20 Of The Craziest Things Seen Through Microscopes

Chalk

Image Source: Reddit

You never really understand how weird things we use are until you see them in a context like this; what you're seeing here is a bit of chalk under an extensive microscope. I mean, how does that even remotely assemble a piece of chalk that you might have used on blackboards or as a child?

Wood

Image Source: Reddit

Now this image is shown under an electron microscope which means that all colour is negative, so no, you're not going crazy and that isn't some illuminous green wood you're looking at. It's kinda mad looking at wood this close, you'd probably never have thought it'd look quite so complicated!

Mites

Image Source: Reddit

These look like the sort of terrifying monsters that we might see in the next big sci-fi, alien monster thriller. It's actually quite scary! But really what we're seeing are little pieces of bacteria that really won't cause us much harm at all, except when they create their own little army.

Banana Slice

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mage Source: Reddit

I suppose when you really look into it, it does look a little bit like a banana. The outer rims are what gives it away, but you probably don't realise quite how sticky a banana is until you see the strings here. Again, it looks like something the CGI team might come up with when they're creating a sci-fi alien den!

The Human Eye

Image Source: Reddit

I suppose we can never truly see how our eye looks with our own eyes, which is quite a terrifying thing in itself when you think about it. But this person managed to get a strong microscopic image of the human eye. It looks like streams of tentacles heading towards a black hole, Scary!

A Vinyl Ridge

Image Source: Reddit

When you look at something on such a microscopic level it can really make you realise how crazy something can be built for the purpose it's used for. In this case, we can see the ridge from the surface of a vinyl disc, each ridge is essential in making sure all your favourite songs come out perfectly!

Velcro

Image Source: Reddit

Now you might have already known this, but it took me by surprise! Velcro underneath a microscope looks exactly like some hooks attached to a rope that 'hook' on to the fibres. I suppose it looks like it should, but is this what you would picture when you first thought of Velcro under the microscope?

Dental Floss (After Use)

Image Source: Reddit

I don't think the floss is what looks weird in this microscopic image, it looks pretty much as it does when you buy it out the packet. However, the pink stuff on the floss shows the deposits of food that have been chewed up and then pulled from the teeth using the floss. It looks a little weird really.

Snowflake

Image Source: Vox

We all know that snowflakes have a traditionally unique shape and under a microscope this doesn't really change. The only real difference between this image of a snowflake under an electron microscope and one you might find around the internet is that it looks a little smoother!

Mosquito Leg

Image Source: Newsweek

This image actually gained some traction in 2016, especially on social media sites like Twitter and Reddit; without any previous knowledge you'd probably never guess this was a Mosquito's leg under an 800x microscope. In fact, a number of people claimed that it was actually reminiscent of the guy on the Pringles can.

Human Ashes

 Image Source: Christen O'Brien

Poetically, this is absolutely top class, and it really gives you an insight into just how amazing our body really is. Without any prior information, you alongside everyone else would probably believe you were looking at some sort of galaxy out in space, but it's actually all the various parts of bacteria.

A Cat's Tongue

Image Source: Pinterest

If you own cat's or you've ever felt that discomforting feeling of a cat licking you, you'll know that a cat's tongue feels quite rigid. And this image might go some way to explaining why it feels that way! It actually looks like your cat's tongue might actually be made of thousands of smaller, mini tongues.

Smallest Man Made Lattice Structure

Image Source: Sci.News

In 2016, a group of scientists managed to create this glassy nanolattice structure using a special technique known as 3D laser lithography. It's actually crazy that us humans are now able to build something ourselves that we can't even see using our own eyes! The power of technology eh?

Toothbrush

Image Source: Reddit

Your toothbrush bristles have to be able to get between your gnashers, so it's no surprise that they still look this small despite it being through the microscope. You'll be able to see the circulated ends of the bristles that are used to remove any of the plaque and chewed up food that get stuck between your teeth. They look a little discoloured at the tip though!

Toilet Paper

Image Source: Reddit

This shredded looking material is actually what we use in order to keep our a** clean, and when you look at it under the microscope you might wonder if it's particularly safe for our body. But don't worry, it only looks this way as most of our toilet paper is actually now mostly made with only recycled materials!

Human Split Ends

Image Source: Reddit

I wouldn't blame you if you thought this was an un-zoomed image of a splintered bit of wood, a branch or something. But it's actually a massively zoomed image of someone's split end. We know split ends mainly as what makes our hair feel knotted, and it can be quite painful in order for us to brush our hair when we have them!

Salt And Pepper

Image Source: Reddit

You're not looking at some small rocks on the beach here, it's actually individual grains of salt and pepper mixed together. I'm not exactly sure what I was expecting when I seen these seasonings but the pepper granules are definitely more rigid and larger than salt. This might be a ploy by marketing companies as you can actually only taste the surface area of salt!

