Meet the JudgesMeet the Judges

Dr. Deboki Chakravarti

For Deboki Chakravarti, the path from the lab bench to the podcast studio was paved with curiosity, creativity, and a deep love for stories, particularly the ones science has to tell.

After receiving her undergraduate degrees in biomedical engineering and English at Caltech, Chakravarti earned her PhD from Boston University, where she worked on engineering T cells to fight cancer. However, while her research addressed some of medicine’s most pressing challenges, she discovered that her true passion wasn’t just in making discoveries, but in explaining them. “I realized that I loved talking about science more than I loved doing research,” she shared.

That realization sparked a new chapter in her career. After completing an internship at Scientific American, she transitioned into science communication full-time, crafting educational content to bring scientific concepts to life through video, audio, and narrative storytelling. Today, Chakravarti is best known for her work as co-host of Tiny Matters, a podcast from the American Chemical Society, as well as for her roles in Crash Course Organic Chemistry, Scishow Tangents, and the microscopy series Journey to the Microcosmos.

“I’ve always loved reading and writing,” she explained. “So, it just made sense to combine the creativity of science and art to find new ways to understand and explain the world around us.” For Chakravarti, the role of science communication is to introduce people to the wonder in the ordinary. “Art can help bring home the way that science touches all of our lives. Sharing it with the public helps people make connections between their own lives and what scientists learn in the field or the lab.”

This perspective made her a valuable voice on the 2025 Nikon Small World judging panel. With her extensive background in visual science storytelling and a soft spot for microbes (thanks in part to her work on Journey to the Microcosmos), Chakravarti brought a keen eye to the image and video entries. “I think the ones that stand out most are the ones that help you see something in a new way, or that have you wondering how the person behind the camera got that particular shot,” she said. “I love the feeling I get when a picture makes me realize just how much bigger the world is than I can possibly imagine, even when we’re looking at tiny things.”

Reflecting on her experience judging the competition, Chakravarti referenced her admiration for the dynamic collaboration among her fellow judges. “It was really cool to see how differently we responded to certain images,” she said. “I loved learning from everyone’s experiences and seeing what we all brought to the table.”

Now in its fourth season, Tiny Matters remains a passion project for Chakravarti, with recent episodes exploring everything from astrobiology to the hidden history of forensic science. Just like the Nikon Small World competition, her work aims to bridge science and storytelling, and to bring the awe of discovery to a broader audience.

Jeff DelViscio

Jeff DelViscio’s career began not in a newsroom, but at sea. As an oceanographic researcher aboard research vessels, he experienced firsthand how data and discovery connect across time, space, and scientific disciplines. “That spark of understanding didn’t lead me back into research,” he said. “It developed in me a desire to tell bigger stories about what that data meant for humanity, both now and in the future.”

Over the past 25 years, that desire has evolved into a mission to redefine science journalism for the digital age, and has manifested in him leading visual, audio, and interactive storytelling initiatives at organizations such as Scientific American, STAT, and The New York Times. His work spans everything from data visualizations to Emmy-winning documentaries, all grounded in his profound understanding of science and effective communication.

The Nikon Small World judging panel offered DelViscio a new lens—quite literally—through which to engage with science storytelling. “I enjoy standing in a creative firehose, just feeling the ideas and attempts at ideas wash over me,” he said. “With so many entrants to the Nikon Small World competition to review, I certainly got the firehose.”

What struck him most about the entries was the level of precision behind the scenes: “I’m always amazed by techniques that require massive numbers of stacked images — tens of thousands in some cases. From an engineering perspective, they’re incredibly hard to capture. I’ve got a lot of respect for the scientific artists who can pull it off.”

For DelViscio, the most compelling images are visually stunning, of course, but they also tell a story. Whether it's a tardigrade hitching a ride on a nematode or water droplets evaporating from the wing scales of a peacock butterfly, “people pause for interesting pictures, but they stay for stories,” he said.

He sees competitions like Nikon Small World as essential to making the invisible both visible and relatable. “It’s incredibly easy to ignore the very small. But think about what happens when someone does understand, maybe for the first time, the very small… The world of our understanding blasts wide open.”

DelViscio’s unique position as both a trained scientist and seasoned journalist made him a valuable bridge between the technical and the accessible. “My insider-outsider status gives me the perspective to see the entries from both sides,” he explained. “You need travelers who have lived in both worlds.”

