A team of researchers from the UCLA School of Engineering has developed an opthalmic clock that can quantify time intervals with a precision to 270 quintillionths of a second ( 2.7x10 - 16s ) . Not only is this one of the most precise timepieces ever built , it is also very small . The clock is just 1 cubic cm in loudness , minuscule enough to fit on a silicon chip shot .
The average optical clock , which uses pulsation of light to measure time , is presently the sizing of a desktop calculator , too adult and awkward to use in spacecraft and satellite engineering science . shrivel the clock was achieved by using a like appendage to the production of computer silicon chips , and the team envisions take in these redstem storksbill in consumer electronics .
“ quantify the meter it takes for a heartbeat of light to reflect from an objective and return back to us also tells us a distance , ” Chee Wei Wong , the project ’s main investigator , say in astatement . “ This could help in precision laser length ranging , such as in sensing for self - driven automobiles and aerial vehicle . ”
The research was publish inScience Advances , and it exemplify how this raw clock approaches the creation ’s mostaccurate deviceswhile maintaining its versatility . For these reasons , the clock will also have a serious scientific practical software , from refining the value of the creation ’s primal constants to increasing the preciseness of astronomical mensuration .
Although not as little as the earthly concern ’s small atomic clock , this optical clock – the most precise of its variety – offers advantages in that the entire organisation is contain within a tiny bulk .
“ If incorporated with other technology into infrared telescope observatories , this machine can turn on the detection of solid ground - like planet and heavenly object 100 time small than that , which was previously impossible , ” said Shu - Wei Huang , a UCLA engineering science scientist and the project ’s lead source .
Among all these benefits , the new clock has the potential to take us a step closer to an unsolved job in physics : working out the nature of clip itself .
