The nanometer-sized tip, which creates patterns and structures on a microscopic scale, is 100,000 times smaller than a sharpened pencil point and can be heated to 1,000 degrees Celsius.

IBM claims that the same technique could be used to prototype a new generation of technologies, from energy-efficient transistors to nano-sized security tags to prevent document forgery.

With our novel technique we can achieve very a high resolution at 10 nanometers at greatly reduced cost and complexity," said Dr. Armin Knoll, a physicist and inventor at IBM Research.

"Now its up to the imagination of scientists and engineers to apply this technique to real-world challenges.

IBM has licensed the technology to a startup based in Switzerland called SwissLitho, which is bringing it to market under the name NanoFrazor.

Several weeks ago, the firm shipped its first NanoFrazor to McGill Universitys Nanotools Microfab in Canada. To celebrate the tools arrival, the university created a nano-sized map of Canada measuring 30 micrometers (0.030 millimeters) wide.

IBM hopes to begin exploring the use of this technology to prototype transistor designs made of graphene-like materials by the end of the year.

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World's smallest magazine cover created using IBM 'nano chisel'