He reflects on the judging experience overall as energizing. “When you’re doing creative work as your job, you really need to play in others’ creativity from time to time to keep your ideas fresh and ambitious,” he said. “This was that for me.”

Dr. Andrew Moore

A postdoctoral researcher in the Lippincott-Schwartz Lab at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Janelia Research Campus, Dr. Andrew Moore spends his days investigating how the cytoskeleton shapes and positions organelles, with a particular focus on intermediate filaments and their interactions with the endoplasmic reticulum. His work draws on an expansive imaging toolkit, from cutting-edge light microscopy to volume electron microscopy, to uncover the inner architecture of cells.

Moore’s fascination with cell biology took root during graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania, where a rotation in Erika Holzbaur’s lab changed the course of his scientific journey. “I’d seen cartoon organelles in textbooks, floating statically in imaginary spherical cells,” he recalled. “But watching organelles actively moving down the axon of a cultured neuron in real time was something else entirely. I was hooked.”

That visual awakening ultimately brought him to Nikon Small World, first as a participant, and now to the other side of the table as a judge. Since 2018, Moore has earned recognition on 12 of his entries across the Nikon Small World photomicrography and video competitions, making him uniquely attuned to the perspectives of contributors. “I think I had a good sense of what some contributors were aiming for,” he said. “Because I work extensively with image processing and analysis, I’m mindful of how certain artifacts or quirks might arise, and that kind of context was helpful to share during judging.”

One of the things Moore appreciated most about the experience was the opportunity to view the full breadth of entries as opposed to only being privy to the winning gallery. “There were some really beautiful and compelling images that just missed the mark because of small technical issues,” he noted. “Getting to see that range was a treat.”

Drawing upon his deep scientific expertise in fluorescence microscopy, Moore brought a discerning technical eye to the judging process. Still, he was just as drawn to the unconventional. “Sometimes it's not about technical perfection but about seeing something novel or surprising,” he said. “I've seen thousands of images of cell division. It’s a striking process, but I know how the story ends. Show me a video where it fails, and I’m instantly more interested.”

Moore, like about 8% of men, has a red-green color deficiency — a condition he says gave him a different lens into the judging process. "That definitely shapes how I experience images,” he explained. “Sometimes an image that really popped for the other judges looked pretty flat to me. But I like to think it gave me a unique perspective.”

He believes the fusion of science and art is essential to building a deeper public connection to biology. “Seeing what cells actually looked like under a microscope completely shattered my textbook view,” he said. “Sharing real images rather than simplified cartoons helps people engage with biology in a visceral way. That sense of wonder, that moment of ‘Woah, I had no idea it looked like that’ — that’s powerful.”

That same spirit of discovery drives Moore’s own research. One of his latest projects is a molecular tool called FilaBuster, a photochemical system designed to selectively disassemble intermediate filaments such as vimentin and keratin in live cells. “Intermediate filaments are crucial for cellular architecture and mechanics, but until now, there hasn’t been a good way to perturb them specifically and acutely,” he said. “We developed FilaBuster to help fill that gap, and we’re excited to see how others use it in their own systems.”

Now, as he prepares to enter the academic job market and launch his own lab, Moore continues to explore the frontier of cellular organization, one frame at a time.

Dr. Liz Roth-Johnson

Since her undergraduate days at the University of California, Berkeley, Liz Roth-Johnson has consistently maintained an equal appreciation for the creative and the analytical. A molecular and cell biology and music double major, she found common ground in this path with many of her peers. “Scientific research is in itself a very creative pursuit, and a lot of scientists find artistic outlets for their creativity,” she said. Reflecting further on the connection between the two, she noted, “I think all the beautiful imagery submitted to Nikon’s Small World competition is evidence of that.”

While music remained more of a hobby, Roth-Johnson's passion for scientific discovery and education were nurtured during her graduate and postdoctoral studies, leading her to run a food science blog, take up an internship at KQED Science, and develop introductory biology courses at UCLA. The common thread? Making science not only digestible, but delightful. She has since spent her career weaving these two passions together to make science accessible, memorable, and even a little magical for audiences of all ages.

As curator of life sciences at the California Science Center, Roth-Johnson designs interactive, curiosity-sparking life science exhibits, drawing on her background in research and education. Her path to the Nikon Small World judging panel was paved by her appreciation for both the technical rigor and emotional resonance that microscopic imagery can offer. “I believe I brought a nice blend of technical microscopy know-how, thanks to my graduate training, along with an appreciation for what kinds of images might capture the imagination of the general public,” she said. That dual perspective was shaped in part by her experience curating a Nikon Small World exhibit, currently on display at the California Science Center.

