Microscopic gingerbread house a big science wonder

EVEN TINY TIM WON’T FIT Rather than going big with holiday decorations this Christmas, a Canadian microscopy researcher has unveiled his creation of a gingerbread house believed to be the smallest of its kind in the world. The house sits atop the head of a winking snowman, and the two objects stacked one on top of the other are barely taller than the diameter of a human hair. —PHOTO BY AFP

OTTAWA—There was Tiny Tim and then the Little Drummer Boy—but they had nothing on the microscopic gingerbread house believed to be the smallest in the world and unveiled on Wednesday by a Canadian researcher.

About half the size of one made in France last year, it was cut and etched from silicon, complete with sharply defined bricks and trim, and a Canadian flag for a welcome mat.

McMaster University researcher Travis Casagrande said he used a beam of charged gallium ions that acted like a sandblaster.

Images provided by the Hamilton, Ontario school’s Canadian Center for Electron Microscopy showed the house sitting atop a cap on the head of a tiny winking snowman made from materials used in lithium-ion battery research.

Scientific curiosity

The pair of decorations stacked on top of the other are barely taller than the diameter of a human hair.

“While the spirit of the new decorations is festive, the intention of the project,” said Casagrande, “is to demonstrate the capabilities of the center” and “stir scientific curiosity among the public.”

The center’s suite of 10 electron microscopes and other equipment are used mostly for materials research.

Unlike a traditional desktop microscope that focuses light through optical lenses, an electron microscope uses an electron beam and electromagnetic lenses, allowing for far greater magnification.