• Question: What is the smallest type of species that you have discovered?

    Asked by anon-205695 to Gabriel on 6 Mar 2019.
    • Photo: Gabriel Gallardo

      Gabriel Gallardo answered on 6 Mar 2019:

      Hi there! We try to look for fundamental particles, which we think are the building blocks that make up the universe. These particles are small — very small. The hydrogen atom is the smallest atom there is, and it is 0.000 000 000 01 meters across; we try to look for things even smaller than that!

      You can try to imagine how small this is: if a basketball were the size of the sun, a hydrogen atom would be about the size of a basketball, and the particles we try to look for are would be about wide as a human hair.

Comments