Roth-Johnson brought a critical eye and an open mind to the judging process. She particularly enjoyed its collaborative nature, and the opportunity to learn from her fellow judges. “Everyone brought a wealth of expertise and unique perspectives,” she said. “Sometimes the other judges’ responses were surprising, making me consider new things about what I was seeing.” The subjective nature of the judging, she said, made for an experience that impressed as much as it surprised.

For her, the most captivating entries were the ones that stirred something in the viewer. “As with any art, I think the most compelling images and videos elicit some kind of response, whether that’s awe, wonder, curiosity, or even unease,” she explained. “They may surprise you by showing something familiar in a new way.”

Roth-Johnson noted that her role as a science educator has given her a personal stake in the importance of fusing science and art, and on the informative nature of the Nikon Small World competition: “Art can be such a powerful way to generate that initial spark of curiosity. It can encourage people to think differently about or dig deeper into a subject,” she said. “Back when I was still a student, artistic representations of molecules and cells captured my imagination and inspired me to study those subjects in school. I hope that art continues to inspire students to develop a love of science.”

Looking ahead, she’s excited about two major projects at the California Science Center: the construction of the Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center, the new home for the Space Shuttle Endeavour, and the early stages of a renovation for one of the museum’s permanent life sciences galleries. “This project will reimagine how we bring human health and physiology to life for a new generation of science learners,” she said.

From molecular biology to museum curation, Roth-Johnson's expertise offers a rare combination of scientific knowledge and creative insight — a perfect match for a competition that sits at the intersection of discovery and design.

Dr. W. Gregory Sawyer

From working on the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s original Mars Rover Program to later remotely leading tribology experiments aboard the International Space Station, Dr. W. Gregory Sawyer’s career journey has followed a nontraditional yet interconnected path through space exploration, mechanical engineering, and cutting‑edge cancer research. Today, as the Chief BioEngineering Officer and inaugural Chair of the Department of BioEngineering at the Moffitt Cancer Center, he leads a multidisciplinary team that advances cancer engineering by applying engineering, biomaterials, and imaging to revolutionize oncology.

Under his leadership, Moffitt’s bioengineering department has developed new tools to create precision replicas of tumor samples taken from patient biopsies. These microtumor avatars are 3D‑printed and built to behave like real tumors in the body, allowing scientists to build and dismantle cancer, understand its mechanisms, identify its weaknesses, and stop it. These innovations bridge the connection between tumor biology, bioimaging, and treatment development in tangible ways.

The Moffitt Cancer Center was recognized in early 2025 as the first standalone cancer center in the world to open a Nikon Center of Excellence, joining a distinguished group of institutions utilizing high-end microscopy to accelerate their scientific discoveries.

The perspective Dr. Sawyer brought to the Nikon Small World judging panel was that of an engineer who values symmetry, composition, and the visual dimension of scientific discovery. “At the core, scientific research becomes relatable through art, where striking images can be appreciated for both their beauty and complexity,” he said.

Reflecting on his experience as a judge, Dr. Sawyer noted, “What I found most rewarding was getting to see the wide range of subject matters, the important science that was being done, and the incredibly creative use of optics and microscopy to answer really important problems and questions in science,” Dr. Sawyer said. "I was awed and surprised by how difficult it was—with so many excellent submissions—to get down to the small number that ended up being the finalists.”

Beyond the lab, Dr. Sawyer is recognized nationally as a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors and was recently inducted into the 2025 Florida Inventors Hall of Fame. Both honors reflect his prolific U.S. patents (of which there are over 40) and transformative contributions to biomaterials, bioimaging, and bioengineering.

His relentless commitment to excellence and precision, combined with over two decades as a Professor and Distinguished Teaching Scholar at the University of Florida, translated naturally to the judging room, where he easily stepped into the role of group discussion facilitator. A natural leader and educator, Dr. Sawyer encouraged thoughtful debate and discussion for each submission while shepherding the judging process along thoroughly and efficiently.

Nikon extends our sincerest gratitude to each of the esteemed 2025 judges for their contributions to this year’s competition. Winners of the Small World in Motion video competition will be announced September 24, 2025, and winners of the Nikon Small World photomicrography competition will be announced October 15, 2025. Don’t miss an update – follow along on social media (LinkedIn, Facebook, X, and Instagram) for a closer look at all things Nikon Small World!