A new atomic clock is one of the world’s best timekeepers, researchers say — and after years of development, the “fountain”-style clock is now in use helping keep official U.S. time. Known as NIST-F4, ...

NIST scientists have published results establishing a new atomic clock, NIST-F4, as one of the world’s most accurate timekeepers, priming the clock to be recognized as a primary frequency standard — ...

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) U.S. has set a new world record for the most accurate aluminum ion-based optical atomic clock. This clock sets a new time-keeping benchmark, ...

A power outage on Dec. 19 at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) campus in Boulder, Colo., disrupted operation of the NIST-F4 atomic clock. Hurricane force winds and dry ...

BOULDER • Every second in a small laboratory room in Boulder, a green light flashes. Within the webs of yellow wire and shelves of computer systems, this green light represents the passage of time.

When a massive windstorm in Colorado last Wednesday indirectly disconnected more than a dozen atomic clocks from their system, it threw out the US official time standard. These touchstone atomic ...

The U.S. government calculates the country's official time using more than a dozen atomic clocks at a federal facility northwest of Denver. But when a destructive windstorm knocked out power to the ...

At this point, atomic clocks are old news. They’ve been quietly keeping our world on schedule for decades now, and have been through several iterations with each generation gaining more accuracy. They ...