NIST Brings Mass Measurement to the Masses

Portable, accurate instrument for measuring mass delivered to U.S. Army

NIST engineer Kumar Arumugam examines the tabletop Kibble balance before its delivery to the U.S. Army. Photo: J. Lee/NIST

Bringing its cutting-edge invention to the larger world for the first time, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has delivered a portable and super accurate tabletop instrument for measuring mass to the U.S. Army. This could revolutionize critical measurements in a variety of applications, from weighing aircraft components to delivering exact doses of medicine.

NIST delivered the mass measurement instrument, known as a tabletop Kibble balance, to the U.S. Army’s Redstone Arsenal near Huntsville, Alabama, in early April 2024. This marks the first time in the United States that a tabletop Kibble balance has been put into use outside of NIST.

“This is the first Kibble balance that is out in the wild,” says Stephan Schlamminger, a NIST physicist. “The Army is a good early adopter of this technology because it has a measurement lab and trained staff. This is the best type of place to test these devices in the field.”

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Calibration of Mechanical Equipment

Would a piece of equipment like this need to be calibrated every year? If so, what is this calibrated against or in accordance to? At awscwi.com we need to have items calibrated in accordance with NIST and are looking for a more cost effective way to keep all of our instrumentation in current compliance.