The water droplets themselves can be as small as a nanometre (a billionth of a metre) across.

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Kim Vandegriff and her colleagues have been using polymer wrappers a mere nanometre (a billionth of a metre) across.

ECONOMIST: Monitor

The 400-nanometre version turned out an average of 190 protein molecules per vesicle.

ECONOMIST: Drug delivery

They found that the mucus film was typically less than 35 nanometres thick (a nanometre is a millionth of a millimetre).

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Some people include things as small as a tenth of a nanometre, which is about the size of the bond between two carbon atoms.

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Half of the atoms in a five-nanometre particle are on its surface, which can make it many times more toxic than expected by weight alone.

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The 170-nanometre version, a thirteenth of the volume, managed 81 molecules.

ECONOMIST: Drug delivery

That done, he deposits them in a 100 nanometre-thick layer on top of a piece of glass, to which they stick without the need for glue.

ECONOMIST: Monitor

The Exynos 4 chip found in Samsung's flagship Galaxy S3 handset and Apple's A5X used in the iPad 3 both use transistors using a 32 nanometre fabrication process.

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Furthermore, unlike most examples of nanotechnology, these new materials may be able to make the elusive transition from nano-sized materials (a nanometre is a billionth of a metre) to macro-sized components.

ECONOMIST: MONITOR

The 100-nanometre vesicles produced no protein whatsoever.

ECONOMIST: Drug delivery