As global warming proceeds a picokelvin at a time, what ever will
Watts' fans make of plans to redefine the whole bloody degree?
Cue indignation from the usual suspects.
Watts' fans make of plans to redefine the whole bloody degree?
Cue indignation from the usual suspects.
Advances in thermometry
The past 25 years have seen tremendous progress in thermometry across the moderate temperature range of 1 K to 1,235 K. Various primary thermometers, based on a wide range of different physics, have uncovered errors in the International Temperature Scale of 1990, and set the stage for the planned redefinition of the kelvin.
- Nature Physics
- 12,
- 7–11
- doi:10.1038/nphys3618
- Rather than fixing the scale at the triple point of water,
The International Committee for Weights & Measures
now recommends using the energy equivalent given by Boltzmann's equation .- Current definition:
- The kelvin, unit of thermodynamic temperature, is the fraction 1/273.16 of the thermodynamic temperature of the triple point of water.
- Proposed redefinition:
- The magnitude of the kelvin as the unit of thermodynamic temperature is to be set by fixing the numerical value of the Boltzmann constant to be equal to exactly 1.38065X×10−23 when it is expressed in the unit s−2·m2·kg·K−1, which is equal to J·K−1.
