Measurement

     Particle physics takes place on an extremely small scale.  Particles are EXTREMELY, unimaginably small.  We are all familiar with the metric system, yes?  We all know about the meter, the volt, the ampere, the coulomb, the gram, etc.  We also know about the prefixes used with these, ex milli-, kilo-, hecto-, mega-, giga-, tera-, etc.  Most people are familiar with micro-,milli-,kilo-,hecto-,mega-, and giga-.  That's not good enough for this scale of the small.  Here is a chart of the metric SI prefixes:

**credit to wikipedia for the chart

     Now in particle physics, things are typically measured on the scale of nano(which is extremely large in particle physics) to even smaller than yocto!  Now when you hear me talking about femto/picometers etc, you should know what I mean.