Even a virus that can pass through the pores of many ceramic products has a diameter of 100 nanometers! This kind of world-so small that it is hard even to imagine-used to have an air of impenetrable mystery. Its veil didn't gradually begin to be lifted until 1982, when two Swiss scientists at IBM invented the scanning tunneling microscope (STM), which allows scientists to view nanometric structures on a computer screen.
這樣難以想像的細微世界中，蘊藏著許多不為人知的神秘現象，直到一九八二年，兩位服務於瑞士 IBM 公司的科學家發明了掃瞄穿隧式顯微鏡，可以在電腦螢幕上觀察到奈米結構後，這個神秘世界才逐漸揭開面紗，讓世人大為驚豔。