Abstract Statistical estimates of thermal noise fluctuation of a linear harmonic oscillator used to detect weak forces are reexamined with special reference to gravitational experiments. Thermal noise limitation on the measurement of displacement of an oscillator is studied. It is found that the signal response of an oscillator reaches the maximum value while the thermal noise response reaches the minimum value at the same time during the transient state of the oscillator, and the precision of the experiments in the transient state could increase about two orders higher than that in the equilibrium state for typical experiments. It is also found that there is an optimum duration of measurement in which the uncertainty due to thermal noise in this period is the least.
Received: 09 June 1997
Accepted manuscript online:
(General theory of classical mechanics of discrete systems)
Fund: Project supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and the Fok Ying-tung Educational Foundation.
Cite this article:
HU ZHONG-KUN (胡忠坤), LUO JUN (罗俊) OPTIMUM DURATION OF MEASUREMENT FOR REDUCING THERMAL NOISE LIMITATIONS IN TORSION PENDULUM EXPERIMENTS 1998 Acta Physica Sinica (Overseas Edition) 7 81
Altmetric calculates a score based on the online attention an article receives. Each coloured thread in the circle represents a different type of online attention. The number in the centre is the Altmetric score. Social media and mainstream news media are the main sources that calculate the score. Reference managers such as Mendeley are also tracked but do not contribute to the score. Older articles often score higher because they have had more time to get noticed. To account for this, Altmetric has included the context data for other articles of a similar age.
