For many years, cesium atomic clocks have been reliably keeping time around the world. But the future belongs to even more accurate clocks: optical atomic clocks. In a few years' time, they could ...

The nucleus of an atom is now the modern version of sand flowing through an hourglass. Researchers have spent 15 years trying to increase accuracy in timekeeping. The U.S. standard currently relies on ...

Scientific clockmakers have crafted a prototype of a nuclear clock, hinting at future possibilities for using atomic nuclei to perform precise measurements of time and make new tests of fundamental ...

Every single day, humans rely on hundreds of hidden clocks. GPS location, Internet stability, stock trading, power grid management ... all rely on atomic clocks in order to work. Many of those clocks ...

For the first time, an international team of physicists has successfully harnessed a rare orbital transition in atoms of ytterbium to create a new type of atomic clock that is both highly precise and ...