NEW STANDARD TIME
FIRST ATOMIC CLOCK PRODUCED NEW YORK, Jan. 7. The National Bureau of Standards unveiled to-day an atomic clock ‘•more accurate than the stars.” The bureau said that the clock employed a new standard of frequency and time which would never vary as long as the universe existed. The standard was the vibration frequency of atoms —in this case, atoms of the ammonia molecule. The bureau claimed that the first model of the clock had an accuracy “better than one-part of 20,000,000.” The whole mechanism, including a spiral copper tube filled with ammonia gas, is mounted in two small cabinets. The bureau declared: “The clock promises to free man from the ageold methods of fixing time by the daily rotation of the earth on its axis: It is based on the principle developed by Harold Lyons, chief of the bureau’s microwave standards section.”
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Ashburton Guardian, Volume 69, Issue 75, 8 January 1949, Page 8
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145NEW STANDARD TIME Ashburton Guardian, Volume 69, Issue 75, 8 January 1949, Page 8
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