Estimation Method 1

Let us start with a friendly number.

210 = 1024, which is approximately 1000
Which means that the piece of graphite after ten halves is
1 10
1
1,000,000,000
( )

= 1,000,000
2
1,000
1,000
There is still plenty of room to complete the operation again. After ten more halves
1 10
1
1,000,000
( )

= 1,000
2
1,000
1,000
Now, lets inch forward one half at a time
1 1 1
1,000
( ) =
= 500
2
2
2
1 1 1
500
( ) =
= 250
2
2
2
1

By adding the exponents of 2 we can see that we need a little more than 22 times of cutting to
produce a thickness of 200 pm