This illustration shows a butterfly's wing across ten orders of magnitude, from the butterfly to the atoms of which it is made. Using the conventions of visual perspective the image travels in one continuous “landscape” from the human scale at the top to the atomic scale in the foreground. Placing objects from the butterfly's wing in one frame clarifies connections between components, highlighting the system’s reliance on structures at very different scales. This version of the image is a poster with annotated text explaining the different objects in the image, but it is also available as a poster without annotations, a banner or a graphic file, and also appears on the "Everything is Made of Atoms" Poster with other parallel zooms into the human bloodstream and a computer chip.
- Objects are made of atoms Things are made of smaller and smaller parts.
- Nanometer-sized things are very small, and often behave differently than larger things do.
- Scientists and engineers have formed the interdisciplinary field of nanotechnology by investigating properties and manipulating matter at the nanoscale.
NISE Network products are developed through an iterative collaborative process that includes scientific review, peer review, and visitor evaluation in accordance with an inclusive audiences approach. Products are designed to be easily edited and adapted for different audiences under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike license. To learn more, visit our Development Process page.