Recent Accuracy Measurement
In 1984 Pierre Boucheron studied the accuracy of a Shortt clock preserved at the US Naval Observatory. Using modern optical sensors which detected the precise time of passage of the pendulum without disturbing it, he compared its rate to an atomic clock for a month. He found that it was stable to 200 microseconds per day, equivalent to an error rate of one second in 12 years, far more accurate than the 1 second per year that was previously measured. His data revealed the clock was so sensitive it was detecting the slight changes in gravity due to tidal distortions in the solid Earth caused by the gravity of the Sun and Moon.
Read more about this topic: Shortt-Synchronome Clock
Famous quotes containing the words accuracy and/or measurement:
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—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)
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—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)