A picosecond (abbreviated as ps) is a

unit of time A unit of time is any particular time interval, used as a standard way of measuring or expressing duration. The base unit of time in the International System of Units (SI), and by extension most of the Western world, is the second, defined as ...

in the

International System of Units The International System of Units, internationally known by the abbreviation SI (from French ), is the modern form of the metric system and the world's most widely used system of measurement. It is the only system of measurement with official s ...

(SI) equal to 10⁻¹² or (one trillionth) of a

second The second (symbol: s) is a unit of time derived from the division of the day first into 24 hours, then to 60 minutes, and finally to 60 seconds each (24 × 60 × 60 = 86400). The current and formal definition in the International System of U ...

. That is one trillionth, or one millionth of one millionth of a second, or 0.000 000 000 001 seconds. A picosecond is to one second, as one second is to approximately 31,688.76 years. Multiple technical approaches achieve imaging within single-digit picoseconds: for example, the streak camera or intensified CCD (ICCD) cameras are able to picture the motion of light. One picosecond is equal to 1000

femtosecond A femtosecond is a unit of time in the International System of Units (SI) equal to 10 or of a second; that is, one quadrillionth, or one millionth of one billionth, of a second. A femtosecond is to a second, as a second is to approximately 31.6 ...

s, or 1/1000

nanosecond A nanosecond (ns) is a unit of time in the International System of Units (SI) equal to one billionth of a second, that is, of a second, or seconds. The term combines the SI prefix ''nano-'' indicating a 1 billionth submultiple of an SI unit (e ...

s. Because the next SI unit is 1000 times larger, measurements of 10⁻¹¹ and 10⁻¹⁰ second are typically expressed as tens or hundreds of picoseconds. Some notable measurements in this range include: * 1.0 picoseconds (1.0 ps) – cycle time for electromagnetic frequency 1 terahertz (THz), an inverse unit. This corresponds to a wavelength of 0.3 mm, as can be calculated by multiplying 1 ps by the

speed of light The speed of light in vacuum, commonly denoted , is a universal physical constant exactly equal to ). It is exact because, by international agreement, a metre is defined as the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time i ...

(approximately 3 x 10⁸ m/s) to determine the distance traveled. 1 THz is in the

far infrared Far infrared (FIR) or long wave refers to a specific range within the infrared spectrum of electromagnetic radiation. It encompasses radiation with wavelengths ranging from 15 μm ( micrometers) to 1 mm, which corresponds to a freque ...

. * 1 picosecond – time taken by light in vacuum to travel approximately 0.30 mm * 1 picosecond – half-life of a

bottom quark The bottom quark, beauty quark, or b quark, is an elementary particle of the third generation. It is a heavy quark with a charge of − ''e''. All quarks are described in a similar way by electroweak interaction and quantum chromodynamic ...

* ~1 picosecond – lifetime of a single (

hydronium In chemistry, hydronium (hydroxonium in traditional British English) is the cation , also written as , the type of oxonium ion produced by protonation of water. It is often viewed as the positive ion present when an Arrhenius acid is dissolved ...

) ion in water at 20 °C * picoseconds to nanoseconds – phenomena observable by dielectric spectroscopy * 1.2 picoseconds – switching time of the world's fastest

transistor A transistor is a semiconductor device used to Electronic amplifier, amplify or electronic switch, switch electrical signals and electric power, power. It is one of the basic building blocks of modern electronics. It is composed of semicondu ...

(845 GHz, as of 2006) * 1.7 picoseconds – rotational correlation time of water * 3.3 picoseconds (approximately) – time taken for

light Light, visible light, or visible radiation is electromagnetic radiation that can be visual perception, perceived by the human eye. Visible light spans the visible spectrum and is usually defined as having wavelengths in the range of 400– ...

to travel 1

millimeter 330px, Different lengths as in respect of the electromagnetic spectrum, measured by the metre and its derived scales. The microwave is between 1 metre to 1 millimetre. The millimetre (American and British English spelling differences#-re, -er, i ...

* 10 picoseconds after the

Big Bang The Big Bang is a physical theory that describes how the universe expanded from an initial state of high density and temperature. Various cosmological models based on the Big Bang concept explain a broad range of phenomena, including th ...

–

electromagnetism In physics, electromagnetism is an interaction that occurs between particles with electric charge via electromagnetic fields. The electromagnetic force is one of the four fundamental forces of nature. It is the dominant force in the interacti ...

separates from the other

fundamental force In physics, the fundamental interactions or fundamental forces are interactions in nature that appear not to be reducible to more basic interactions. There are four fundamental interactions known to exist: * gravity * electromagnetism * weak int ...

s * 34 picoseconds – signal

rise time In electronics, when describing a voltage or current step function, rise time is the time taken by a signal to change from a specified low value to a specified high value. These values may be expressed as ratiosSee for example , and . or, equiva ...

(20% to 80%) of a SFP+ transmitter for

10 Gigabit Ethernet 10 Gigabit Ethernet (abbreviated 10GE, 10GbE, or 10 GigE) is a group of computer networking technologies for transmitting Ethernet frames at a rate of 10 gigabits per second. It was first defined by the IEEE 802.3ae-2002 standard. Unlik ...

. * 10 to 150 picoseconds – rotational correlation times of a molecule (184 g/mol) from hot to frozen water * 100 picoseconds –

Unit Interval In mathematics, the unit interval is the closed interval , that is, the set of all real numbers that are greater than or equal to 0 and less than or equal to 1. It is often denoted ' (capital letter ). In addition to its role in real analysi ...

of a 10 Gbit/s

serial communication In telecommunication and data transmission, serial communication is the process of sending data one bit at a time, sequentially, over a communication channel or computer bus. This is in contrast to parallel communication, where several bits a ...

link, such as USB 3.1. * 108.7827757 picoseconds – transition time between the two hyperfine levels of the ground state of the

caesium-133 Caesium (55Cs) has 41 known isotopes, ranging in mass number from 112 to 152. Only one isotope, 133Cs, is stable. The longest-lived radioisotopes are 135Cs with a half-life of 1.33 million years, with a half-life of 30.1671 years and 134Cs with ...

atom at

absolute zero Absolute zero is the lowest possible temperature, a state at which a system's internal energy, and in ideal cases entropy, reach their minimum values. The absolute zero is defined as 0 K on the Kelvin scale, equivalent to −273.15 ° ...

* 330 picoseconds (approximately) – the time it takes a common 3.0

GHz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), often described as being equivalent to one event (or Cycle per second, cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose formal expression in ter ...

computer CPU to complete a processing cycle

References

External links

National Institute for Standards and Technology Glossary
{{Orders of magnitude seconds Orders of magnitude (time) fr:1 E-12 s

See also

References

External links