One year from Wednesday, the 2020 Summer Olympics will get underway in Tokyo. To celebrate that one year mark, the medals that will be handed out to some of the world's best athletes have been unveiled.
The Tokyo 2020 organizing committee revealed the medals, designed by Junichi Kawanishi, on Wednesday. According to International Olympic Committee guidelines, every medal design must include the iconic Olympic symbol featuring the five rings, as well as the official name of the games, the Greek goddess of victory Nike and the Panatheniac stadium.
Back in 2017, the organizing committee began a two-year collection campaign to gather old electronic devices from members of the public. That harvest brought them 78,895 tons of gadgets -- including 6.21 million mobile phones -- and gave them enough necessary metals to produce the Olympic medals, about 5,000 in total.
Both the gold and silver medals are made entirely from pure silver, though the former uses more than six grams of gold plating on top of the silver base. The bronze medals are made from a red brass alloy, which is 95 percent copper and five percent zinc.