Masses, lengths and times

The following list gives the orders of magnitude of a whole range of distances, masses and times throughout the Universe.

Distances
'Diameter' of a sub nuclear particle	10-15 m
Distance across an atom	10-10 m = 0.1 nm
Distance a fingernail grows in 1s	10-9 m = 1 nm
Wavelength of yellow light	6x10-7 m = 600 nm
Diameter of a human hair	5x10-6 m = 50 mm
World record long jump (man 2010)	8.95 m
Height of an adult	1.75 m
Length of a marathon (approximately)	40 000 m = 40 km
Distance of the Earth from the Sun	150x109 m
Distance light travels in a year	1016 m = 1013 km
Radius of the observable universe	1025 m
Masses
Mass of an electron	10-30 kg
Mass of a person	100 kg
Mass of a small car	1000 kg
Mass of a diesel locomotive (average)	50 000 kg
Mass of the Earth	6x1024 kg
Mass of the Sun	2x1030 kg
Mass of the Universe	1050 kg
Times
Time for light to cross a nucleus	10-23 s
One 'beat' of the clock in a 'fast' PC	10-9 = 1 ns
One heart beat	1 s
World record for 100m (man 2010)	9.58 s
Time to boil an egg	100 s
Length of a football match	1025 m
A school morning	10 000 s
One day	8.64x104 s
One year	3.2x107 s
'Average' human lifetime	2.5x109 years
Time for our galaxy to rotate once	7x1015 s = 2x108 years
Age of the Universe	1018 s

You might like to look at some more interesting magnitudes of quantities by visiting
Physics facts