Nanocosmos: Journeys in Electron Space (Abrams, 2025) is a 320‑page visual exploration of the microscopic world using scanning electron microscopy. This piece features two exclusive SEM images of lunar impact glass from NASA’s Apollo 16, showing how meteoroid strikes melt regolith into glassy shards, spherules and beads. Michael Benson spent six years assembling hundreds of SEM scans at the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa to create composite micrographs that fuse scientific detail with striking artistic composition.
Lunar Impact Glass Revealed as Towering Micro‑Mountains in Michael Benson’s 'Nanocosmos' (Exclusive)
Exclusive: Microscopic Landscapes from the Moon in Michael Benson’s Nanocosmos
Nanocosmos: Journeys in Electron Space (Abrams Books, 2025) is a 320‑page, image‑driven exploration of the microscopic world, created by author, visual artist and filmmaker Michael Benson. The book translates scanning electron microscope (SEM) data into dramatic, artful images that make tiny objects appear like vast, otherworldly terrains.
We are sharing two exclusive SEM images of lunar impact glass taken from samples returned to Earth by NASA’s Apollo 16 mission. These glassy fragments — spherules, beads and shards formed by violent meteoroid impacts — look like miniature mountain ranges under Benson’s magnification.
"The tiny worlds here, invisible to our unassisted eyes, are if anything more intricate, complex and extraordinary than anything so far seen in deep space." — from the book description
Lunar impact glass forms when meteoroids strike the Moon’s regolith with tremendous heat and pressure, briefly melting lunar soil. The molten droplets cool rapidly as they fly, freezing into glassy beads and shards that record the high‑temperature events that created them.
Benson assembled Nanocosmos from hundreds of carefully curated SEM scans captured over six years at the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa. The resulting composite micrographs reveal surprising symmetry, texture and design at scales too small for the unaided eye, blending scientific precision with aesthetic composition.
Why these images matter
Beyond their visual drama, the SEM images provide scientific insight into the microstructure and formation of lunar materials. Benson’s work sits at the intersection of art, science and documentary filmmaking — he supervised the cosmology sequences in Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life (2011) and Voyage of Time (2016), and authored the Hollywood history Space Odyssey (2018).
These exclusive images invite readers to rethink scale: what our eyes read as a grain or a bead becomes a landscape when viewed through the electron microscope, offering a fresh perspective on both the Moon and the techniques we use to study it.
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