For the first time in history humans are aware of the giant and minuscule worlds in which they are immersed.
SCALES OF NATURE 2026 VERSION IS HERE!
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Scales of Nature is a vertical composite illustration of the physical world across 64 consecutive powers of ten, from 10^28+ m (entire universe) down to 10^-35 m (quantum foam). The image is a stack of translucent elliptical layers. Each shows the same viewpoint at one-tenth the width of the layer above it, with a label on the right giving the approximate length and the subject. The upper layers show cosmic structures, the Milky Way and the Solar System.
From Earth downward, the layers zoom into the Caribbean Sea, a beach and a person, a hand, a fingerprint, an artery, blood cells and viruses. Layers below the atomic scale are greyscale artistic renderings of subatomic, hypothetical and theoretical entities. Layer labels are orders of magnitude, not exact measurements.
Scales, top to bottom:
- Entire universe (>10^29): Its true extent is unknown and may be infinite.
- 10^27 m, future observable universe: The future visibility limit is about 19 Gpc (62 billion light-years) in comoving distance, or about 1.2 x 10^27 m across.
- 10^26 m, observable universe: Its diameter is about 8.8 x 10^26 m (93 billion light-years).
- 10^25 m, cosmic web: Filaments and walls of galaxies span from hundreds of millions to billions of light-years.
- 10^24 m, Laniakea Supercluster: It is about 160 Mpc across (4.9 x 10^24 m).
- 10^23 m, Local Sheet: This flat galaxy structure is 10.4 Mpc across and 0.47 Mpc thick (3.2 x 10^23 m wide).
- 10^22 m, Local Group: More than 30 galaxies are spread over about 10 million light-years (9.5 x 10^22 m).
- 10^21 m, Milky Way: It is about 100,000 light-years across and 1,000 light-years thick (9.5 x 10^20 m wide).
- 10^20 m, Orion Spur: The arm is about 3,500 light-years wide and 20,000 light-years long (1.9 x 10^20 m long).
- 10^19 m, Gould Belt: This ring of young stars is estimated at 3,000 light-years across (2.8 x 10^19 m).
- 10^18 m, Local Bubble: This cavity in interstellar gas is about 300 light-years across (2.8 x 10^18 m).
- 10^17 m, nearest stars: There are 14 known stars located within a 10^17 meter radius of Earth (10.57 light-years).
- 10^16 m, Oort Cloud: It is theorized to span 2,000 to 200,000 AU from the Sun (3 x 10^14 to 3 x 10^16 m).
- 10^15 m, Hills Cloud: This hypothetical inner Oort cloud reaches to about 20,000 AU (3 x 10^15 m).
- 10^14 m, scattered disk: Its objects come within 30 to 35 AU of the Sun, but orbits extend beyond 100 AU.
- 10^13 m, outer Solar System: Neptune orbits at 30.07 AU, so its orbit is about 9 x 10^12 m wide.
- 10^12 m, inner Solar System: The terrestrial planets and asteroid belt extend to about 3.3 AU (5 x 10^11 m).
- 10^11 m, Earth’s orbit: The orbital diameter is about 299 million km (3.0 x 10^11 m).
- 10^10 m, near-Earth objects: These bodies have a perihelion below 1.3 AU.
- 10^9 m, Moon’s orbit: The orbital diameter is about 768,000 km (7.7 x 10^8 m).
- 10^8 m, geostationary orbit: Its radius is about 42,164 km (8.4 x 10^7 m across).
- 10^7 m, Earth: The equatorial diameter is 12,756 km (1.28 x 10^7 m).
- 1,000 km, Caribbean Sea: It covers about 2.75 million km^2.
- 100 km, Jamaica: The island is 234 km long, up to 80 km wide, and 10,991 km^2 in area.
- 10 km, Kingston: Kingston Parish covers 22 km^2.
- 1,000 m, Bull Bay: It is a coastal area about 16 km east of Kingston.
- 100 m, Bob Marley Beach: It is a beach at Bull Bay.
- 10 m, sea almond tree: The species (Terminalia catappa) grows up to 35 m tall, typically 30 to 55 feet (9 to 17 m), with a crown up to 50 feet (15 m) wide.
- 1 m, human: Average adult height is roughly 1.6 to 1.7 m.
- 0.1 m, hand: Adult hand length is typically 16 to 20 cm.
- 1 cm, fingerprint: A fingertip print spans 1 to 2 cm, with ridges about 0.5 mm apart.
- 1 mm, artery: Small arteries are about 1 mm wide.
- 0.1 mm, megakaryocyte: It averages 50 to 100 µm in diameter.
- 10^-5 m, blood cells: Red cells are about 7 to 8 µm across, and platelets are 2 to 3 µm.
- 10^-6 m, chromosomes: Human metaphase chromosomes are about 1.6 to 8.2 µm long, per one preprint.
- 10^-7 m, megavirus: Megavirus chilensis has a 440 nm capsid in dried samples and about 520 nm natively, or 680 nm with fibres.
- 10^-8 m, medium-size virus: Most viruses are about 20 to 300 nm.
- 10^-9 m, DNA: The double helix is about 2 nm wide.
- 10^-10 m, carbon atoms: The covalent radius is about 70 to 77 pm.
- 10^-11 m, helium atoms: The radius is about 28 pm (2.8 x 10^-11 m).
- 10^-12 m, gamma rays: Wavelengths are shorter than about 10 pm (10^-11 m).
- 10^-13 m, vacuum polarization halo: The scale is the electron’s reduced Compton wavelength, 3.9 x 10^-13 m.
- 10^-14 m, atomic nuclei: Diameters run from about 1.7 x 10^-15 m (hydrogen) to about 12 x 10^-15 m (uranium).
