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One Step Closer to New Kilogram

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Crazy Horse:

--- Quote ---NIST’s Newest Watt Balance Brings World One Step Closer to New Kilogram

June 21, 2016

Contact: Chad Boutin
 301-975-4261

A high-tech version of an old-fashioned balance scale at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has just brought scientists a critical step closer toward a new and improved definition of the kilogram. The scale, called the NIST-4 watt balance, has conducted its first measurement of a fundamental physical quantity called Planck’s constant to within 34 parts per billion – demonstrating the scale is accurate enough to assist the international community with the redefinition of the kilogram, an event slated for 2018.

--- End quote ---

Rest of the article at the link.

http://www.nist.gov/pml/div684/nist-newest-watt-balance-brings-world-one-step-closer-to-new-kilogram.cfm

As someone in the metrology field, this is rather interesting.

obumazombie:
If this is at the level of quantum physics including the application of planks constant, I wish they would make it more understandable to the layperson by putting the kilo in terms of a ratio to Avogadro's number and a standard corresponding element. 

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