Physicists assemble world's smallest snowman

The National Physical Laboratory has deployed a range of techniques to create the world's smallest snowman - a diminutive fellow just 10 µm across, or "1/5th the width of a human hair". The world's smallest snowman. Pic: NPL The NPL explains: "The snowman was made from two tin beads used to calibrate electron microscope …

[Tzael]

Where's the snow?

I saw the "just 10 µm wide" under the article title and thought "that's neat, I didn't realise snowflakes could be so small"... I just want to say I feel cheated by the false claim of "snowman" :P

[Stoneshop]

So you feel

woodchucks should be made of wood, and water buffalo out of water.

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not a snow man...

It's not made of snow.

[Anonymous Coward]

@ Fail AC

>It's not a snow man it's not made of snow.

I, for one, SPIT every time I see those so-called "snow"men in stores and bakeries, grinning at me with their DEAD PLASTIC OR COOKIE EYES. HOW DARE THEY NAME SOMETHING AFTER WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE.

[John A Fotheringham]

Yeah...

...and where's the "not actual size" disclaimer?

[Sarah Bee]

Re: fail

Yeah. It's like totally lame.

[Simon C]

absolutely

I've created the first adamantium fork......

only its not created of adamantium, its made of blu-tac.....

do I get a phsyics nobel?

[Blain Hamon]

Details, details

Sure! All you have to do is be able to assemble it in blu-tac, and make it a hundredth of a millimeter in size.

[Morris Maynard]

Next step

These guys need to read up on Calvin and Hobbes: http://sengupta.posterous.com/a-special-tribute-to-calvin-hobbes-and-the-un

[Toby Rose]

More a cowardly lion ...

Than a Tin Man too.

[g e]

A better use for my taxes

Than speedcameras or arresting overly tall people

[Riscyrich]

Waaaa, waaaa, waaa...

.... it's not made of snow. Jog on you strokers.

Don't even try to be a little bit amazed that these boffins can actually do this. Or appreciate that they might want to try bring a little bit of Christmas spirit into their lives or that Sarah liked this story.

No instead sit in front of you PC’s typing “it’s not made of snow”, “it’s not IT related”, “where’s the IT angle” etc etc

(whilst dribbling no doubt)

[Raving]

Stop abusing snowmen

PeTA needs to protest this.

[Anonymous Coward]

but but

But that is what we do. It is what we live for. In an equal way that people like you pick on the nitpickers. So, what is the Paris Hilton angel?

[Stoneshop]

Thanks for feeding the nitpickers

Thats's 'angle', not 'angel', you illiterate twat.

[Anonymous Coward]

Pedants

the lot of you...

[Anonymous John]

What about

the World's smallest Playmobil reconstruction?

[leakyPC]

Good to know

Good to know, Scientists are advancing science and using there grants productively.

Oh wait there not

[Anonymous Coward]

And..

Good to know spelling and grammar are still being taught in British schools.

[Lee Dowling]

Thank God I don't live in your humourless world.

Thank God I don't live in your humourless world, where people can't play for ten minutes to create a bit of festive cheer.

And thank God you're not a "Scientist", you can barely capitalise, punctuate or spell properly. That really carries weight when discussing proper use of academic funds...

[Anonymous Coward]

@leakyPC

Right! Should go to speling education there grants shoud.

[3kids2cats1dog]

Sounds like a Friday afternoon thing to do....

But Look Out Micro Snowman 2.0 will be self replicating! WIth presumably Micro Snow-women, Micro Snow-fetish and all that entails...

[Aristotles slow and dimwitted horse]

Cool.

I like this a lot.

It blows my mind though when I realise that things can still get much much much much smaller.

[John Hawkins]

Follow the yellow brick road...

"The wonderful Wizard of Oz.

We hear he is a Whiz of a Wiz if ever a Wiz there was.

If ever, oh ever a Wiz there was..."

I guess the little chap will be looking for a heart.

[Sir Runcible Spoon]

it might be the smallest

but is it the most expensive snowman-like construction ever?

It may not be made of snow, but it certainly looks cool!

Go-go nanotech

[Cliff]

Most expensive?

Per kilogram, I'll bet it is ;-)

[Sir Smokesalot]

May not be snow.....

But it is still very cool!

[Andus McCoatover]

10 points! Good on you, folks.

Lovely piccie! Next year, I'll bet they can get a reindeer in the piccie! (Moore's law for the IT angle, natch)

Made me chuckle.

[Anonymous Coward]

Award these people 10 Awesome Points

That's charming, and nicely produced. Great stuff.

