It’s the time of year when scientists celebrate the season by making very small objects. This menorah was created by a team at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, from the Dec. 3, 2013 posting by Ari Yashar for the Canadian Friends of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (CFHU) website,

In honor of Hanukkah a physics laboratory at Hebrew University in Jerusalem has built the world’s tiniest hanukkiah (menorah for Hanukkah). The hanukkiah, which is the size of a dust speck, demonstrates the revolutionary abilities of the lab’s Nanoscribe system.

The Jerusalem-based laboratory, part of the Peter Brojde Center for Innovative Engineering and Computer Science, focuses on applying scientific discoveries into ground-breaking technology.

As part of its state-of-the-art research, Brojde lab recently became home of the first and only Nanoscribe system in Israel. To demonstrate the Nanoscribe’s capabilities in constructing miniscule three-dimensional structures, Yossi Kabessa and Ido Eisenberg, two doctoral students at the lab, recently built the tiniest hanukkiah in the world.

Standing at less than a tenth of a milimeter and invisible to the naked eye, the microscopic menorah is built of building blocks measuring 100 nanometers.

Here’s a little about the technology used to create the menorah, from the nanoscribe technology webpage,

Nanoscribe’s technology for the fabrication of three-dimensional micro- and nanostructures of photo-sensitive materials is based on “direct laser writing”, i.e., a non-linear two-photon absorption process. Learn more about technical backgrounds and new developments called Dip-in laser lithography (DiLL) on the following pages:

• 3D Laser Lithography / Direct Laser Writing
• Dip-in Laser Lithography (DiLL)
• Photoresists

Nanoscribe’s company headquarters is located in Germany.

Getting back to the menorah, I offer a belated Happy Hannukah!