Physicists are quietly rewriting one of the most basic units in science, using a new generation of optical clocks that can keep time so precisely they barely lose a beat over the age of the universe.

The next generation of atomic clocks "ticks" with the frequency of a laser. This is about 100,000 times faster than the microwave frequencies of the cesium clocks which are generating the second at ...

The way time is measured is on the edge of a historic upgrade. At the heart of this change is a new kind of atomic clock that uses light instead of microwaves. This shift means timekeeping could ...

Optical lattice clocks are emerging timekeeping devices based on tens of thousands of ultracold atoms trapped in an optical lattice (i.e., a grid of laser light). By oscillating between two distinct ...

Atoms are the world’s most precise timekeepers – so much so that the second is defined as exactly 9 192 631 770 ticks of a caesium-based atomic clock. Commercially-available versions of these ...

WASHINGTON — In a new study, researchers carried out the most extensive coordinated comparison of optical clocks to date by operating clocks and the links connecting them simultaneously across six ...

We normally think of atomic clocks as the gold standard in timekeeping. The very definition of a second — in modern times, at least — is 9,192,631,770 periods of the radiation corresponding to the ...

You can check out the trailer for this clock here: This is a mechanical clock that weighs over 15 kilograms. It works by having a marble travel along the back of the device, with its weight moving the ...