[Nathan 13]

Amazing

We can create these wonderful things that are totally invisible to the human eye unless magnified 100s of times.

And its got me feeling like Christmas is coming so Merry Christmas all.

[Geoff Mackenzie]

Absolutely awesome

No sarcasm. That's mind blowing. Very nice work!

I actually want one, although that's slightly tempered by the fact that there's almost no difference between having one and having zero of them. :-)

[Jon Leighton]

I want one too, but

I don't have the room for it.

[Pirate Dave]

Where ...

are they gonna find a magic silk hat that small? And how will such a snowman lead the children through the streets of town when they can't even SEE him?

Someone wasn't thinking ahead...

[archengel46]

Nor the children

They weren't thinking of the children!

For God's sake!

[Anonymous Coward]

title should read

boffins make something that looks like a snow man so small they're calling it the worlds smallest snowman - no snow included... SLIGHTLY LESS IMPRESSIVE NOW ISN'T IT, MIGHT NOT HAVE WASTED MY TIME READING IT MIGHTEN I!!!

[Stoneshop]

Correction, title should read

"Commentards whining about world's tiniest snowman not being made of actual snow".

Get a life, wankers. This is awesome.

[Eddie Edwards]

Yeah, but

Yeah, but what did they take the picture with? The world's smallest webcam?

It looks shopped to me.

[Hedley Phillips]

Fab

I like

[DZ-Jay]

What'll they do for an encore?

Perhaps we should give them more grant money and see what they'll come up with next? The world's tiniest Christmas tree, perhaps? How about the teeniest weeniest ikkle toy train?

When money and time is no limit, and no actual expectations are are set, the sky is the limit, no?

All for the advancement of science.

-dZ.

[Stu]

Yes indeedy

<<<Smileyfaced snowman

Amazing stuff. You idiots who complain its not snow can stroke off too.

Just one thing - why does it look like freddy krueger took to his neck with a large blade.

Also tried to hack off his right leg/foot too!

Its kinda horrific!

[John Smith 19]

OK not actually very useful

But quite cool.

And it's probably improved their skills at ion writing and platinum bonding.

I look forward to the writeup in J Vac Sci & Tech.

[Anonymous Coward]

A platinum nose?

Were they short of carbon atoms or something?

[Captain DaFt]

Aw, quitcher griping

So technically, it's a snowman figurine, and not a snowman, So what?

It's still a nice piece of work, although they have been doing stuff like this for twenty years now.

http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/20360.wss

It's just a fun way to calibrate the equipment and show off what it can do.

[Stoneshop]

Vulture Standard Units:

7.1 uLg (microlinguini)

[windywoo]

What do they do with it afterwards?

It won't melt will it? They have denied themselves the pleasure of doing it all again next year. Tsk.

[Stoneshop]

Sure it will melt

At 505K, or thereabouts. That's (for very obvious reasons) well within the capabilities of your average soldering iron.

[Big-nosed Pengie]

Is it anatomically correct?

If not why not?

She is.

[Moss Icely Spaceport]

Nano-riffic

Love it.

Oh look, he's even got a tiny...

[Doug Glass]

Holiday Spirit

Wow, I see holiday spirit and simile are both quite dead in certain parts of the world.

"Bah, humbug" is truly your heritage.

[Anonymous Coward]

so dont

eat the metallic yellow snow

[bexley]

tax payer money well spent

Never mind that cure for cancer nor the threat of climate change.

It's way more fun to fuck about with micro snowmen.

I would not mind what these chaps did under normal circumstances. But i wan them to get on with some real work now thankyou very much.

[DaWolf]

jog on

it will have cost very little if they already had the equipment, and is awesome. It's also on their educational section - it's supposed to get kids interested in science.

all the negative people on this thread should just jog on....

[rciafardone]

This is a test of capabilities...

This is a test of capabilities, not a superfluos use of great resourses.

These are not medical scientist...

And "Manmade" Climate change is BS since all the "science" behind it is BS.

[Captain Thyratron]

Always good to see...

...what some good electron optics and some ion beams can do. I wonder how many of the "it's not snow" and "waste of funds" crowds realize that the very same technology is instrumental in the manufacturing of many of the integrated circuits in the computers they're using to write their whiney comments.

[Thimmus]

Not made of snow?

Maybe not 'snow' in the traditional sense, but why limit the definition of a word to being just what we've always understood it to mean?

Besides, it looks vaguely crystalline, and it's bloody impressive. I want one for my tree.

[P. Lee]

santa hat?

I thought this was under a .co.uk domain?

That'll be "Father Christmas" please! And a bowler hat.