We investigate images of higher-order differential operators of polynomial algebras over a field
$k$. We show that, when
$\operatorname{char}k>0$, the image of the set of differential operators
$\{\unicode[STIX]{x1D709}_{i}-\unicode[STIX]{x1D70F}_{i}\mid i=1,2,\ldots ,n\}$ of the polynomial algebra
$k[\unicode[STIX]{x1D709}_{1},\ldots ,\unicode[STIX]{x1D709}_{n},z_{1},\ldots ,z_{n}]$ is a Mathieu subspace, where
$\unicode[STIX]{x1D70F}_{i}\in k[\unicode[STIX]{x2202}_{z_{1}},\ldots ,\unicode[STIX]{x2202}_{z_{n}}]$ for
$i=1,2,\ldots ,n$. We also show that, when
$\operatorname{char}k=0$, the same conclusion holds for
$n=1$. The problem concerning images of differential operators arose from the study of the Jacobian conjecture.