience, NASA/MBL, and the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Dr. Forscher counts among with academic awards and honors the Academic Infrastructure Instrumentation Award of the National Science Foundation, a McKnight Scholars Award from the McKnight Endowment Fund for Neuroscience and a postdoctoral fellowship from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Yale University School of Medicine.

Carolyn Smith is the Manager of the Light Imaging Facility at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke on the campus of the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. Dr. Smith came to the NIH in 1988 as a Senior Staff Scientist and was appointed to Manager of the Light Imaging Facility in 1994.

In her current work Dr. Smith uses the techniques of time-lapse microscopy to study aspects of the biology of living cells, such as the outgrowth of processes from developing neurons, protein transport through the intraneuronal secretory pathways, and the intricate process by which cells undergo cellular suicide, or “apoptosis.”