Re: 128 Orders of Magnitude

On Sat, 21 Jun 2025 05:59:29 -0000 (UTC), David Entwistle wrote:

On Fri, 20 Jun 2025 02:54:05 +0000, HenHanna wrote:
 

This is NOT a puzzle.  I'm posting here because I had (and still
have?)
friends in this newsgroup who might be inspired to somehow devise a
puzzle from some of the information in the following webpage:
      https://james.fabpedigree.com/yscaling.htm
It is a chart with three columns (the wavelength, energy, and
mass-equivalent of a photon) and 128 rows (for 128 orders of
magnitude).

 
Excellent information.
 
Have NPL'S website got quetta (Q) (10^30) wrong, or is that a language /
usage thing?
 
https://www.npl.co.uk/resources/the-si-units/si-prefix
 
All the BIMP references I've seen confirm quecca for 10^30.

In response to a request for clarification, I have received the following
information from the NPL, quoted without permission (I'm sure they won't
mind).

<start quote>

 Just wanted to follow up on your recent feedback submission to the NPL
website.
I can confirm that the terminology on our website is correct and that the
below are the official CGPM approved names/terminology for the new
prefixes:

    quetta (symbol Q) for 10^30 or 1 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000
000
    quecto (symbol q) for 10^−30 or 0.000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000
001

From your feedback form, you refer to quecca for 10^−30, which is where I
am assuming the potential confusion lies. This was part of an original
suggestion, which was then subsequently changed to quecto ahead of the
final CGPM vote, as 'quecca’ is quite close to a Portuguese profanity,
(which is best avoided when the language is spoken by 250 million
globally!)

For more information, please see our news story related to the expansion:
SI Prefix expansion - NPL

https://www.npl.co.uk/news/si-prefix-expansion

<end quote>

So, the formal SI prefix for 10^30 is quetta and not quecca.

The BIPM articles I'd been looking at were probably discussion documents
and outdated.

Best wishes,
--
David Entwistle