| 26 January |
The ATOMIC CLOCK RADIO and its History |
The ATOMIC CLOCK RADIO and its History
The idea of the ATOMIC CLOCK RADIO has been around since the mid 1950’s but wasn’t originally thought of for civilian use. It was originally a way for the military to synchronize all of its clocks to an infallible source. Despite what the name implies it is not powered by plutonium or anything radioactive at all. The atomic part of it refers to the method for keeping accurate time.
An ATOMIC CLOCK RADIO keeps its time by using an Atomic Resonance Frequency Standard. This is the most accurate standard to date for keeping time and is now used worldwide. The idea for using this method in order to measure time was first suggested in the late 1800’s. The technology to allow this theory to be put into practice was developed in the 1930’s and the first atomic clock was made in 1949.
However this was an early test model and wasn’t as accurate as quartz clocks of the time. But this first model served as the building block for the advances to come. Today our clocks have many more features than they did back in the 1950’s. The first notable difference is that most of them now use digital displays.
While an ATOMIC CLOCK RADIO can use both old fashioned hands and a digital display to show the time neither has an advantage over the other now. It is purely an aesthetic appeal and does not impact the performance of your unit. The alarm that is standard on all clocks has gone through some changes as well. A few clock radios may have old fashioned bell alarms installed in them but most use a speaker.
This speaker is tied into the ATOMIC CLOCK RADIO and is the same speaker that you listen to music on. You can either set it to play the sound of a bell, or turn on your favorite radio station at the appropriate time. In recent years radios have started to evolve farther than this. Some of them are built into other appliances in order to save on space and promote multiple functions.
Atomic clocks are also the foundation of GPS technology and without them the systems would not function. They are also integral to almost any part of our society that requires exact timing and regulation. Satellite based systems make the heaviest use of this due to the fact that their transmissions have to be timed perfectly. Of course if you want to look at something more down to earth you can examine factories and utility services.
Clocks have been a part of human history for a very long time. We depend on them now more than ever to help organize the chaos of our daily lives. Even though the technology may have changed the idea is still the same. As technology increases they will continue to get smaller, and able to handle even more functions.
So if you’re wondering how important your ATOMIC CLOCK RADIO is think of this. Without them people wouldn’t be getting out of bed for work, satellites wouldn’t function on time, and many of our systems would be less efficient. All of this was the result of simply wanting a faster accurate way to tell time.
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