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NIST Unveils Chip-scale Atomic Clock
grumling writes "The heart of a minuscule atomic clock, believed to be 100 times smaller than any other atomic clock has been demonstrated by scientists at the Commerce Department's National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), opening the door to atomically precise timekeeping in portable, battery-powered devices for secure wireless communications, more precise navigation and other applications. "
especially when you're trying to get first psot
Yeah, so I can keep time 5 minutes early more precisely than ever before...
With a atomic clock in a GPS you no longer need to solve for time, so you can get the same quality position with one less satellite. There are times where this could make a huge difference.
'SBEMAIL!' is better than a goat!!
...has finally been unleashed! Home users will be able to measure the relativistic effects of using table saws and ice makers.
Wouldn't it radioactivate you or something???
Cesium is a stable isotope and is not radioactive. The only problem I see with a wrist watch containing Cesium is accidentally jumping in the pool with it or being caught in the rain.
"hey man... watch my tripple sommersault dive"
BOOM.
The original generic sig.
But it's only natural that this becomes smaller. Give the rich part of the world ten years, and we're all spending our time wearing atomic _and_ digital watches.
Interestingly, this could affect our lifestyle. The more synchronized timepieces become, doing stuff in sync and on time gets more feasible. But that also lowers the acceptance for being late and inaccurate. And I know that I always come a few minutes late to every appointment.
Will people start yelling at me for coming only seconds late? Will the unspoken five-minute courtesy time ("the meeting starts at 2pm" really means "2:05pm") disappear? Will I become more stressful because of all this accuracy?
So, while this seems to be a step forward for mankind, it does not necessarily create more happiness. Just like an entire host of new inventions.
What bothers me with this is that it is not really useful in a wristwatch (Yes I know - they aren't making it for wristwatches yet - but just wait!). But because everyone else has one, I'll be forced to get one as well. Just like the cellular phone. And then it starts affecting my life. Scary.
Roses are #FF0000, violets are #0000FF, all my base are belong to you
I've always imagined that the proliferation of wireless communications would eventually replace the need for having any sort of portable timing devices... I mean, my computer updates its clock from some atomic NTP server. A wifi clock could do the same.
Why carry an atomic clock, when you can talk to an even more accurate atomic clock, through the air? Although I guess the few ms of lag between the request and response might introduce too much error for some applications?
Visit the Game Programming Wiki!
Not only video games. I don't know when, I don't know how, but I am sure that eventually one day someone will somehow use is for pornography...
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
I don't get it... Would it make a chain reaction???
No. It would make a perfectly normal, everyday exothermic chemical reaction.
Cesium FAQ
Shoudn't it be illegal to wear???!!!
If atoms are outlawed only outlaws will have atoms.
KFG
Most of the time that is true but in this case, an atomic clock has a very precise meaning in scientific instruments. It is a clock that counts the vibrations of atoms to determine time intervals. Accoring to SI units a second is
Up until now atomic clocks like the ones used by NIST were large pieces of equipment. They were highly accurate but not very portable. Before, merchanical watches would lose seconds a day. With the use of quartz in electronic watches that dropped to about a second every 2 months. This lowers that bar even further. I'm not sure for what that level of precision could be used.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Cell phone with web surfing: $150
Unlimited web surfing option on cell plan: $10/month
Cell phone with atomic clock and web surfing (future): $200
The ability to snipe someone on eBay for that powder blue Elvis jumpsuit: priceless
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Since atomic clocks can be used to measure effects of gravity, it would be interesting to see how mass producing atomic clock chips could be used to create maps of gravity, seeing how they can be used to reveal geological information.
First Atomic Clock Wristwatch
SPF support for most open source mail servers can be found at libspf2.
You still can do it.
:00 minutes they get a ntp version of a slashdotting because people stick ntpdate in crontab.
Just run ntpdate when you connect instead of on boot. And kill ntpd before disconnecting. You can do this easily on Linux. On Windows I heard some programs exist to do this as well.
This is not about broadband arrogance anyway. ntpd uses much fewer server resources than ntpdate every second. In fact, many public ntp server administrators often complain about that every hour at
There are many NTP servers that are free to access out there. Please keep them that way by observing a simple netiquette.
The story claims that this device pulls 75 mw and that it can be run on batteries. Assuming a 3V system, that's 25 mA of current. If one if these was in a typical portable device with a 750 mAH battery, it would last for 30 hours. Less, of course, if you actually turned on the device. Basically your battery would go dead in a day or so even with the device turned off.
For reference, real time clock chips that are used in portable electronic devices today pull about 3 microwatts of current -- almost 10,000 times less than this device.