There is some really amazing photography being done with scanning electron microscopes, or SEMs, these days. And I’m not talking about those grainy monochromatic pictures you remember from high school biology.

Nikon’s MicroscopyU Web site is the ultimate guide to these snazzy images. SEM photography used be done on sensitized film, but the DXM1200 camera paired with a charge couple device, or CCD, that detects photons, can now produce high quality digital images.

After browsing the vivid photos on the site, you are probably asking, how much do these babies go for? Well the camera and the CCD come in a package for about $5,000. As far as the microscope goes, be ready to pay at least $60,000. Out of your price range? Yeah, mine too. But hey, maybe One Deal will sell it one day... you never know!

Don’t quite understand the science mumbo jumbo in some of Nikon's images? Well you’re not alone. Wikipedia has realized it needs to brush up on its science too. The National Institutes of Health has been recruited to update the science articles which have needed work for awhile. How long till professors start accepting Wikipedia as a source on term papers?

Even Major League Baseball is breaking out the Bio texts. The New York Times ran an article today detailing the MLB practice of DNA testing potential players. Apparently, quite a few Latin American players lied about their age to appear younger, and thus more attractive to recruiters. So essentially they are acting like a group of middle aged women. Nothing like a good stereotype!

Apparently these tests can also tell the MLB if a player will be injury prone in the future. They deny using the tests for this, but as a baseball exec, would you be able to pass up that opportunity?

Anyway, the ethics of the testing has been called into question. How much information is an employer entitled to? So to avoid my own DNA testing: Hey Greg! I was blonde until I was two years old... just fyi.

Well the federal government thinks DNA goes a few steps beyond fair game for a personnel file, and has outlawed testing by companies starting November 21.

Hear that MLB? You’ve got four months to confirm the age of all your potential recruits... get poking!

(top photo: Calf Thymus DNA Single Crystal, Michael W. Davidson, Florida State University)

(bottom photo: ephedrine crystallites, Nikon, MicroscopyU)