Life Magnified 2023 Forever Stamps — Microscopy Images, Panes of 20

Issue facts

First Day of Issue: August 10, 2023
First Day City: Cleveland, Ohio
Printed by: Banknote Corporation of America
Printing Method: Offset, Flexographic
Format: Panes of 20

The set

Twenty different photographs, every one made through a microscope using specialized technique, each captioned with the name of the specimen shown. The premise is simple: put things on the mail that the eye cannot resolve on its own. The first-day ceremony was held at The Great American Stamp Show in Cleveland.

A short history of looking closely

Magnification has been in use for over 4,000 years. The word "microscope" comes from the Greek for "small" and "to look at, examine or inspect." Instruments have run from the simple compound microscope to the scanning electron microscope, which uses electron beams rather than light and produces detail no optical instrument can reach.

The consequences are everywhere: medical research, robotics, engineering. Viruses, bacteria, fungi, and the fine structures inside larger organisms all became visible, and each step in the technology opened territory the previous one could not see.

What the set demonstrates, incidentally, is that scientific imagery and good design are not separate categories. These images inform and they also happen to be beautiful.

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