Really close up

Nano nature: nature’s spectacular hidden world

Richard Jones

London, UK: HarperCollins 2008 | 208pp | ?20.00 (HB) ISBN 9780007278428

Reviewed by Tony Stubbings 

This beautifully produced book of images is a tribute to the way in which the scanning electron microscope (SEM) has opened our eyes to the wonders of nature and science on the micro, and even on the nano, scale. 

Conventional microscopes have long allowed us to see in minute detail but SEM images, in their three dimensions and false colouring, have made things come alive in a new way.  

Nano nature  is a joy to thumb through just as a picture book, but Richard Jones has arranged the images to display the outer forms of natural things like scales, hairs and leaves and their functions including senses, procreation and breathing. 

There is a good brief commentary running though the picture display which explains how the pictures in the book shed light on the inner workings of nature in a way which just can’t be appreciated when things are viewed on a larger scale.