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Smallest hotel

With an overall floorspace of 53 m2, the Eh’hausl hotel in Amberg, Germany, holds the record for the smallest hotel. Sandwiched between two larger buildings, the hotel is too small to accomodate more than two guests at any given time.

Smallest hominid

The smallest known member of the hominid family is Homo floresiensis, discovered by Indonesian and Australian scientists in a cave at Liang Bua on the island of Flores, Indonesia. Standing just 1m (3 ft 3 in) tall, it inhabited Flores as recently as 13,000 years ago. This means it existed at the same time as modern humans, and probably interacted with them. This new species, nicknamed ‘the hobbit’ by dig workers, was announced in the journal Nature on 28 October 2004.

Smallest Guru Granth Sahib

The smallest known copy of the Guru Granth Sahib measures 29.61 x 29.59 x 23.36 mm (1.17 x 1.16 x 0.92 in) and contains 1,430 pages. The book is owned by Mehmood Imran (India) and was measured on 1 October 2006. Mr. Imran told us the book was published by the British Empire for the Sikh soldiers of the Indian Army during the First World War. The soldiers used to tuck these miniature books in their turbans after daily prayers.

Smallest manned spacecraft

The Manned Manoeuvring Unit (MMU), used by astronauts working outside the space shuttle, is 1.24 m (4 ft) tall, 0.83m (2 ft 8 in) wide and 1.12 m (3 ft 8 in) deep and weighs just 109 kg (240 lb). Powered by nitrogren thrusters, it was first used on shuttle mission STS-41-B in February 1984 when astronaut Bruce McCandless manoeuvered up to 100 m (328 ft) away from Challenger.

Smallest living organism

The smallest entity universally recognised to be a living organism (not everyone considers the slightly smaller nanobes to be alive) is Nanoarchaeum equitans. This minuscule microbe was only discovered in 2002, in a hydrothermal vent on the seafloor off the coast of Iceland, and its cells are only 400 nanometres across. In addition, its genome is only 490,885 nucleotide bases long, which makes it the smallest non-viral genome ever sequenced.

Smallest model sailing boat, radio controlled

The smalles radio controlled modes sailing boat is 15.2 cm (5 in) long, 6.3 cm (2 in) wide and its hight including mast, keel and bulb is 38 cm (1 ft 2 in). It was build by Claudio Diolaiti in Nice, France and was tested and measured on 14 November 2007. The boat is handmade except for the motors. It was made from fibergalss and other materials used in modern boat manufacturing. The boat is not a small sized replica of a real boat but Continue reading →

Smallest mint

The smallest issuing mint in the world belongs to the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, in the City of Rome. Its single-press mint is housed in one small room and has issued proof coins since 1961.

Smallest microchain drive

The smallest microchain drive has chain links with centres only 50 micrometres apart. It is constructed of silicon and designed to transmit power in microelectromechanical devices. It was created by Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA, and announced in January 2002.