Mass metrology

News and Updates

C-RMAP 2025: “That’s A Wrap!”

July 7, 2025

In early June, over 115 metrologists from state, county, and federal government laboratories gathered with manufacturing and industry laboratory metrologists in

Advanced Mass Metrology alumni (Class of 2023)

Advanced Mass Metrology Training with Guidance on the Kilogram Consensus Value

July 7, 2025

NIST OWM will welcome a full class of students to its Advanced Mass Metrology course at NIST’s Gaithersburg, Maryland campus at the end of this July. This nine

NIST unit conversion card ruler measures an autumn oak leaf

Classroom-Ready: NIST Releases Updated Metric Ruler and Conversion Card

July 7, 2025

The NIST Metric Program provides a wide range of educational materials to help students learn to apply the International System of Units (SI), commonly known as

Blog Posts

A researcher wearing a lab coat uses tongs to place a silvery sphere into a large scientific device as another researcher looks on.

One of the World’s Roundest Objects Is Helping to Build a Better Mass Measurement

Measurement in the Movies

A Scientific Christmas Tale

Events

Additive Construction The Path to Standardization III

Additive Construction – The Path to Standardization Continues III

Mon, Aug 18 - Wed, Aug 20 2025

The event, Additive Construction – The Path to Standardization Continues, will bring together industry and academic

Building a Path Forward for Meaningful Cannabis Breathalyzer Realization

Wed, Sep 24 - Thu, Sep 25 2025

We are bringing together participants from government, forensic laboratories, industry, academia, law enforcement

Projects and Programs

GadInk filled neutron transmission grating

Interferometry: INFER - Neutron Interferometric Microscopy of Small Forces and Hierarchical Structures

Ongoing

Multi-scale Images and Hierarchical Structures One of the keys identified by the 2015 DOE report, “Challenges at the Frontiers of Matter and Energy: Transformative Opportunities for Discovery Science” are methods that can study hierarchical systems. Such systems include the propagation of

Nanometrology: Composition and Structure of Nanomaterials

Ongoing

Pushing the Limits of Measurement Accuracy in Atom Probe Mass Spectrometry Nanoscale Analysis of Biological and Organic Materials Release from Nanocomposite Consumer Products

OWM Laboratory Metrology Training for mass metrology

OWM Training Program: Metrology, Metrication, and More!

Ongoing

OWM offers a variety of in-person, online, and "blended" training classes and materials that provide guidance instruction on national legal metrology standards, weights and measures field inspection procedures, and laws and regulations related to packaging and labeling. OWM provides technical

Precision Electro-Mechanical Experiments (PREME)

Ongoing

NIST-4 Kibble Balance Previously called ‘the Electronic Kilogram’ Project, a major component of PREME is the realization of SI unit of mass, the kilogram, using the NIST-4 Kibble balance, the fourth generation of Kibble balances at NIST. This is accomplished through a high-accuracy comparison of

Publications

NIST SP 1181 - Unit Pricing Guide - A Best Practice Approach to Unit Pricing (2025 Ed.)

July 9, 2025

Author(s)

John McGuire, David Sefcik, Katrice Lippa, Scott Dolan, Isabel Baucom

This guide was developed to provide retailers with information about the best practice requirements for the unit pricing of commodities. The guide consists of

Precision Control of Resistive Power in Kibble Balance Coils: An Advanced Method for Minimizing Temperature-Related Magnetic Errors

June 10, 2025

Author(s)

Weibo Liu, Shisong Li, Stephan Schlamminger

Temperature changes affect the coercivity of permanent magnets, thereby impacting the $Bl$ factor and potentially introducing systematic errors in Kibble

Thoughts on the Kibble-Robinson Theory

March 31, 2025

Author(s)

Lorenz Keck, Kumar Arumugam, Leon Chao, Zane Comden, Frank Seifert, David Newell, Darine El Haddad, Stephan Schlamminger

We revisit the Kibble-Robinson Theory (KRT), first proposed in 2014 by Kibble and Robinson, which significantly simplifies the construction and operation of

Flexures for Kibble balances: Minimizing the effects of anelastic relaxation

July 1, 2024

Author(s)

Lorenz Keck, Stephan Schlamminger, René Theska, Frank Seifert, Darine El Haddad

Modern weighing cells would not be possible without flexure technology. Flexures are thin metal strips that form pivots, and they can be engineered to bend in a