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How Big Are Things?
Home     Welcome
small Real
world

big     solar system between galaxy
nano
micro
meter
kilo
Mega
Giga
Tera
Peta
Exa
  micrometer's Room - looking at the entire room
  um = 10-6 m
look at a sheet of graph paper
 
galaxy21
 20
19
local stars18
 17
16
between15
 14
13
E's orbit12
 11
10
sun9
 8
7
texas6
 5
4
hood3
 2
1
you0
 -1
-2
salt grain-3
 -4
-5
bacteria-6
 -7
-8
atom-9
10-6 m    1 um
10-5 m    10 um
10-4 m    100 um
10-3 m    1000 um (1 mm)

bacteria ~1 um
red blood cell ~10 um
hair ~100 um dia

original
grain of salt ~1000 um

  card paper
  thick paper
  plain paper
  thin paper
 
a sheet of paper

   one day's hair growth

light-picoseconds ( 10-12 lt·s )
0
1
2
3
4
5

 inches  mils (1/1000 inch)
0
10
20
30
40
50
60

typesetting's points (pt) (1/72 inch)
0
1
2
3
4

1200 dpi
600 dpi
300 dpi
100 dpi
/tr>

your screen
(If you sputter tiny drops of water on your screen (spit works), you can see them.)


The letter "a", and a period, in a 12-point font.
You can make your own big letter "a" poster.


a 20 uL drop (on a hydrophobic surface, like tile, or glass, or ...)


source
The eye of a needle.

pin diameters pin source, img

These are adult fleas. They feed on blood (see the fangs). Of big animals (mice, rats, cats, dogs, humans, etc). They have narrow bodies for running through hair forests. They can jump high - 100 mm (in this room, that's a thirty story building), surviving 200 G's on takeoff (ie, they leap tall buildings in a single bound:). Vampire bear? Elephant?

source


q-tip src    

alveoli balloon-like

smallest raindrops src


typical raindrop src

quarter

Thumbnail of micropaper.

(c) 2000-2003 Mitchell N Charity. All rights reserved.
Noncommercial use is fine. Otherwise, ask.