Big and Small Numbers in Biology

Work with numbers big and small to estimate and calulate various quantities in biological contexts.

Scientific Measurement

Practice your skills of measurement and estimation using this interactive measurement tool based around fascinating images from biology.

A Question of Scale

Use your skill and knowledge to place various scientific lengths in order of size. Can you judge the length of objects with sizes ranging from 1 Angstrom to 1 million km with no wrong attempts?

Choose Your Units

Phenomena to units

Volume of a bacterium - Cubic micrometres $\mathrm{\mu m}^3$
Mass of an oak tree - Tonnes $(10^3\textrm{ kg})$
Area of a leaf - Square centimetres $(\textrm{cm}^2)$
Half-life of Uranium-235 - Millions of years
Area of a football pitch - Hectares
Average life-span of a human -Years
Volume of a bath tub - Cubic metres $(\textrm{m}^3)$

Units to phenomena

Millimetre - size of an amoeba
Newton - weight of an apple
Angstrom - atomic diameter of a hydrogen atom
Joule - kinetic energy of a table tennis ball travelling at $100\textrm{ km h}^{-1}$
Volt - voltage across an AA cell
Microgram - mass of $1\textrm{ mm}^3$ of air
Micrometre - mitochondrion
Hertz - frequency of tick-tock on a clock
Parsec - distance to Proxima Centauri (closest star other than the Sun)