 PML at WorkHighlights of Science and Services
PML has developed a new humidity generator for industrial calibrations that extends the range of dew-point measurements up to 98 °C – a 25% improvement over the current limit.
Until recently, getting direct NIST traceability for vacuum gauges has been a time-consuming and relatively expensive process. Now, however, even small businesses and labs can take advantage of a new, fully automated calibration system devised by PML.
PML played a major role in NIST’s contributions to the Science and Engineering Festival in Washington DC in April. The annual event promotes science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) by providing students with an up-close look at a wide variety of interactive exhibits.
Space may be the final frontier. But often a few trips to PML are necessary before things can get off the ground. Such is the case with NASA's Extreme Ultraviolet Monitor, which will soon head to Mars to examine the depletion of the planet's once-dense atmosphere.
The U.S. petroleum industry relies on volume measurements traceable to NIST, specifically to the Flow Metrology Group in PML's Sensor Science Division, to ensure maximum accuracy.
In the pursuit of precision measurements, nothing is simple, even when the apparatus employed appears to be utterly uncomplicated. An instructive case in point is the new ionization chamber used to determine the U.S. primary standard for air kerma, the amount of kinetic energy released per unit mass of air by ionizing radiation.
Clinicians who treat severe wounds may soon have powerful new diagnostic tools in the form of hyperspectral imaging (HSI) devices, calibrated to new NIST standard reference spectra, which will provide unprecedented perspective on the physiology of tissue injury and healing.
The reliability of trapped-ion quantum information systems – a promising candidate technology for an eventual quantum computer – can be dramatically improved by giving the trap electrodes a good scrub. That’s the conclusion of PML researchers who found that cleaning the electrode surfaces of a room-temperature, gold-film trap with a beam of argon ions produced a 100-fold decrease in thermal jitter of the trapped ions.
During the week of February 6-10, 2012, some extremely weighty matters were in progress at NIST’s non-magnetic facility, where PML researchers hosted an international gravimeter shoot-out with potentially momentous consequences for the impending redefinition of the kilogram.
 Laying the Groundwork for 3D Stacked Integrated CircuitsCould three-dimensional stacked integrated circuits (3DS-ICs) be the next big innovation in technology development? Richard Allen of PML's Semiconductor and Dimensional Metrology Division has already played a role in the development of five separate SEMI standards related to 3DS-ICs.
For climatologists and environmental policy makers who need to determine the flux of greenhouse gases, there are three paramount questions: Where is it, how much is there, and how is it moving? PML is testing a new measurement approach that may provide answers of unprecedented accuracy to all three. Read more...
Much of what is known about decadal climate change comes from satellite-based remote sensing of microwave radiation at different levels in the Earth's atmosphere. Yet, at present, there is no accepted brightness-temperature (radiance) standard for microwaves that can be used for calibration. Read more...
Open-Source Software to Automate Test Equipment A free, easily customizable software program for automating test equipment may sound too good to be true, especially for smaller companies, graduate students, and hobbyists or for day-to-day laboratory work. But that's exactly what the PML's Semiconductor and Dimensional Metrology Division has created. Read more...
UV Lithography: Going to Extremes Sometime soon, microchip fabricators will take the next major step in the relentless reduction of feature size, from the current minimum of 22 nm down to 10 nm and perhaps even smaller. Getting there, however, will entail much more than incremental progress. Read more...
 PML Researchers Create Tool for Circuit Aware Reliability Specs
A PML research team has devised a reliability data transformation methodology that could ease one of the semiconductor industry's most vexing problems: reliability qualification. Read more...
Bright Future for GaN Nanowires PML researchers are growing GaN nanowires with near-perfect crystalline structure using MBE. Potential uses abound, from new light-emitting diodes and diode lasers to ultra-small resonators, chemical sensors, and highly sensitive atomic probe tips. Read more...
The American Physical Society (APS) has named the location of a 1956 breakthrough by NBS scientists -- now on the campus of the University of the District of Columbia -- as an "historic site." Read more...
Until now, it has not been possible to accurately determine the number of photons in a pulse of light if the photon number exceeds about 50. PML researchers devised a method of extending the count to 1000 with extremely low uncertainty. Read more...
The international General Conference on Weights and Measures (CGPM) has approved a plan to redefine four of the seven base units of the International System of Units (SI) in terms of fixed values of natural constants. Read more...
When an interagency team was putting together the next addition to the Earth Observing System satellite fleet, they called in experts from PML's SIRCUS facility to calibrate critical sensors. The results dramatically reduced uncertainties and opened new areas of research. Read more...
The nations of North, Central, and South America share the world's first continuous, near-real-time international time network, thanks in large measure to Mike Lombardi of the Time and Frequency Division, winner of this year's Wildhack Award from the NCSLI. Read more...
Researchers are learning how to control the growth of sizable, high-quality graphene sheets using a promising method: cooking wafers of silicon carbide until the silicon sublimates, leaving behind layers of the celebrity carbon allotrope. Read more...
Tens of millions of clocks are controlled by NIST's venerable AM radio station, WWVB in Ft. Collins, Colorado. But in parts of the United States, distance from the source and radio frequency interference are making it hard to get a clear, strong signal. Read more...
When PML researchers set out to make measurements of unprecedented precision in two isotopes of lithium, they uncovered an unexpected effect that explains why data from different experiments on the same transitions have differed so drastically. Read more...
A quantum dot made by a group in Boulder has helped an international team of researchers "see" a quantum-mechanical process without disturbing it—an achievement long considered impossible, and one that made headlines worldwide. Read more...
The Hyperspectral Image Projector (HIP), now in development in the Sensor Science Division, will make possible high-quality, standardized evaluation of the performance of future optical and infrared imaging instruments by projecting realistic scenes into their sensors. Read more...
 PML Workshop Leads to Safer Flow Calibrations
NIST PML hosted a workshop on turbine meters and hydrocarbon liquid flow measurement to promote the replacement of toxic and flammable calibration liquids with benign ones; discuss the effects of liquid properties on the performance of turbine meters; and report the results of a comparison between 12 labs in the DoD and private industry. Read more...
This Just In! (Archives) Recent Awards |
New Point for Dew Point
PML Reaches out at USA Science and Engineering Festival
Beaming Up on the Way to Space
Petroleum Volume: Getting Calibrations in the Can
Adding Up Photons with a TES
PML Plays a Central Role in Redefining the SI Units
Traveling SIRCUS Calibrates Satellite Sensors
Pioneer of Inter-American Time Network Honored
PML Develops Graphene Fabrication Facility
All Time, All the Time: Improving NIST Radio
Quantum Measurements Solve a Longstanding Problem
NIST Quantum Dot Helps Scientists 'See' Quantum Mechanics at Work
PML Gets HIP: A New Way of Testing Optical Sensors