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geared mechanism with an electric plug. Attached to the plug's wire is a tag that reads "231." The device is geared to another smaller gear on a device with what looks like a flywheel coming from the front of it.

Unidentified Museum Objects, Vol. II

September 11, 2017

Fran Webber

In Unidentified Museum Objects I, we asked for help identifying some mysterious whatchamacallits in the collection of our very own NIST museum ... and you enthusiastically responded. The Twitterverse helped us close the case on item 0266, and NIST staff sent in a number of leads on some of the other

The Saga of the Bird-Brained Bombers

August 29, 2017

Keith Martin

During World War II, NIST was among those working intensely to develop guided weapons to help the Allies win the war. But before the advent of satellites and GPS, laser targeting or even radar, how would one guide a bomb? Why, trained pigeons, of course. ‘Stupid’ bomb Air bombs of that era were

Image of a napkin that has written on it the names of researchers involved in the project and their guesses for the value of Planck's Constant

A Massive Bet: The Planck Napkin

August 25, 2017

Jason Stoughton

So, a bunch of metrologists walk into a bar. In late December 2013, a group of NIST researchers met at the local watering hole across the street from NIST’s Gaithersburg, Maryland, campus. NIST researchers meeting up after work during the holidays is a common occurrence, but this particular group

Printing with Concrete: How I Spent My Summer Vacation

August 15, 2017

Austin Thomas

Since they came out a few years ago, the capabilities of commercially available 3-D printers have radically expanded. At first, they could only print little things out of plastic, but now people have begun to print working cars and even bridges. People are actively experimenting with how to print

‘W’eird Signals: Listening in on the Eclipse

August 15, 2017

Jill Nelson

Two years ago, I had never heard of the WWVB radio station. Today, it’s one of my favorites, but that’s not because it broadcasts a pleasant mix of Top 40 hits. (It doesn’t.) WWVB is a low-frequency station, operated by NIST, that provides precise time information to radio-controlled clocks across

man standing in front of a white board filled with equations. Four other men sit around a table watching.

Quantum Information: Changing the Rules of the Game

August 2, 2017

Carl Miller

I was a math researcher at the University of Michigan back in 2008 when I had the crazy—one could even say random—notion to shift from studying pure mathematics to studying quantum information science. My mentor at the time was confused by this. Why give up the field in which you have all your

NIST scientist with jars of baby food and scientific equipment

(Baby) Food for Thought: The Limits of Detecting Toxic Elements

July 27, 2017

Laura Wood

As the seasoned mom of three grown children, I’m happy to say that they all made it through babyhood without any major health issues. While I worked as an analytical chemist at NIST during their baby years, I wasn’t working on reference materials for measuring nutrients in the foods that they ate or

'Cybersecuring' the Internet of Things

June 27, 2017

Donna Dodson

I recently had the chance to talk with the legendary Vint Cerf, one of the founding fathers of the internet. We had a wide-ranging discussion about the past, present and future of the internet, network security and what it would take to successfully, safely and reliably merge the digital and

Things That Make Me Wannacry

June 21, 2017

Pat Toth

I’m a bit emotional these days. My youngest—my baby—just graduated from high school. It’s the end of an era for our family: The years of homework, packing lunches, attending sporting events, and endless nagging to study for exams are finally over. It’s a bittersweet time as a mom. If I think about

More Power to You, Wonder Woman!

June 16, 2017

Ms. Ampere

First, let me say that I’m totally energized by the good press my dear acquaintance Wonder Woman has been receiving lately. It’s absolutely electrifying to see a strong woman get good publicity! And she has done some wonderful things, what with defending the world from evil-doers and all. Maybe with

Unidentified Museum Objects, Vol. I

June 14, 2017

Fran Webber

Right now, the NIST museum in Gaithersburg, Maryland, is displaying a glass globe the size of a large beach ball. When visitors first come upon it, they’re not sure what to make of it. Is it a giant lightbulb? A highly impractical fishbowl? Thankfully, they can quickly quench their curiosity by

Deciphering: The Thrill of a Lifetime

June 9, 2017

Lily Chen

When I went to graduate school to pursue my master’s degree 35 years ago, I couldn’t have predicted where my study of mathematics would end up taking me. I simply thought I was going to become a math professor. Before digital communications, the internet, and personal computers became part of our

