Life at the Edge of Sight: Photographic Exploration of the Microbial World

"I travel to photograph exotic microbial life across the planet, but I could also explore my own backyard for the rest of my life, and never discover and document all of the beauty and biology happening in a single pinch of soil." - Scott Chimileski

Chimileski's presentation will feature a stunning visual exploration of microbes—magnificent close-ups of the inner workings and cooperative communities of Earth’s most prolific organisms – through vignettes and images from his recent book, Life at the Edge of Sight: A Photographic Exploration of the Microbial World .

“Every day, I am astonished by the biodiversity that the microbial world contains,” says Chimileski. “We are all biased by our vision, only able to see life forms of a certain size, but in reality, most life on Earth extends into the microscopic realm. Sometimes microbial organisms are entirely invisible. In other cases, microbes extend into the visible, forming colorful and elaborate colonies and microbial mats.”

Scott Chimileski is based in the Kolter Lab at Harvard Medical School. He is a guest curator of the Microbial Life: A Universe at the Edge of Sight exhibition currently at the Harvard Museum of Natural History which is on view through September 3, 2019. He is coauthor with Roberto Kolter of Life at the Edge of Sight: A Photographic Exploration of the Microbial World (Harvard University Press, 2017)

Chimileski received a Passion in Science Award in Arts and Creativity from New England Biolabs in 2016 and the BioArt award in 2016 and 2017 from the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB). His images have been published in many popular outlets, including TIME, WIRED, The Atlantic, STAT, NPR, Scientific American and Smithsonian Magazine.