世界最小圣诞贺卡诞生 "细"如头发

'The card is 200 micro-metres wide by 290 micro-metres tAll. To put that into some sort of perspective, a micro-metre is a millionth of a metre; the width of a human hair is about 100 university's school of engineering drew up the design to highlight its 'world-leading' nanotechnology expertise. A total of 8,276 of the cards could be placed on an area the size of a stamp. Professor David Cumming and Dr Qin Chen etched the Christmas tree image on to a minute piece of glass.

如果用具体数字来说明卡的大小，那么英国格拉斯哥大学纳米技术研究人员会这样告诉你，这张贺卡长290微米，宽200微米。而“微米”又是什么概念呢？1微米相当于1米的一百万分之一。用最直观的方法来显示出微米的大小我们可以拿头发做比较，一般“人类头发”的平均宽度仅仅为100微米而已。所以这张迷你贺卡恐怕无法直接用肉眼看到，卡片虽小，但也十分精美。贺卡上绘有圣诞树，科学家们为了不将其弄丢，将它镶嵌在一小块玻璃上。

'You could fit over half a million of them on to a standard A5 Christmas card - but signing them would prove to be a bit of a challenge.'Although the Christmas card example is a simple demonstration, the university said the underlying technology has important real-world applications.

来自英国格拉斯哥大学纳米技术研究人员说：“虽然纳米圣诞贺卡只是纳米技术的简单体现，但是，这项技术在现实世界具有重要的应用前景。”研究人员还打趣到，虽然卡面的意义深远，但是若要邮寄这个圣诞贺卡恐怕要费一番心思了。