A View from the Back of the Envelope top

Length
m (meter)
Scale of some things
Landmarks
Scaling the universe to your desktop
Length Area Volume
[ Scale | Landmarks | Other ]
Rough Draft
10x m
27
U		 24
Gs		 21
G		 18
S		 15
 12
SS		 9
 6
 3 0
 -3
mm		 -6 -9
 -12 -15 -18 -21 -24 -27 -30 -33 -36
PW
... 9
 8
7
6
 5
4
3
km		 2
1
0
 -1
-2

cm		 -3

mm		 -4
-5
-6 -7
-8
-9
 ...
--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 -1 -2 -3 -4 -5 -6 -7 -8 -9 -10
Tm Gm Mm km m cm mm um nm
to Sun Sd Jd Ed East
Coast		 MA Bos. big
build.		 you a
marble		 Sugar
grain		 anim. cells bact. virus molec. atoms
power & telephone ... radio ... microwave infrared Visib UV X-Ray
1000 mi 100 mi 10 mi mile 1/10 mi 1/100 mi 10-3 mi
300 ft 30 ft foot in 1/32 in
lt·ks lt·s lt·ms lt·us lt·ns lt·ps lt·fs
1x 10x 100x 1000x
12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 -1 -2 -3 -4 -5 -6 -7 -8 -9
--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
m
...?
10-35 Planck-Wheeler length | space no longer "flat"
10-34
10-33
10-32
10-31
10-30
10-29
10-28
10-27
10-26
10-25
10-24
10-23
10-22
10-21
10-20
10-19
10-18 am
10-17
10-16
10-15 fm
10-14
10-13
10-12 pm
10-11
10-10 A | atoms
10-9 nm | atoms
10-8 bigger molecules
10-7 virus
10-6 um | hc/1eV | bacteria
10-5 eukaryotic cells | blood cell
10-4 eukaryotic cells
10-3 mm | grain of sugar
10-2 cm |
10-1 foot | light-nanosecond |
100 m meter | human
101
102
103 km
104 ocean & atmosphere thickness
105
106 Mm
107 Moon | Earth
108 light-second | Jupiter
109 Gm | Sun | to Moon
1010
1011 to Sun
1012 Tm
1013 to Pluto
1014
1015 Pm | to Oort Cloud
1016 light-year | pc (parsec)
1017 local stars | star cluster
1018 Em
1019 kpc | to Betelgeuse
1020 galactic disk - width | to Crab Nebula
1021 galactic disk - diameter | to LMC | galaxy
1022 to M31 | Mpc (megaparsec)
1023 Local group | galaxy cluster
1024 to Virgo Cluster | galaxy cloud | supercluster | voids | filaments
1025 to Coma Cluster
1026 ~ visible universe
1027
1028
...
10nm
-9
-8
-7
-6
-5
-4
-3
-2
-1
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27

A View from the Back of the Envelope
Comments encouraged. - Mitchell N Charity <mcharity@lcs.mit.edu>