7 Ways Measurements Help You Get Around

May 19, 2017

Fran Webber

With International Firefighters’ Day behind us and World Turtle Day looming, you might not think you’ve got time for another international day in May. But don’t skip World Metrology Day, which is observed on May 20 every year—the anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of the Meter in 1875. Because

Better Image-Quality Measurements for Bomb Squads

May 18, 2017

Jack Glover

I’ve been interested in science ever since I was a child. If you had told 8-year-old me that I was going to be a physicist, then I would have been very excited. Had you told me that my lab would be filled with a bevy of bombs, and that my typical work day might involve blasting those bombs with X

Growing Our Economy Through Technology Transfer

May 16, 2017

Paul Zielinski

From the GPS receivers that help us find our way and the MRI machines that provide lifesaving medical images of our bodies to the reliable electrical power we receive in our homes, federal research benefits us and fuels our economy. Transforming a discovery made in the lab to something you can use

What Debbie Jin Meant to Me

May 11, 2017

Jun Ye

NIST/JILA Fellow Debbie Jin died of cancer on Sept. 15, 2016, at the age of 47. One of the most prominent researchers at NIST, she won many science awards, including a John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur (“Genius”) Fellowship in 2003 and a L’Oreal/UNESCO “For Women in Science” Award for North America

Carbon Nanotubular: SURFing into the Sciences

May 5, 2017

Andrew Gayle

I’m a bit of a romantic when it comes to science. When anyone asks what inspires me to be a scientist, I tell them that it’s amazing to add to the collective knowledge of humanity. NIST is the kind of place where that happens every day. Until I went to college, I had lived my whole life within a

Plotting a Path from NASA Grids to NIST Graphics

April 27, 2017

Bonita Saunders

Before “Hidden Figures” was a movie, it was a book. Actually, two books—the regular book and a young readers’ edition. I liked the movie, but I loved the books. For many months, I watched the excitement surrounding the movie about three African-American women who made significant contributions to

Grote Reber's Sterling, Virginia, radio telescope installation

Grote Reber, Radio Astronomer

April 18, 2017

Keith Martin

Dulles International Airport, in the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C., sits on land once owned by NIST. It was on this spot that NIST brought together an eclectic combination of people and projects that would help birth the field of radio astronomy. It would involve a backyard tinkerer

The Magnetic Allure of Superconductivity

March 31, 2017

Nick Butch

One of my favorite things about being a condensed matter physicist is how broadly defined the subject is. There are lots of interesting phenomena begging for scientific attention, so it’s never boring. One of my favorite topics lies at the crossroads of magnetism and superconductivity. Magnets have

NIST biomedical engineer Laurie Locascio places a water sample on a highly sensitive, inexpensive "lab-on-a-chip"

Who Are You, Little Girl? Being a Woman, and a Leader, in Science

March 22, 2017

Laurie E. Locascio

Like a lot of scientists, I am very goal-oriented, so after I got my Ph.D. in toxicology, I set out to become a leader in my field by the time I was 40. To get there, I knew I had to be acknowledged by the top researchers in my field, get invited to speak at important conferences, organize

Map of dark matter (in pink) in the universe

Pushing the Quantum Limit in the Search for Dark Matter

March 16, 2017

Konrad Lehnert

Here’s a surprising fact: We don’t know what makes up 80 percent of the matter in the universe. I don’t mean that the matter is made of atoms, and we just don’t know which kind of atoms. What I mean is that four-fifths of the universe appear to be made of something that isn’t atoms at all, or more

Refrigerants to the Rescue: Plugging the Ozone Hole

March 13, 2017

Mark McLinden

Did you know there was a hole in the ozone layer? Thanks to swift, decisive international action not many people under a certain age probably do. Those of us over a certain age, however, should remember the ozone hole—a precipitous seasonal drop in the amount of ultraviolet radiation-blocking, skin

Georgia Harris at UPSRJ in Querétaro, Mexico

Teaching Metrology Abroad as a Fulbright Specialist

March 8, 2017

Georgia Harris

It seems that I have been a teacher nearly my entire life. One of my first jobs as an early teen was helping to teach gymnastics to elementary students. Before and after I earned my black belt in Tae Kwon Do, I taught a women’s and children’s classes. In the world of weights and measures and

Doug Olson with an engraved meter in Paris

Measuring Up to the Task

March 3, 2017

Doug Olson

Even though I have spent my entire professional career at NIST, until a year ago it would never have entered my mind that I would become the chief of the NIST Office of Weights and Measures. I started out on the scientific side of metrology, improving our nation’s standards for calibrating devices

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