Head Lice

Image Source: Reddit

Instead of the headlice hanging off our hair, it actually looks more like another Sci-fi alien monster mixed with some sort of samurai warrior. Instead, we all know that these little critters are actually some of the most invasive and infuriating creatures that we can come across during our lives. They cause some serious itching!

Pollen

Image Source: Reddit

It's hard to believe that these little spiky balls are actually at fault for millions if not billions of people suffering from allergies like hay fever every year. Not only do they cause us to sneeze and struggle to breathe, but we actually also have to spend our hard earned cash on over the counter medicine to relieve the issues!

Tip Of A Pencil

Image Source: Reddit

This one actually looks kind of disgusting, when in reality it's probably one of the least disgusting things we'll see or use in our daily life. Instead of looking like a (shaped) piece of fatty and congealed meat, it's actually an extreme close up of the graphite we see within our pencils.

Thread And Needle

Image Source: Reddit

If you're like me, you might remember struggling to squeeze your thread through that tin hole in a needle, and when you look at it this zoomed in its actually even more chaotic. The thread we use looks pretty neat, but using a microscope it looks like a mess of fibres (which I suppose it is). It's a hard task though!

Instant Coffee Granule

Image Source: Reddit

This little rock looks a little similar to the ones we seen earlier on; but this one is actually related to something we drink instead! Instant coffee isn't everyone's favourite morning drink, but sometimes any form of caffeine is what we need to get our day going properly. The little holes we see are what helps them dissolve!

Human Skin Pores

Image Source: Reddit

I feel like everyone is seeing something different here, and without someone telling you what this is you'd never actually guess the right thing. The outer layers which look a little leafy here are actually layers of our skin and the redness we see at the centre is probably the inside of the body as this is a human sweat pore!

Human Eyelash

Image Source: Reddit

The correlation that's appearing as we go through this list is that things look nothing, when seen through a microscope, like they do normally. It might be the colour of this image that puts us off but these are actually images of the site of our eyelashes coming out from the tips of our eyes.

Guitar Strings

Image Source: Reddit

It's hard to believe that this coiled set of wires creates a noise that each of us probably hear every single day of our lives. It's even harder to believe that something that looks like this can actually make music that sounds so good! It's actually much more complicated than some people might believe too!

Fortune Cookie

Image Source: Reddit

Other than the colour we see, nothing here looks much like our traditional fortune cookies. In fact, and this is just my opinion, it looks more like something that might feature in the intro to Game of Thrones! If you've seen the show then you'll know what I'm getting at here... I hope.

Dust

Image Source: Reddit

This looks even more chaotic than anything we've seen on this list before, and the reason we're seeing so much colour is because there is genuinely bits of everything being zoomed in on here. Unsurprisingly, dust will look completely different depending on where it is you collect it.

Blood Clot

Image Source: Reddit

Blood clots can be extremely dangerous within the human body as, as the name suggests, the blood clots meaning it can't efficiently travel around the body. In this image you can see the amount objects that can block the bloodstream from flowing and it's no surprise these bricklike features can cause so much damage.

Kidney Stones

Image Source: Can You Actually

From a life threatening body issue to a really, really uncomfortable one; kidney stones can cause some severe pain within our bodies and obviously are a tough one to get out. I should point out that kidney stones can also be life threatening! It's no surprise urinating hurts when we're trying to get rid of these spikes out the body.

Fish Scales

Image Source: Reader's Digest

You wouldn't be the only one to think that this was actually a close up of the human fingerprint, but it's actually the scales of a fish! I suppose this shows a likeness between ourselves and our little swimming friends in the sea. We all have distinguishable markers upon our skin!!

A staph infection

image source: uk.pcmag.com

A staph infection can often look like a simple spot on the skin, which is why it can be dangerous to pick or squeeze it if you don't know what it really is. Staph infections can often happen from unhygenic things like dirty makeup brushes. This is actually what a staph infection looks like under a microscope.

Epoxy resin

image source: uk.pcmag.com

You might have heard of epoxy resin, which is a substance often used in manufacturing and even small-time crafts as a means to use as an adhesive. It usually comes as two parts which can bond together, good for repairs on different materials. What you see here is the bonding process of epoxy resin under a microscope!

Your bed pillow

image source: cracked.com

We already know dust mites and bed bugs exist, we're all aware of it, but because we can't actually see them (usually) we easily forgot what could actually be going on in our cozy bed space when we don't clean as often as we should. This is what your pillow might actually look like!

