A team of Japanese engineers has created the smallest statue ever.

A three-dimensional bull the size of a red blood cell has been etched in plastic by engineers at Osaka University in Japan.

Now, Wired News has obtained the best pictures on the Net of the tiny work of art.

Measuring only 10 by 7 micrometers – one micrometer is one-thousandth of a millimeter – the bull is the smallest truly three-dimensional sculpture ever created.

Previously, microscopic sculptures had been assembled from separate 2-D slices built up in layers.

The bull was etched in transparent plastic with a pair of lasers. The plastic resin solidified at the focal point of the two lasers in a process called two-photon photo-polymerization.

The Osaka engineers also made a tiny spring from the plastic resin that shares the same mechanical properties as a normal spring.

The tiny structures demonstrate the possibility of making micro-components for nanomachines.

The research is described a recent issue of Nature.

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