A new book about cells featuring micrographed images of the biological blueprints for each and every living thing in the universe could be considered more than an informational and visual tome — it could easily be a photographic work of art.

The Cell: A Visual Tour of the Building Block of Life by Jack Challoner contains a plethora of photos — around 250 in total — taken with the use of micrography, a technique that utilizes digital imaging through a microscope. Each micrograph was then light-enhanced, which accounts for the vibrant coloring. The micrographs are also accompanied by text, which delves into and explores the history of cell biology and describes the makeup of cell machinery.

The cells featured in the book are as widely diverse as the micrographs depict, encompassing everything from the building blocks for lily plants to the Ebola virus to the organisms that create a monkey's kidney. 

Here's a summary of the book from the U of Chicago Press:

"The book is an authoritative yet accessible account of what goes on inside every living cell — from building proteins and producing energy to making identical copies of themselves — and the importance of these chemical reactions both on the familiar everyday scale and on the global scale. Along the way, Challoner sheds light on many of the most intriguing questions guiding current scientific research: What special properties make stem cells so promising in the treatment of injury and disease? How and when did single-celled organisms first come together to form multicellular ones? And how might scientists soon be prepared to build on the basic principles of cell biology to build similar living cells from scratch."

Check out some pictures of the micrographed cells below.

Via: Wired