Your tongue

image source: cracked.com

Now you can think about this the next time you're kissing someone... or eating something... or brushing your teeth.... or anything, really. The tiny spikes on the tongue are known as filiform papillae, and they're there for a good reason, obviously, but it doesn't make them any easier to look at.

Human fertilization

image source: cracked.com

When you have the fertilization process under a microscope, you basically have the egg getting absolutely swarmed by long stringy things that look like spaghetti, and has now probably changed your whole idea of what goes on in the body when someone is trying to get pregnant!

Plaque on your teeth

image source: cracked.com

If you're already pretty casual about when you brush your teeth - and would be the first to admit you skip the floss - you might want to change your mind about that... at least, you probably will now that you've seen this picture. We all know about plaque on our teeth, but it's one of those 'out of sight, out of mind' situations...

Rose petal

image source: rd.com

And to think you've probably stuck your nose in there, too, to take a big sniff of the flower that ultimately looks like this when it's up close and personal under a microscope. What you can see here are actually the glands of the flower on the petal. And it's not so beautiful when it's black and white and not red or pink, is it?

Hydrothermal vent worm

image source: cracked.com

You might never have thought a worm could ever have teeth looking things like that! It sure gives a shark a run for its money... or it would if it was actually the size of a shark, which luckily it's not. Even when they're not being looked at under a microscopic, hydrothermal vent worms are seriously tiny.

Demodex

image source: cracked.com

Demodex are a classification of mites... but they're a type of mite you're going to regret ever finding out about in just a second when we explain. The good news is that not everyone has demodex, which will live on the eyelashes.. of people. They're also known as face mites. So there you go.

Bee larvae

image source: cracked.com

Bees have tons of larvae that of course eventually hatch into full bees, but this is just one solitary bee larvae - and now that we've seen it, one is quite enough, thank you very much. Any and all types of bee have larvae that look pretty similar, so you can expect any sort of bee larvae to look like this.

Aphids

image source: cracked.com

Aphids can be seen by the naked eye at their normal size - they sort of look like watermelon seeds, and are around the same size, green in color. You usually won't find an aphid alone, as they like to congregate in groups, like a lot of insects do. But just in case you wanted to know what these innocent-looking seed like creatures look like under a microscope...

Squid

image source: cracked.com

This isn't a whole squid itself under a microscope - which, let's be honest, would actually be terrifying. This is actually an extreme close up of the suckers on a squid. Which, from the outside, you never really wanted attached to you, but now you know what they look like...

Flat mite

image source: uk.pcmag.com

It might sound like something you'd order from a coffee shop, but definitely don't get confused with this one - it's definitely not something you want near you! If how it looks under a microscope is anything to go by, anyway. Also known as the brevipalpus phoenicis.

Peacock mite

image source: uk.pcmag.com

Surprisingly, this could actually be considered food looking compared to some of the horrors on this list! And we can see why it's called the peacock mite due to those striking weird feather things. The peacock mite is tiny, but worth looking at under a microscopic to see that bright orange skin and white feathers.

Rust mite

image source: uk.pcmag.com

One thing we definitely don't need to see more of is mites, but here we are again. The rust mite - different from the dust mite - is also known as the aceria anthocoptes scientifically, and it can usually be found in America - North America specifically - targeting thistle plants.

Soybean cyst nematode

image source: uk.pcmag.com

Even the name of this just sounds all kinds of wrong, but even more so when you see what it actually looks like. The snake-like creature on the left is the thing we're talking about, and although it looks huge on this picture, we just have to remind ourselves that in reality it's actually tiny, to save on the nightmares.

Colorado potato beetle

image source: uk.pcmag.com

The Colorado potato beetle is not named after the fact it sort of resembles a potato (because it doesn't!) but because it targets potatoes, and is basically the bane of anyone's existence who is trying to grow some pretty nice potato crops. It's just under half an inch in size.

Copepod

image source: uk.pcmag.com

The copepod is on the right, and actually isn't the issue here. The cholarae is on the left, and it's this thing that's the problem! The copepod isn't really a threat to humans, but the cholarae latches itself to the copepod - without its consent, probably - and is actually a well known collection of bacterium spores, which do

pose a problem for humans!

Maggot

image source: reddit.com

Maggots are horrible enough to look at at normal size, and you never really think about them having a face... until now. Is it as terrifying as you imagined? If you imagined at all? Yes, apparently maggots have teeth, scary looking bulging 'eyes' and whatever else is going on with that body.

Caterpillar

image source: reddit.com

We know we're supposed to give caterpillars a chance because they turn into beautiful butterflies and we shouldn't judge, but it's hard not to when they look like this. Turns out caterpillars are covered in a lot more hair than you thought - and are a lot more scary than you thought, too...