- 10^-15 m, protons and neutrons: The proton’s charge radius is 0.8409 fm (8.4 x 10^-16 m).
- 10^-16 m, proton’s core: The proton’s mass radius is estimated at 0.55 fm, a model-dependent value (5.5 x 10^-16 m).
- 10^-17 m, gluon saturation: This is a predicted dense-gluon regime. Estimated saturation scales of about 1 to 3 GeV correspond to roughly 10^-16 m.
- 10^-18 m, top quarks: The particle is point-like, with a reduced Compton wavelength of about 1.1 x 10^-18 m.
- 10^-19 m, PeV neutrinos: The particle is point-like with no measured size, the layer reflects an interaction radius.
- 10^-20 m, bottom and charm quarks.
- 10^-21 m, preons: These are hypothetical.
- 10^-22 m, high-energy neutrinos: The particle is point-like, the layer reflects an interaction radius.
- 10^-23 m, cosmic-ray second knee: It occurs near 3 x 10^17 eV, a wavelength of about 4 x 10^-24 m.
- 10^-24 m, EeV cosmic rays: At 10^18 eV, the wavelength is about 1.2 x 10^-24 m.
- 10^-25 m, cosmic-ray ankle: It occurs near 5 x 10^18 eV, a wavelength of about 2.5 x 10^-25 m.
- 10^-26 m, axionic strings: These are hypothetical, and their core width depends on the unknown axion decay constant.
- 10^-27 m, ultra-high-energy cosmic rays: The spectrum reaches about 3 x 10^20 eV, a wavelength of about 4 x 10^-27 m.
- 10^-28 m, neutron electric dipole: The measured dipole is below 1.8 x 10^-26 e-cm, or 1.8 x 10^-28 e-m.
- 10^-29 m, heavy seesaw neutrinos: These are hypothetical, and at 10^13 GeV the Compton wavelength would be about 2 x 10^-29 m.
- 10^-30 m, inflaton field: This is a hypothetical field, and its scale is model-dependent.
- 10^-31 m, primordial magnetic monopole: A grand-unified monopole’s core is about 10^-29 cm, or 10^-31 m.
- 10^-32 m, electron dipole: The measured dipole is below 4.1 x 10^-30 e-cm, or 4.1 x 10^-32 e-m.
- 10^-33 m, compact extra dimension: This is hypothetical, with a model-dependent size often placed near the Planck scale.
- 10^-34 m, heterotic strings: The size of a hypothetical string is thought to be near the Planck length (1.6 x 10^-35 m).
- 10^-35 m, quantum foam: This theoretical spacetime fluctuation is expected near the Planck length, about 10^-35 m.
Image and idea by Pablo Carlos Budassi – @aweeyedesign
PREVIOUS VERSION OF SCALES OF NATURE
Quantum Foam to Universe
Fist published in 2017, this illustration shows a progressive zoom in passing trough landscape views in different orders of magnitude. Currently featured on Wikipedia, and in several publications includding “Macroscopic magnetic self-assembly” by Per Löthman and in WNDR Museum Chicago. Along with OULI, it was chosen to integrate the Moon time capsule “Sanctuary”.
Other features: Moodle2, Okcydentalistyka.
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Zoomable Explorer of this image:
A brief description of each zoom level:
At 10^-32m is thought to exist a foam of twisted spacetime (Quantum foam).
10^-24m cross-section radius of 1 MeV neutrinos.
10^-22m Top Quark, the smallest quark.
10^-20m Bottom and Charm quarks.
10^-18m Up and Down quarks.
10^-16m Protons and Neutrons.
10^-14m Electrons and nuclei.
10^-12m Longest wavelength of gamma rays.
10^-11m Radius of hydrogen and helium atom.
10^-10m Radius of carbon atoms.
10^-9m Diameter of the DNA helix.
10^-8m Smallest virus (Porcine circovirus).
10^-7m Largest virus (Megavirus).
10^-6m X Chromosome.
10^-5m Typical size of a red blood cell.
0.1mm (10^-4m) Width of human hair.
10mm (10^-2m) Width of an adult human finger.
1m Height of an infant human being.
10m Argentinosaurus is the biggest dinosaur discovered yet (30 to 35 meters). Human figure is for comparison. In reality humans and dinosaurs didn’t live at the same time.
1km Diameter of Barringer Crater in the northern Arizona desert (1186m).
100km (10^5m) Jamaica Island (235km long).
10000km (10^7m) Diameter of planet Earth (12,742 km).
10^8m Moon’s orbit (770,000km).
10^9m Diameter of the Sun (1391400km).
10^11m Diameter of the inner Solar System. (600,000,000 km)
10^13m Diameter of the Solar System.
10^15m Outer limit of the Oort Cloud.
10^16m Distance to Alpha Centauri.
10^18m Messier 13 globular cluster.
10^20m Diameter of the Milky Way Galaxy.
10^22m Local Group of galaxies including Milky Way, M31(Andromeda), M33, SMC, LMC and smaller galaxies.
10^23m Typical galaxy cluster (2 to 10 Mpc).
10^24m Laniakea Supercluster of galaxies. (160 Mpc)
10^25m End of Greatness (“Cosmic web” structure).
10^26m Diameter of the observable universe sphere.
The entire Universe is larger than 10^27m and possibly infinite.
Related Artwork: POWERS OF TEN (below)
“Powers of Ten: Human to Universe”
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ETERNAL DISC
This work is part of Disc 1 of the Sanctuary on the MoonTime Capsule, co
mprising 12 industrial sapphire discs with 7 billion pixels printed on each.
Related Work:
Fundamental Particles to Scale
2024 Idea and research by Julie R. Peasley, design by Pablo C.Budassi – sources: symmetrymagazine.org, wikipedia.org
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