What is the smallest thing you have ever studied as a microbiologist

Question: What is the smallest thing you have ever studied as a microbiologist
- Keywords:
  bacteria,
  microbiology,
  size
Asked by anon-406718 to Karen A on 11 Jul 2024.
- Karen Adler answered on 11 Jul 2024:
  
  I think the smallest thing I’ve worked with is a bacteriophage (“bacteria eater” in Greek), a virus that infects and kills bacteria. The smallest I know of is 10 nanometers across (100,000 of them fit into 1 millimeter), and the largest is 750 nanometers across (or 3/4 the size of an average bacterial cell!). Bacteria are usually 1-1.5 micrometers across (1000 nanometers in a micrometer)(1000 bacteria in a milllimeter).