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Physical Measurement Laboratory

News and Updates

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NIST Researchers Help Design a Prototype Quantum Computer

December 20, 2023

Researchers have created a prototype quantum computer with a record number of qubits—the analog of bits in an ordinary computer—capable of performing logical

NIST’s Ultra-small, Shape-shifting GEMS Offer an Easier and Cheaper way to improve MRI Imaging

December 20, 2023

Microscopic magnetic probes that change shape in response to their environment may greatly enhance magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). However, producing the

Do the Bump: NIST Scientists Perfect Miniaturized Technique to Generate Precise Wavelengths of Visible Laser Light

November 28, 2023

In research, sometimes the bumpy path proves to be the best one. By creating tiny, periodic bumps in a miniature racetrack for light, researchers at the

Partially Unraveling an Entangled Mystery

October 26, 2023

Entanglement—a uniquely quantum phenomenon that intimately links the fate of subatomic particles even if they reside on opposite sides of the galaxy—is a key

Illustrated celestial body shines on a flat box-shaped device with a protruding center.

NIST Team Develops Highest-Resolution Single-Photon Superconducting Camera

October 25, 2023

Researchers at NIST and their colleagues have built a superconducting camera containing 400,000 pixels — 400 times more than any other device of its type.

Twisted Science: NIST Researchers Find a New Quantum Ruler to Explore Exotic Matter

October 5, 2023

A single-atom-thick sheet of carbon known as graphene has remarkable properties on its own, but things can get even more interesting when you stack up multiple

NIST Researchers Develop a Breakthrough COVID-19 Detection Technology

October 2, 2023

“Only connect” is the most famous line in the British novelist E. M. Forster’s writings. Forster was urging the readers of his book Howard’s End to make

Measuring Up: NIST’s Missile Defense Transfer Radiometer

September 29, 2023

If you’re undergoing a missile attack and that missile is above the atmosphere, the best place to destroy it is while it’s still in space. To do that, you need

What is the true meaning of a “scale division” (d) versus a “verification scale division” (e)

September 28, 2023

Introduction If you are a state weights and measures official, scale manufacturer, or any other stakeholder dealing with scales used for commercial transactions

2023 NIST Internship Reflections

September 28, 2023

During the summer of 2023, the NIST Physical Measurement Laboratory’s ( PML) Office of Weights and Measures ( OWM) hosted four undergraduate students who were

NIST SP2200-03: An Evolving Regulatory Landscape for Commercial Electric Vehicle Fueling

September 28, 2023

As part of NIST OWM's Special Publication 2200 series on Legal Metrology, NIST SP 2200-03 An Evolving Regulatory Landscape for Commercial Electric Vehicle

Working Their Thermal MagIC: Digging Into the Details of an Ambitious New ‘Thermometry Camera’

September 26, 2023

Thermometers can do a lot of things: measure the temperature at the center of your perfectly braised chicken or tell you whether to keep your child home from

Illustration of a pair of tweezers surrounding a beam of light that illuminates a line of atoms, each with an analog clock face in the center and an up and down arrow pointing through it.

New Spin-Squeezing Techniques Let Atoms Work Together for Better Quantum Measurements

September 25, 2023

Opening new possibilities for quantum sensors, atomic clocks and tests of fundamental physics, JILA researchers have developed new ways of “entangling” or

Imaging the Elusive Skyrmion

September 25, 2023

Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) with colleagues elsewhere have employed neutron imaging and a reconstruction algorithm

Metric Week 2023: Seven Days of SI Fun

September 20, 2023

National Metric Week (October 8 to 14, 2023) is an opportunity to underscore the usefulness of metric system measurements, formally known as the International

NIST chip containing a single-photon detector made of superconducting nanowires. Four chips like this were used in the experiment that entangled three photons.

Unity in the Photon Community

September 12, 2023

The creation and detection of single photons (the smallest units of light) has grown in a few decades from an experimental laboratory pursuit to an important

Detangling Light-based Thermometers with Combs

August 29, 2023

Photonic thermometers, which measure temperature using light, have the potential to revolutionize temperature measurement by being faster, smaller, and more

Four researchers pose standing in a lab, smiling and wearing safety glasses, surrouded by wires and other electronics.

NIST Demonstrates a New ‘Primary Standard’ for Measuring Ultralow Pressures

August 10, 2023

Chip manufacturing, gravitational wave detectors and quantum computers could all benefit from better ways to measure a vacuum.

Big Improvements in New Probe Design for Smokestack Emission Monitoring

July 31, 2023

Each year, to meet requirements set by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), coal-fired power plants must have their smokestack emissions audited by an

Two people wearing coveralls in a "clean room" lab look up at a disk-shaped object that one of them is holding.

Spotlight: Detecting the Inner Workings and Origins of Our Universe With NIST Researcher Tammy Lucas

July 20, 2023

NIST researcher Tammy Lucas is building tools to help astronomers and cosmologists look back in time to the earliest moments of our universe — and see what we

NIST researcher Jared Strait with a prototype hand-held KDFR

MEASURING UP: Kibble Dynamic Force Reference

July 18, 2023

Static force, such as the weight of a person standing motionless on a bathroom scale or the force that an office full of equipment exerts on a high-rise floor

New NIST Measurements Aim to Advance and Validate Portable MRI Technology

July 17, 2023

A new wave of smaller, less expensive MRI systems promises to expand the delivery of health care and the capabilities of medicine.

white matter mimic in the bottom half of the artificial cranium

Lessons from an Experimental Brain Phantom

July 12, 2023

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and colleagues have developed a novel, anatomically accurate reference model of the

Sam Oberdick and Gary Zabow pose for a picture, standing together with lab equipment in the background.

Spotlight: The Creative Minds Working Behind the Scenes on Agents of MRI Contrast

July 7, 2023

You might not recognize these two faces from such NIST social media hits as “microprinting with candy” and “molds for microparticles,” but they were behind that

Illustrated molecules, represented by red spheres and blue spheres connected by a white cylinder, fill a dark blue field. Alongside the molecules are electrons, represented by light blue spheres with directional arrows pointing through them.

Why Does Matter Exist? Roundness of Electrons May Hold Clues

July 6, 2023

JILA physicists make record-breaking measurement of a key electron property.

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