[time-nuts] Rb Oscillator - rather fundamental question

Poul-Henning Kamp phk at phk.freebsd.dk
Tue Feb 23 09:52:58 UTC 2010


In message <4B83A33C.1010903 at smiffytech.com>, Matthew Smith writes:

>Simple and rather fundamental question: does the common or garden 
>rubidium oscillator constitute an atomic clock?

Yes.

It is classified as a "secondary" atomic clock, because it does not
have an intrinsic physical frequency, like the cesium standards,
but it is an atomic frequency, and it is an atomic clock (if you
attach a display or a pair of hands :-)


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Poul-Henning Kamp       | UNIX since Zilog Zeus 3.20
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