The Paper Clip

If you could harness its power -- that is, turn every one of its atoms into pure energy -- the paper clip would yield about 18 kilotons of TNT. That's roughly the size of the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in 1945. In the Hiroshima explosion, countless atoms of uranium were split apart in a nuclear chain reaction. Each time an atom split, the total mass of the fragments speeding apart was less than that of the original atom. The bomb, in essence, transformed three-hundredths of an ounce of mass into a cataclysmic burst of heat and light.