BEAUTY AND FASCINATION OF MORPHOLOGIES OF THE MICROCOSMOS AND MACROCOSMOS - EXAMPLES FROM MATERIALS CHARACTERIZATION AND THE TYROLEAN ALPS

Twenty years of experience of the authors with scanning electron micro scopy (SEM) led to the idea to present a collection of striking exampl es of micrographs of intrinsic structural beauty as a birthday present to Professor Fresenius. Harmonic structures, marvellous or scurrilous SEM micrographs of inorganic materials are followed by some examples from the living microcosmos. Sometimes, striking parallelisms to our m acroscopic world can be detected, which ultimately lead to some outsta nding macroscopic morphologies of the Tyrolean Alps. This is an experi ment which tries to encompass fascinating morphologies of the microcos mos and morphologies of the environment of the authors, the Tyrolean A lps. It should empasize the totalitarian aspect of our existence as sc ientists in a specific environment although one of the authors has rec ently moved to a less dramatic landscape.