The world’s smallest snowman has been created by scientists
Thursday 10 December 2009
Scientists have used special technology to create the world’s smallest snowman – which is the size of a fifth of the width of a human hair.
The snowman is made of two tiny specks of tin which were welded together with platinum.
A focused ion beam was used to carve the snowman's eyes and smile, and to deposit a tiny blob of platinum for the nose
He also made a snowball with a smiley face which is a couple of micrometres across – one micrometre is one millionth of a metre.
Dr David Cox, a researcher at the Advanced Technology Institute, University of Surrey, created the images using nanomanipulation – which is moving extremely tiny items using optical beams.
He works with particles that are nanometers in length – a nanometre is equal to one billionth of a meter.
Dr Cox made the snowman which is just 0.01mm across at the university.
He said: “Making the snowman took me the best part of the morning. It’s relatively straightforward, assuming you have access to a focused ion beam and a nanomanipulation system.
“It would have been possible to make an even smaller snowman, but then things start to get a bit fiddly, and it would have taken a lot longer.
“The technology we used for this can be used to measure and manipulate the smallest things possible, like the interactions of single molecules.
“We are looking things like setting standards for how electricity will be measured 20 years in the future, when the technology catches up.”
Dr Cox is seconded to the National Physical Laboratory (NPL), which is one of Britain’s leading science facilities and research centres.
And he made it for a Christmas card for the NPL.
The NPL is one of Britain’s leading science facilities and research centres.
A new ion milling technique has been developed between scientist and the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) in west London to produce complex 3-dimensional patterns on the length scale.
This is achieved through the accurate control of milling depth to within one nanometre.
The reason scientists use nanomanipulation is to explicit the unique properties that can exist in materials and devices when they are this small.
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