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Physical Measurement Laboratory

News and Updates

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NIST Finds Many Protective Glasses Do Not Meet Specs for Shielding Light from Ultrafast Lasers

November 28, 2017

High-power, ultrafast pulsed lasers increasingly supply light for biomedical applications and imaging, materials processing, industrial micromachining and more...

Two rectangular boxes with oblong shapes in the center of each in red, green and fuscia

Microwave-Based Test Method Can Help Keep 3-D Chip Designers’ Eyes Open

November 28, 2017

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have invented a new approach to testing multilayered, three-dimensional computer chips...

How Disposable Diapers Can Improve Measurements of Tumor Growth

November 20, 2017

Catching cancer early can make all the difference for successful treatment. A common screening practice measures tumor growth with X-ray computed tomography (CT...

Man with gray hair standing beside computer with digital clock display

NIST’s Next-Generation Atomic Clocks May Support Official Timekeeping

November 16, 2017

For more than a decade, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has been unveiling experimental next-generation atomic clocks. These clocks...

NIST Scientists Discover How to Switch Liver Cancer Cell Growth from 2-D to 3-D Structures

November 15, 2017

Paving the way for testing experimental drugs in more realistic environments, scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have...

Lights, Camera, Calibrate! Improving Space Cameras with a Better Model for Ultra-Bright Lamps

November 14, 2017

Studio photographers may be familiar with the 1,000-watt quartz halogen lamps known as “FELs.” Scientists use them too—specially calibrated ones, at least—to...

New Insights on ‘Captured’ Electrons Could Improve Flash Memory

November 7, 2017

An entirely new model of the way electrons are briefly trapped and released in tiny electronic devices suggests that a long-accepted, industry-wide view is just...

Need Entangled Atoms? Get 'Em FAST! With NIST’s New Patent-Pending Method

November 7, 2017

Physicists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have come up with a way to link a group of atoms’ quantum mechanical properties among...

Image showing several lines of a circuit, with an inset showing a device that has both a quantum dot and a network of waveguides

Hybrid Circuit Combines Single-Photon Generator and Efficient Waveguides on One Chip

November 7, 2017

Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and their collaborators have taken a new step forward in the quest to build quantum...

Color me Purple, or Red, or Green, or …

November 7, 2017

Imagine a miniature device that suffuses each room in your house with a different hue of the rainbow—purple for the living room, perhaps, blue for the bedroom...

It’s All About the Mix

October 24, 2017

A marriage between 3-D printer plastic and a versatile material for detecting and storing gases could lead to inexpensive sensors and fuel cell batteries alike...

Person holding wallet card showing the values of fundamental constants being used for revising the International System of Units, the modern metric system.

Bringing the World Closer to Revised Measurement System, Scientists Update Four Key Fundamental Constants

October 23, 2017

Paving the way for transforming the world’s measurement system, an international task force has determined updated values for four fundamental constants of...

Amplitude Sensing below the Zero-Point Fluctuations

October 18, 2017

Employing techniques developed for quantum information processing with trapped ions, we demonstrate a sensitive technique for measuring the amplitude of the...

Distant Exoplanets Revealed by Light from Wobbling Stars

October 16, 2017

Ask most folks what they would need to find planets orbiting distant stars, and very few will list a bottle of iodine. Yet that element plays a vital role in...

How Bright is the Moon, Really?

October 13, 2017

The “inconstant moon,” as Shakespeare called it in Romeo and Juliet, is more reliable than his pair of star-crossed lovers might have thought. Now researchers...

Cavity coating in flat red layer below blue-green light beam

Plasmons in an Open Box Create Miniature Laser

October 12, 2017

Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed the first miniature laser in which the light is guided along the floor of...

PML Technology Transfer in the News

October 12, 2017

The Denver Post recently ran a front-page story about drones (unmanned aerial vehicles) and their many useful, emerging applications. According to the article,...

JILA Spinning Method Confirms the Electron Still Seems Round

October 9, 2017

JILA physicists have for the first time used their spinning molecules technique to measure the “roundness” of the electron, confirming the leading results from...

JILA’s 3-D Quantum Gas Atomic Clock Offers New Dimensions in Measurement

October 5, 2017

JILA physicists have created an entirely new design for an atomic clock, in which strontium atoms are packed into a tiny three-dimensional (3-D) cube at 1,000...

Stop the Presses: NIST Finds a Way to Measure Fuel Cell 'Printing' at a Fast Clip

October 4, 2017

If you’re wondering when a hydrogen-powered car will become a viable option for you, take heart. A team including scientists at the National Institute of...

Lighting a Path to 'Smarter' Homes, Roads, and Bridges

September 27, 2017

If you’re worried about carbon monoxide poisoning, you might purchase a detector for your home. But what if your house itself could sense carbon monoxide and...

Atomic-Scale Movies Reveal That Catalyst Nanoparticles Undergo Internal Changes to Forge Carbon Nanotubes

September 20, 2017

Lights, camera, catalysis! Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have made some of the first movies of the structural...

CNST Releases Summer 2017 Edition of the CNST News

September 14, 2017

The NIST Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology (CNST) is pleased to announce the release of the Summer 2017 edition of the CNST News. This quarterly...

Researchers Find New Way to Manipulate Magnetism

September 14, 2017

In a pioneering effort to control, measure and understand magnetism at the atomic level, researchers working at the National Institute of Standards and...

NIST Boulder Microfab Lab Goes 'Nano'

September 12, 2017

The world-class clean room in the NIST Boulder Microfabrication Facility (BMF) has just gotten a bit more crowded – in a good way. Staff members have recently...

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